There are plenty of methods for producing algae without taking up massive acreage. Algae can be grown in large verticle greenhouses and take up far less land. And be grown on any land for that matter. So while this initial approach will not scale to meet the worlds demands it is an interesting small scale test. And yes the algae requires refining but from what ive read the refining is very simple.

But with your father being the "CEO of one of the largest refiners in the US" i can understand your scepticism and criticism of an alternative to oil

But as for algae, why turn it into ethanol. Whynot just turn it into biodiesel which is more energy dense and seems to be easier to produce.

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I'd think a great oil man like you would be able to figure this out fairly quickly...

Let's assume they have to buy their plastic from Home Depot, easily a conservative estimate on cost. At 4.45 cents per square foot, an Acre (43,560 sf) of 6 mil polyethylene would only cost $1,938.42. Now, they'll need about 3.14 times that much if they want tubes, making the plastic cost $5,815. Someone would have to spend a week rolling this out and filling them up, add $2,000 = $7,815 installed. If they can harvest $12,000 of fuel from this acre of desert, I'd say they're doing pretty good (54% ROI). Even when you add in the pipeline to the refinery and the cost to extract the ethanol this is a money maker. If they get to $1/gal unsubsidized your dad may be refining ethanol.

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"Algae can be grown in large verticle greenhouses and take up far less land."

But no less plastic. Seriously, why do you think hydroponic food costs so much?

Nor, BTW, do vertical greenhouses actually get you any more per unit acre shaded. They get you more per unit acre *that you sit on*, but they do that by shading land that you're not sitting on.

"But with your father being the "CEO of one of the largest refiners in the US" i can understand your scepticism and criticism of an alternative to oil"

Ah, gotta love stereotypes. FYI, I'm going to be one of the earliest owners of an Aptera 2e. Financed through my father.

"Let's assume they have to buy their plastic from Home Depot, easily a conservative estimate on cost. At 4.45 cents per square foot, an Acre (43,560 sf) of 6 mil polyethylene would only cost $1,938.42"

Sorry, but not even close, for three huge reasons.

1) Polyethylene thin film is not sufficient strength for containing large volumes of water.
2) Polyethylene thin film lasts under a year before UV degradation makes it brittle and it falls apart (as well as partly opaque).
3) Polyethylene thin film cannot withstand the elements for any significant length of time.

I know this stuff because I used to build greenhouses. Shock of shocks, I actually have a background in this field. I once built a "home depot" greenhouse glazing. It was in pieces by the next year.

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Ofcourse an oil refinery can produce abundantly, quickly, but not efficiently. And when the supply is used up?

It is actually YOUR comparison that falls short. And I SHOULD know, I worked as a researcher for 'finding the oil', and it is just there that the oil industry commits a mass majority of their resources and energy. The bottom line is, hitting 'pay dirt', with all our technology is still threading the needle. Once hit, the average well is less than 10 years. The number of hits is less than 1 and 100 tries. I think it may be much more. And that's fine for the oil industry, their mentality is that this economy is self sustaining for oil and it will never fall short of large margins profit wise. It's a brutist mentality.

And the simple fact is, in 50 years, oil will turn the way of the dinorsaurs. It served its purpose well no doubt, as if meant to be, but we are going to see it the well dry up in the next 2 generations, that is a fact. That is why 'big oil' likes to promote alternate energy, and show a warm kind side to sidle up to the environmentalist, as if to show a noble cause I guess.

But come on, it's a industry like any other. It shouldn't apologize for that. But it is going to be the independent companies that find the alternatives.

But the simple point to make, and where your fallacy lies, is that producing mass quantities in short time is only the tip of the iceberg. And it is a short stick to measure.
These alternatives are long term. Their development? Is just that, still in development. But that will change and evolve. They are self sufficient. They show the stability that big oil lacks. And by many agencies, they are considered the work horse solution.

And with that evolution in technology will come greater returns over time. That is simply science at work. No different than the oil industry experiences in R&D.

Oh, and I too am going to be the proud owner of the first line of Aptera2e? I am, but I don't think of it as an alternative. It really isn't. But it is cool.

I also drive an old 1965 ford pick up with modified diesel engine to run on bacon fat. Well not really, but it has been done successfully.

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Have I ever seen an oil refinery? Um, yeah. My father is the CEO of one of the largest refiners in the US. On an acre to acre comparison, their Port Arthur refinery, to pick one, produces the 6,000 gallons of fuel that this facility produces per acre year every nine hours. And most of that used space in the refinery is pipelines and storage tanks. *And*, algae needs to be refined into fuel, too. Completely ridiculous comparison on your part.

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