None other than Willie Nelson is getting into the biodiesel game. Behold BioWillie!
I was thinking.. Part of the biodiesel/ethanol movement is about "reducing our dependence on foreign oil". But is that necessarily a good thing? I mean, it sounds to me like, "If we don't use their oil, then we can just happily ignore them and all will be well." The Middle East is screwed up enough as it is... Now imagine if we take away their primary source of income. Yes, that might mean less money for state-funded terrorism, etc., but I'm sure there's at least some trickle-down effect, and so won't the people there get even poorer? And then what?
It reminds me of the part in Syriana where Will Hunting complains that oil countries waste away all their money on luxuries instead of improving their infrastructure, and Dr. Bashir retorts that, every time someone does try to improve infrastructure there, the US actively tries to disrupt it, presumably because weaker countries are easier to control. (Ha!) Anyway, I find the idea of reducing dependence on foreign oil scary in its own way.
In related news (from a few months ago), here's a list of gas prices in other countries. I think this list was published when prices in the Bay Area were just under $3. (They're back down to just over $2 now.) At the top of the list is Amsterdam, at $6.48/gal. London was $5.79/gal. The cheapest? Venezuela at 12 cents/gal. (!)
And now for your postly image. Low-income housing in Ixtapaluca, Mexico:
The pictures are originally from this helicopter pilot's page.
