San Francisco Magazine - 2007
http://www.sanfran.com/home/view_story/1838/
Are we backing the right fix for global warming?
Jaimal Yogis is a San Francisco contributing writer.
[Following interview with biologist Jay Keasling, UC Berkeley]
Page 1
"If last year for Keasling was all about saving the Third World, this year has been about saving the entire world. He is now employing his skills to develop what he calls next-generation biofuels, petroleum-like liquids derived from the cellulose inside plants. He believes such fuels, unlike corn ethanol, the biofuel that is becoming a controversial staple of the U.S. energy industry, will be key to bailing the earth out of its global warming mess. Although Keaslings biofuels are still in the experimental phase, an astonishing amount of money is being bet on them- and him. Swept up in the green-tech boom that is transforming Silicon Valley and academia, Keaslings company has raised tens of millions in venture funding. He is set to head up a new $125 million biofuel lab at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, funded by the Department of Energy (DOE), and he is one of the key figures behind the $500 million grant, announced in February, from the worlds third-largest oil company, BP, to UC Berkeley. The biggest such award ever made to a university, the corporate grant will fund a new energy lab with equal parts hope and expectation riding on it. Berkeley Lab chief Steven Chu, a Nobel Prize-winning physicist, has compared it to the Manhattan Project, the 
World War II era effort to create the atom bomb.
World War II era effort to create the atom bomb. "When the extraordinary news came out that UC Berkeley would receive half a billion dollars for bioenergy research from BP- an oil company desperate to ensure its future in a greening world- the groans could be heard across the land. Why was the worlds leading public university trying to fix global warming by getting in bed with an oil company that helped create the disaster in the first place?"
Page 2
"As for the fear that wind energy is hard to store? Hogwash, says Jacobson. Electric cars can stockpile energy in their batteries and pump it back to the grid when necessary. Nor is he swayed by the argument that it may simply be too hard to build the turbines and transmission system required to make all this work. Harnessing the power of wind, and even converting to electric vehicles, is not nearly as challenging as trying to make a safe and efficient cellulosic biofuel, he responds. The real reason we are not investing as much in wind is that research dollars usually follow the biggest lobbies, and the oil and farm lobbies want biofuels to be the answer. After all, the oil companies have the infrastructure for liquid fuels, and what farmer would not be excited about essentially growing oil?"
"Still, even if research reveals prohibitive social and environmental impacts of biofuel development, everyone knows it will not be easy to derail it. Many also believe better alternatives will get short shrift in the deal. Every dollar spent on an ineffective solution to global warming is one less dollar spent on a better solution, says Mark Jacobson, an environmental engineer at Stanford who champions wind- and solar-powered electric cars. "What BP is doing is just crazy. We have technology now that could address this problem."
Page 3
"Only time will tell if next-generation biofuels will be remembered as a savior, an overhyped concept, or a source of pollution tacked onto a long list of other bad options. But one thing seems clear: the potential negatives of a biofuels economy, alongside the alternatives that bio-fuels may eclipse, should ensure that UC, the public, and the media keep vigilant tabs to ensure that the research coming out of the UC/BP lab actually greens the planet- not just the pocketbooks of the major players. If biofuels go the way of DDT or leaded gasoline, Berkeley could well end up on the wrong side of history. For now, all the players seem well intentioned. But as the labs ethics overseer, Dean Kammen, tells me, "The risks are large, and greed is a real problem."
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Comments: 4
The original article was chopped up a bit.
One thing I found interesting is that
"Keasling is a synthetic biologist, a scientist who combines molecular biology, genetic engineering, and chemistry. "My specialty," Keasling tells me, "is manipulating the chemistry inside a cell."
Keasling is of the profession that brought us (widely seen as evil by environmentalists) G.M. foods.
Please use the link I provided for the full story at the top of the page:
http://www.sanfran.com/home/view_story/1838/