I like the way you politely stated that Stevo ... "stepping stone." I personally think that we are probably on the road toward some sort of hydrogen fuel source but also see it a long way away. I recall the ol' World Fairs predicting we would all be driving flying cars we moved into the next century but most experts do not see us even close to that today. I've kind of got this feeling that we are not jumping to Hydrogen all that quickly.

Biodiesel (or any biologically derived renewable fuel) is something that is so unbelievably do-able that it screams to be part of our energy solution for at least this century. Trucks, trains, ships and heavy equipment will not be quickly converted to a hydrogen fuel cell (or whatever) and certainly the infrastructure that supports hydrogen is nowhere close to being built. The beauty of most bio-fuels is that they can be blended with petroleum and at the same time provide cleaner emissions. This alone is a great matchup as it doesn't totally displace the petroleum industry, yet offers opportunity to slowly develop the proper oilseed crops (perhaps algae) and productions facilities needed to supply our thirst for portable energy.

Its easy to 'think' about switching to the future energy sources ... but probably more appropriate to 'grow' (pun intended) slowly into cleaner renewable alternatives; biodiesel and ethanol are two of them. (personally biodiesel makes the most sense to me as it is more efficient and can be used in heavy equipment which will most likely be the last to convert to hydrogen fuel cells)

--RichC --- "My Desultory Blog" & CinciTDI Club