unless algae oil producers come up with some story of ravenous water locust ate our crop and we have to bump up prices on existing cost of fuel my bet is on algae fuel

The oil companies will survive. Oil prices will drop as algae supply comes online and they will match it. We will never get off oil unless algae is cheaper than oil can be pumped.

And even if they should go out of business, pension funds will just invest in other stocks, perhaps these algae stocks. NO problem.

As for any offshore drilling or in Anwr,according to the US energy department, it will take until 2025 till we see any affect in the price from drilling off our shores and even then the price affect will only be .04-.05/gal. Big deal.

Let’s take an even more indepth look at oil. It is in no way a free market. Over half the oil in the world is subsidized to the consumers in oil producing and developing nations. What’s free market about that. What about a major cartel like Opec limiting production. Then we have the oil companies restricting supply by closing about 25 refineries over the past 10-15 years to increase margins. Check out Sen. Wydens report of his investigation into this matter. The oil companies 2 years ago in a hearing before the Senate Judiciary Committee also said they had no intention of building any new refineries. It’s not because communities don’t want it. Some do, especially in poor economic times with the need for jobs and high oil prices. It’s because it’s cheaper to build and run refineries in other countries. By the way, the products of those offshore refineries can be sold to anyone, not just us. Whomever it is more profitable for them to sell to.

We’re leaving some things out of this discussion. We can become completely energy independent with this fuel and have jobs that can’t be exported. It can be grown anywhere in the country. We can eliminate a major part of our trade deficit and help the value of the US $. We can cut of funding to terrorist organizations by switching to this fuel. We can impose a sustainable embargo against rogue nations like Iran forcing them to give up nuclear ambitions and their terrorist activities. Also something off point but interesting in how algae can become a another foreign policy tool but it seems Iran also harbors internet identity theives. By threatening their revenues with such an embargo we can force them to give these people up as well. We can spend much less militarily stabilizing the Middle East. Why would we even need to be in Iraq?

Amazing all the things algae can help us accomplish and help us in other areas. Aalcent and their partner Global Green solutions plan to come to market with this technology in 2010. I can’t wait.

I wouldn’t buy either of these stocks just yet but I’m definitely keeping my eye on both of them.

I believe you all are correct in many ways considering our current dilemma with energy consumption in America. I would like to make a couple of points that may provide some discussion. First of all, putting the oil companies out of business might impact you more than you care to know. The current percentage of ownership the major oil companies are pension plans, mutual funds, and private stockholders. Only a very small percentage of the companies stocks are held by the stuff shirt, black suit fat guys. (About 1.2%) Pensions and mutual funds make up, if memory serves me, around 78% with the balance held by folks like you and me. Secondly, the drive today in the price per barrel has several heads, an increase in world comsumption, speculation, and of course supply and demand. For years we have not really had much competition for oil and not many gave it a second thought. With the emerging markets (industrialization) in India, China, and other part of the world, oil has become a very important resource. In the end we will benefit by this bitter and painful transition to cleaning, efficient, and renewable fuels. At $140.00 a barrel, it will spur the wheels of change and innovation to a better world. My advice is to think smart, conserve, and support and administration that has a green thumb. The oil companies are. They are already changing to enthanol and biofuel.

Drilling in protected wildlife areas in Alaska will take years to see any results and Exxon and its Big Oil buddies don’t have Norway’s environmental record. Other problem, we have the oil industry writing our energy plan which a change in regime may change. Time to move in a different direction and take control of our energy policy by reducing consumption and creating alternative energy sources and technologies. Cheaper gasoline isn’t the answer, using less of it is.