Juan Enriquez :种植能源

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http://dotsub.com/view/abb50871-4dc7-43c3-89e5-0f8bb9c4ac6c
Juan Enriquez :种植能源
什么是生物能源？生物能源不是乙醇。 生物能源也不是全球变暖。生物能源 与很多人想象的东西不是一回事。生物能源 石油，是煤炭，是通向 未来的桥梁的一部分。在那个彼岸，我们终于能够 理性地看待我们的海洋，或者 建立这些地理空间轨道，让它们能高速旋转或者 小幅度地波动，这些都将取决于 我们如何理解并管理好生物能源。要做到这些， 你必须首先了解农业。
人类种植农作物的历史已经有11000年了。 在种植的过程中，我们学会了 如何对付害虫， 还要面对各种各样的麻烦， 培育出新的作物。了解到 如何用水来灌溉农田后， 你还要能够把尼罗河水抽取上来。 你需要有动力设备，才能实现灌溉 产量就会大不相同。
灌溉使你能够随心所欲地种植农作物， 而不是只能种在 河水能够流到的地方。你可以开展这种有机农业， 你开始使用机械设备进行生产。 机械化，结合大量的水， 使大规模的农业生产成为可能。 运用机械及水，得到了 现在这样一幅图景。然后这样的一些 产品就能够销售出去。这是巨大外力的作用。 这样一个发展农业的过程，是从 一个原本相当自然的体系起步， 最终去驯服这个自然体系。 你把很多外力施加于这个自然体系。 你使用了大量的杀虫剂和除草剂
（笑声）在这个自然系统中。 你最终把这个系统改造成这个样子。
这是在蛮干。这也是我们 取得能源的方式。应此 农业给我们带来的教训是，你可以 在使用大规模外力作用于一个体系的时候 融入这个体系，研究这个体系并将 生物学运用于其中。你从遵循 机械的原理，运用化学的原理，转为 遵循生物学的原则。 这个世界上最重要的人之一， 就是我身后的这个人。
他的名字叫Norman Borlaug。 他得到了诺贝尔奖。还获得了国会荣誉奖章。 这一切都是他应得的。 因为他的贡献是让更多的人吃饱饭。 对此他做出的贡献比任何其他人都大。 他把生物学理论用于育种。 他在墨西哥完成这项研究。这就是为什么 印度和中国不再有那么多人挨饿。 Norman Borlaug教他们如何用更高效的 方法种植粮食作物，掀起一场 绿色革命。很多人对此 持批评的态度。当然，那是因为，那些人 没有意识到，中国和印度 不仅不再挨饿， 并且在出口粮食。
具有讽刺意味的是，这个方法 在他进行这项研究的地方——墨西哥 这项技术没有得到应用，反而是被忽视。 有人认为这项技术还有欠考虑的地方， 而没有真正去应用它。 墨西哥仍旧是世界上最大的 谷物进口国，因为他们没有应用 在他们的国家发明的这项技术。 事实上，他们并不认同这个人， 墨西哥没有这个人的塑像。 而在中国和印度都有。 这个人设立的研究机构现在搬到了 印度。这就是谈论一项技术和应用 这项技术二者之间的区别。 现在，不仅仅是这个人的技术让世界上大量 的人有饭吃，而且，这示范了 科学技术所能起到的作用。如果 你懂得生物学的话。
农业发生了怎样的变化？如果你回头看 一个世纪以前的农业， 1900年的农业跟一千年前的 种植方法没有很大的区别。是的，看起来，犁的样子 有些不同。人们用上了拖拉机等机械 而不是骡子，但是农民们 知道，这仍是人在操作， 他还是要这么做，没什么太大的不同。 农业真正开始改变 始自从使用大规模的 机械和化学力量转为运用生物学。并且 从此生产力大大提高了。 自从你那么做以后，产量 这样的变化：
基本上，产量从每250个小时生产100蒲式耳， 变为40、15，甚至5个小时就可以生产这么多。农业劳动力 的生产效率提高了7倍，从1950年到2000年间， 其他的经济活动提高的程度是 2.5倍。这样的提高真是突飞猛进， 人均产出大大增加。 当然，这种效果，看上去 不仅是麦浪滚滚，而是堆积如山了。 结果是欧盟百分之五十的预算用于 对农业的补贴，补贴给人们生产出的这些粮食， 无疑已经是过度生产。
能源要是也有这样的局面就好了。 当然，听到这里，你也许会对自己说， “嘿，我想我是来听有关能源的演讲， 可是这家伙在这里大谈生物。” 那么，这两个事物间的联系是什么呢？ 整个体系中具有讽刺意味的一点是， 我们在讨论对一个我们所不了解的体系要做点什么。 我们甚至都不知道石油到底是什么。 我们不知道石油是从哪里来的。 事实上，这至今都是有争议的， 这流动着的黑色物质到底是什么，是从哪里 来的。最靠谱的假说和猜测， 这种物质来自于这些东西。 这些东西吸收 阳光，在压力的作用之下腐烂 经过了上百万年，变成了这黑色河流。
那么，这个理论有意思的地方在于， 如果这个理论是成立的，那么石油 以及所有的碳氢化合物，都是 浓缩的阳光。如果你再来看 生物能源，生物能源不是乙醇，生物能源是 来自于太阳，（太阳的能量）浓缩在变形虫中， 浓缩在植物里，可能那就是 为什么有这些彩虹（一般的东西）。 你在审视这个体系的时候，如果 碳氢化合物是浓缩的阳光， 生物能源是以不同的方式起作用的。我们必须 把石油和其他碳氢化合物看作是 太阳能板的一部分。 也许这就是其中的一个原因，当你飞过得克萨斯西部时， 看到那些油井的景象 似曾相识， 它们与堪萨斯的灌溉图景大同小异。
这就是如何“收获”石油的景象。当你想象 石油可以这样收获以及它们是如何演化来的，我们开始 使用采用这种大规模外力的做法。然后，我们 学到了什么呢？我们学到了必须更大规模地干。 然后又学到什么呢？那就是还要干的 更大。我们变得破坏性越来越大， 在以这种方式收获生物能源的过程中。 这是阿萨巴斯卡油砂田，油井 星罗棋布，第一步是开采， 世界上最大的卡车在这里工作。 然后人们把这些黑色泥沙拉走， 这些黑泥基本上就是不流动的石油。 因为石油跟泥沙结合在一起了。下一步就要用 大量的蒸气使它们分离，其成本之高 只有在现在的高油价下才有可能。
煤炭事实上是差不多同样的 东西。其来源也是植物，不同之处在于 这些植物曾被焚烧，再被高压压碎。 你就用这一类东西，经过燃烧，把它们置于 压力之下，多半不会得到这样的 东西。尽管这样，我一再强调：我们并不知道真相。 我们就这些事情进行辩论是出于好奇。 当你在考虑煤炭时，它们看起来跟燃烧过的 麦子很相似。这看起来跟煤炭没有太大差别。
当然，开采煤炭是非常危险的事情， 因为在一些煤矿里，你会 发现有毒气体。当这些气体爆炸时，是会死人的。 这些生物气体（比如沼气）存在于有些 煤矿，另外一些煤矿则没有。 每个地方都有些不同之处，有些问题 很有意思。有的问题诸如 你应该如何对待这些东西。但是 仍以煤炭为例，它们可能是同样的东西，可能 是生成与同样的体系，可能就是生物能源，你都在运用 相同的技术。
这就是施加大规模外力的方法。一旦你能够 成功地使用这种方法，结果是 整个山头被夷平。最终是 造成最大单一来源的碳排放， 即燃煤燃气发电厂。这也许 并不是对生物能源的最好的利用。 当你试图发现还有什么更好的选择， 找到一种替代性的方法是很重要的， 因为人们意识到美国的 石油储备在不断减少，但是 煤炭的储备并未减少，中国也是如此。 煤炭的储备量非常之大， 我们应该开始考虑把煤炭看作 生物能源，因为如果我们继续视其为 化学能源，或机械能源，我们 会陷入大麻烦。
天然气也是类似的。天然气也是一种 生物产品。当你想到天然气时， 你会觉得很熟悉。开采天然气的方法 是不同于采煤的。 这种气体称为煤层甲烷气。为什么 这个画面很有趣？因为如果煤炭真的是 浓缩的植物体，那么你在 不同的煤矿发现有不同的气体 有的煤矿会爆炸 而有的又不会，可能都是因为 有些东西吃掉了另一些东西而产生气体。 这是一个广为人知的现象（大笑）。你 吃了某种东西后，会产生很多气体。 那可能也是在生物进程中煤矿中发生的 类似过程。如果这是真的， 那么从煤炭中获取能源的方法 就可以不必夷平整个山头， 也可能不必燃烧煤炭。也许可以对 煤炭进行某种生物处理，就像在 农业中所做的那样。
这才是生物能源的含义。而不是什么乙醇。 并不是说要补贴几个公司，也不是 进口玉米到爱荷华州，去喂饱那些已经建起来的 乙醇工厂。而是要开始 去理解发生在农业中的转变。 从大规模外力的模式转为使用生物力量。 在这么做的过程中， 你可以使很多东西变得清洁， 很快就可以做到。 我们在这方面已经有了一些生产力的指标。 如果你将蒸气打入煤矿 或者油田，它们已经被开发了 几十年，你可以获得明显的 增产，比如产量增加8倍。 这还只是最开始的 步骤。
在你考虑生物材料时，这个人， 就是他完成了对人类基因组测序的一部分工作， 因为他的工作，基因和蛋白质数据库的数据量 倍增，他为此走遍了全世界， 他也在考虑你将如何构建这个体系。 还有很多高人 在考虑这个问题。他们走到一起 成立了像Synthetic Genomics这样的公司， 还有Cambria、Condon等公司，这些公司 都在试图发现，你如何能够运用 生物学原则来避免使用大规模的外力？ 请用以下的理念去考虑问题。把这事想象成 为了某种特殊目的开始一项计划。 把细胞想象成硬件。把 基因想象成软件。在你以这种方式 去想象生命的代码 是可以互换的，可以变成能源，也可以 变成食物，还可以变成纤维，还可以 变成人，可以变成一系列的 各种东西。然后你必须转换 你的思维方法，去构思和设想 能源问题，从一个完全不同于以往的 角度。
什么是有关这些东西的最重要的原则？ 我们应向何处去？这是这个星球上最温顺的 庞然大物。他是你所见过的人里面 最好的人。他的名字叫汉密尔顿-史密斯。 他因发明如何切分基因而获得诺贝尔奖。 这种基因称为限制性内切酶。 他当时在霍普金斯，他是如此 谦虚的一个人，在他获奖的那天，他的母亲 问他说：“我不知道在霍普金斯还有另外一个 Ham Smith。你知道他刚刚获得了 诺贝尔奖么？”（大笑）我的意思是，这就是母亲。 不过，他本人也正是这样的。你会发现 他每天都在工作台那里，在用 吸液管构建一些东西。他做的事情之一 就是制造了这些东西。
这是什么？这是第一次移植的 经过剥离的DNA，你从细胞里提取了整个DNA的 运行体系，注入到不同的 细胞，再把那个细胞培育成另一个 物种。这个细胞已经生存了1个月。下个月你将看到 很重要的东西， 象这个一样重要。 当你设想这个东西会给我们带来的 影响的时候，我们正在开始的一种转化， 不是那种享有很高的补贴的，将玉米转化为乙醇 的过程，我们正在开始考虑把 生物学用在能源方面。这种转化过程 代价很高，不论从经济的角度看，还是从 能源的角度来说。
这是一种积聚在阿尔伯塔的油砂中的物质， 大堆大堆的硫磺。因为我们在从油砂中 分离石油的时候，要使用 大量的能源进行蒸馏， 用蒸汽分离这些物质——你同时会分离出 硫磺来。轻质原油与重质原油的差别在于， 它们的价格每桶相差14美元。 这就是为什么你会看到这些堆的象金字塔 般的硫磺。并且，这些东西的 规模相当大。
现在，如果你能够把做这部分工作消耗的能源 减少的话，你就简化了整个体系，并且 开始运用生物学原则于 能源的生产。这将是联系各种新能源的桥梁， 诸如风能的利用，太阳能的利用， 以及核能的利用，等等。 希望你今后就不需要在风光秀美的海边， 在地震断层的附近建设新的核电厂。
（大笑）这还仅仅是个设想。
与此同时，至少在今后的几十年里， 唱主角的都是碳氢化合物。可以是 石油，可以是天然气，可以是煤炭，都是我们的 研究对象。我不想把这个演讲拖得 太长，这里介绍一下目前的 能源体系的发展。 我们消耗的能源的百分之八十六 是碳氢化合物。这意味着我们消耗物质的百分之八十六 是植物、变形虫和其他这类物质 演化而来的。那么这里就有一个 环境保护的角色。还有一个 可替代物质的角色，同时我们必须 把其余的部分也做好。 我们如何对待其余的那个比例是 我们通向未来的桥梁。当我们把这看作是通向未来的 桥梁时，有一件事必须认真思考： 现在我们把大约三分之二的石油留在 那些油井中。这样我们花费巨大的 开支，把大部分的能源留在 地下。当然，这样做需要更多的能源 去获取其他能源。这个比值会变得 很愚蠢，如果你取得的是乙醇的话。 那样做，产出的能源与消耗的能源之比 几乎就是一比一。这是在用一种很傻的做法 管理这个体系。
最后一点，最后一张图表，我们必须做的 事情之一是稳定石油价格。 这就是石油价格的走势，对不对？ 这是一个很糟糕的体系，因为你的 最低资本预期回收率设置的很低。人们想出了 很好的太阳能板的设计，或者是利用 风能或其他（新能源）的方式，猜猜会怎么样？ 石油价格跌破了最低点。那些公司 只好破产，然后石油价格又 重新上涨了。
因此，我最后要提出一个温和的建议， 让我们在欧洲和美国设定一个稳定的 石油价格。怎么能做到呢？那么，我们可以在 油价上加一项税——非收入税， 基本理念是说在最近的20年中，石油价格 将是——随便假设一个数字，35美元也好， 40美元也罢。如果欧佩克的油价低于这个价格，我们 就开征这项税。如果油价高于这个价格，这项税 就取消。 这样做对企业家有什么好处呢？对公司企业 有什么好处呢？这可以告诉人们，如果你能以 低于35美元或40美元的价格生产能源， 或低于50美元一桶的价格生产能源， 我们可以竞争——你就能赢得生意。 我们不能让人们进入这样 一种循环，（由于油价的波动）企业付不出研发费用 而破产，这就等于让欧佩克操纵了石油替代品的研发 使生物能源无法取得成功。
谢谢。


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Juan Enriquez wants to grow energy
What is bioenergy? Bioenergy is not ethanol. Bioenergy isn't global warming. Bioenergy is something which seems counterintuitive. Bioenergy is oil. It's gas. It's coal. And part of building that bridge to the future, to the point where we can actually see the oceans in a rational way, or put up these geo-spatial orbits that will twirl or do microwaves or stuff, is going to depend on how we understand bioenergy and manage it. And to do that, you really have to look first at agriculture.

So we've been planting stuff for 11,000 years. And in the measure that we plant stuff, what we learn from agriculture is you've got to deal with pests, you've got to deal with all types of awful things, you've got to cultivate stuff. In the measure that you learn how to use water to cultivate, then you're going to be able to spread beyond the Nile. You're gonna be able to power stuff, so irrigation makes a difference.

Irrigation starts to make you be allowed to plant stuff where you want it, as opposed to where the rivers flood. You start getting this organic agriculture, you start putting machinery onto this stuff. Machinery, with a whole bunch of water, leads to very large-scale agriculture. You put together machines and water, and you get landscapes that look like this. And then you get sales that look like this. It's brute force. So what you've been doing in agriculture is you start out with something that's a reasonably natural system. You start taming that natural system. You put a lot of force behind that natural system. You put a whole bunch of pesticides and herbicides -- (Laughter) -- behind that natural system, and you end up with systems that look like this.

And it's all brute force. And that's the way we've been approaching energy. So the lesson in agriculture is that you can actually change the system that's based on brute force as you start merging that system, and learning that system and actually applying biology. And you move from a discipline of engineering, you move from a discipline of chemistry, into a discipline of biology. And probably one of the most important human beings on the planet is this guy behind me.

This is a guy called Norman Borlaug. He won the Nobel Prize. He's got the Congressional Medal of Honor. He deserves all of this stuff. And he deserves this stuff because he probably has fed more people than any other human being alive because he researched how to put biology behind seeds. He did this in Mexico. The reason why India and China no longer have these massive famines is because Norman Borlaug taught them how to grow grains in a more efficient way and launched the Green Revolution. That is something that a lot of people have criticized. But of course, those are people who don't realize that China and India, instead of having huge amounts of starving people, are exporting grains.

And the irony of this particular system is the place where he did the research, which was Mexico, didn't adopt this technology, ignored this technology, talked about why this technology should be thought about, but not really applied. And Mexico remains one of the largest grain importers on the planet because it doesn't apply technology that was discovered in Mexico. And in fact, hasn't recognized this man, to the point where there aren't statues of this man all over Mexico. There are in China and India. And the institute that this guy ran has now moved to India. That is the difference between adopting technologies and discussing technologies. Now, it's not just that this guy fed a huge amount of people in the world. It's that this is the net effect in terms of what technology does, if you understand biology.

What happened in agriculture? Well, if you take agriculture over a century, agriculture in about 1900 would have been recognizable to somebody planting a thousand years earlier. Yeah, the plows look different. The machines were tractors or stuff instead of mules, but the farmer would have understood, this is what the guy's doing, this is why he's doing it, this is where he's going. What really started to change in agriculture is when you started moving from this brute force engineering and chemistry into biology. And that's where you get your productivity increases. And as you do that stuff, here's what happens to productivity.

Basically, you go from 250 hours to produce 100 bushels, to 40, to 15, to five. Agricultural labor productivity increased seven times, 1950 to 2000, whereas the rest of the economy increased about 2.5 times. This is an absolutely massive increase in how much is produced per person. The effect of this, of course, is it's not just amber waves of grain, it is mountains of stuff. And 50 percent of the EU budget is going to subsidize agriculture from mountains of stuff that people have overproduced.

This would be a good outcome for energy. And of course, by now, you're probably saying to yourself, "Self, I thought I came to a talk about energy and here's this guy talking about biology." So where's the link between these two things? One of the ironies of this whole system is we're discussing what to do about a system that we don't understand. We don't even know what oil is. We don't know where oil comes from. I mean, literally, it's still a source of debate what this black river of stuff is and where it comes from. The best assumption, and one of the best guesses in this stuff, is that this stuff comes out of this stuff. That these things absorb sunlight, rot under pressure for millions of years, and you get these black rivers.

Now, the interesting thing about that thesis -- if that thesis turns out to be true -- is that oil, and all hydrocarbons, turned out to be concentrated sunlight. And if you think of bioenergy, bioenergy isn't ethanol. Bioenergy is taking the sun, concentrating it in amoebas, concentrating it in plants, and maybe that's why you get these rainbows. And as you're looking at this system, if hydrocarbons are concentrated sunlight, then bioenergy works in a different way. And we've got to start thinking of oil and other hydrocarbons as part of these solar panels. Maybe that's one of the reasons why if you fly over west Texas, the types of wells that you're beginning to see don't look unlike those pictures of Kansas and those irrigated plots.

This is how you farm oil. And as you think of farming oil and how oil has evolved, we started with this brute force approach. And then what did we learn? Then we learned we had to go bigger. And then what'd we learn? Then we have to go even bigger. And we are getting really destructive as we're going out and farming this bioenergy. These are the Athabasca tar sands, and there's an enormous amount -- first of mining, the largest trucks in the world are working here, and then you've got to pull out this black sludge, which is basically oil that doesn't flow. It's tied to the sand. And then you've got to use a lot of steam to separate it, which only works at today's oil prices.

Coal. Coal turns out to be virtually the same stuff. It is probably plants, except that these have been burned and crushed under pressure. So you take something like this, you burn it, you put it under pressure, and likely as not, you get this. Although, again, I stress: we don't know. Which is curious as we debate all this stuff. But as you think of coal, this is what burned wheat kernels look like. Not entirely unlike coal.

And of course, coal mines are very dangerous places, because in some of these coal mines, you get gas. When that gas blows up, people die. So you're producing a biogas out of coal in some mines, but not in others. Any place you see a differential, there're some interesting questions. There's some questions as to what you should be doing with this stuff. But again, coal. Maybe the same stuff, maybe the same system, maybe bioenergy, and you're applying exactly the same technology.

Here's your brute force approach. Once you get through your brute force approach, then you just rip off whole mountaintops. And you end up with the single largest source of carbon emissions, which are coal-fired gas plants. That is probably not the best use of bioenergy. As you think of what are the alternatives to this system -- it's important to find alternatives, because it turns out that the U.S. is dwindling in its petroleum reserves, but it is not dwindling in its coal reserves, nor is China. There are huge coal reserves that are sitting out there, and we've got to start thinking of them as biological energy, because if we keep treating them as chemical energy, or engineering energy, we're gonna be in deep doo-doo.

Gas is a similar issue. Gas is also a biological product. And as you think of gas, well, you're familiar with gas. And here's a different way of mining coal. This is called coal bed methane. Why is this picture interesting? Because if coal turns out to be concentrated plant life, the reason why you may get a differential in gas output between one mine and another -- the reason why one mine may blow up and another one may not blow up -- may be because there's stuff eating that stuff and producing gas. This is a well-known phenomenon. (Laughter) You eat certain things, you produce a lot of gas. It may turn out that biological processes in coal mines have the same process. If that is true, then one of the ways of getting the energy out of coal may not be to rip whole mountaintops off, and it may not be to burn coal. It may be to have stuff process that coal in a biological fashion as you did in agriculture.

That is what bioenergy is. It is not ethanol. It is not subsidies to a few companies. It is not importing corn into Iowa because you've built so many of these ethanol plants. It is beginning to understand the transition that occurred in agriculture, from brute force into biological force. And in the measure that you can do that, you can clean some stuff, and you can clean it pretty quickly. We already have some indicators of productivity on this stuff. OK, if you put steam into coal fields or petroleum fields that have been running for decades, you can get a really substantial increase, like an eight-fold increase, in your output. This is just the beginning stages of this stuff.

And as you think of biomaterials, this guy -- who did part of the sequencing of the human genome, who just doubled the databases of genes and proteins known on earth by sailing around the world -- has been thinking about how you structure this. And there's a series of smart people thinking about this. And they've been putting together companies like Synthetic Genomics, like, a Cambria, like Codon, and what those companies are trying to do is to think of, how do you apply biological principles to avoid brute force? Think of it in the following terms. Think of it as beginning to program stuff for specific purposes. Think of the cell as a hardware. Think of the genes as a software. And in the measure that you begin to think of life as code that is interchangeable, that can become energy, that can become food, that can become fiber, that can become human beings, that can become a whole series of things. Then you've got to shift your approach as to how you're going to structure and deal and think about energy in a very different way.

What are the first principles of this stuff and where are we heading? This is one of the gentle giants on the planet. He's one of the nicest human beings you've ever met. His name is Hamilton Smith. He won the Nobel for figuring out how to cut genes -- something called restriction enzymes. He was at Hopkins when he did this, and he's such a modest guy that the day he won, his mother called him and said, "I didn't realize there was another Ham Smith at Hopkins. Do you know he just won the Nobel?" (Laughter) I mean, that was mom. But anyway. This guy is just a class act. You find him at the bench every single day, working on a pipette and building stuff. And one of the things this guy just built are these things.

What is this? This is the first transplant of naked DNA, where you take an entire DNA operating system out of one cell, insert it into a different cell, and have that cell boot up as a separate species. That's one month old. You will see stuff in the next month that will be just as important as this stuff. And as you think about this stuff and what the implications of this are, we're going to start not just converting ethanol from corn with very high subsidies. We're going to start thinking about biology entering energy. It is very expensive to process this stuff, both in economic terms and in energy terms.

This is what accumulates in the tar sands of Alberta. These are sulfur blocks. Because as you separate that petroleum from the sand, and use an enormous amount of energy inside that vapor -- steam to separate this stuff -- you also have to separate out the sulfur. The difference between light crude and heavy crude -- well, it's about 14 bucks a barrel. That's why you're building these pyramids of sulfur blocks. And by the way, the scale on these things is pretty large.

Now, if you can take part of the energy content out of doing this, you reduce the system, and you really do start applying biological principles to energy. This has to be a bridge to the point where you can get to wind, to the point where you can get to solar, to the point where you can get to nuclear -- and hopefully you won't build the next nuclear plant on a beautiful seashore next to an earthquake fault. (Laughter) Just a thought.

But in the meantime, for the next decade at least, the name of the game is hydrocarbons. And be that oil, be that gas, be that coal, this is what we're dealing with. And before I make this talk too long, here's what's happening in the current energy system. 86 percent of the energy we consume are hydrocarbons. That means 86 percent of the stuff we're consuming are probably processed plants and amoebas and the rest of the stuff. And there's a role in here for conservation. There's a role in here for alternative stuff, but we've also got to get that other portion right. How we deal with that other portion is our bridge to the future. And as we think of this bridge to the future, one of the things you should ponder is: we are leaving about two-thirds of the oil today inside those wells. So we're spending an enormous amount of money and leaving most of the energy down there. Which, of course, requires more energy to go out and get energy. The ratios become idiotic by the time you get to ethanol. It may even be a one-to-one ratio on the energy input and the energy output. That is a stupid way of managing this system.

Last point, last graph. One of the things that we've got to do is to stabilize oil prices. This is what oil prices look like. OK? This is a very bad system because what happens is your hurdle rate gets set very low. People come up with really smart ideas for solar panels, or for wind, or for something else, and then guess what? The oil price goes through the floor. That company goes out of business, and then you can bring the oil price back up.

So if I had one closing and modest suggestion, let's set a stable oil price in Europe and the United States. How do you do that? Well, let's put a tax on oil that is a non-revenue tax, and it basically says for the next 20 years, the price of oil will be -- whatever you want, 35 bucks, 40 bucks. If the OPEC price falls below that, we tax it. If the OPEC price goes above that, the tax goes away. What does that do for entrepreneurs? What does it do for companies? It tells people, if you can produce energy for less than 35 bucks a barrel, or less than 40 bucks a barrel, or less than 50 bucks a barrel -- let's debate it -- you will have a business. But let's not put people through this cycle where it doesn't pay to research because your company will go out of business as OPEC drives alternatives and keeps bioenergy from happening. Thank you.