A problem with sawgrass?

Ethanol bashers among you (and you know you are) have smugly suggested we switch to some fast-growning reed or wild grass to harvest into a biofuel rather than corn, which has skyrocketed in price as countries have begun using it in earnest for fuel.

Now comes a report that substituting reeds and wild grasses, which might ease looming food shortages worldwide, has harmful effects, too. As invasive species, these grasses could overtake other vegetation and change the face of some areas of the country, such as the Everglades. So reports The New York Times today. Click here for the article.

The Times and Wired magazine each report on different alternatives as oil prices near $135 a barrel(and a leading market analyst suggests it could reach $200) . Interest is stoked these days, the Times reports Thursday, in long-closed coal fields and mines in Japan, the UK, and elsewhere. Here's the article.

Wired, in a piece this week by Spencer Reiss, argues for full-throttle nuclear as a serious way to cut sharply the level of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere. He points to two places in the United States comparatively low on carbon emissions -- the hydro-powered Northwest and the land of Bernie Sanders and Ben & Jerry, powered by the 30-year-old Vermont Yankee nuclear reactor.

In a recent visit to Cambridge, Duke Energy chief Jim Rogers, whose company relies on coal and nuclear to produce most of its power, pointed out two problems with a nuclear nirvana: 1) the huge amount of time and money, upwards of $9 billion, to build a new reactor, and 2) companies have a plan for spent nuclear fuel rods for the next century, but what about the next 600 or so years? Is there a plan for that?

A Wired rebuttal to Reiss's story, by Alex Steffen of the green futurist site worldchanging.com, doesn't dismiss nuclear, but states other clean fuels could improve in efficiency or affordability during the 10 years it would take to implement a nuclear program. "If we invested the money that we would spend on new nuclear facilities more wisely (and eliminated subsidies on fossil fuels), alternatives like wind, solar, hydroelectric, and wave power could deliver a clean-energy future more cheaply and probably sooner,'' Steffen writes, "without any of the security or health risks of nuclear plants.''

Enough of those experts...what do you think? After this musing, I'm all eyes to read your alternatives.