IMHO, bottom line, at home, Big Oil shot down any and all alternative energy projects that were in the planing stages because they felt threatened that they would lose most of the pie (profits) that they have enjoyed for themselves over the past 100 years.

It was Big Oil sitting in the White House under Bush adiministration whos tentacles reached out to control the geopolitics concerning crude oil in the middle east and at home the President publicly threatened several times to veto any alternative bill that made it to his desk. The President was able to make such bold statements about veto-ing such bills because he knew that Big Oil bought off enough Congressman/women and Senators, just enough to allow the President to win any veto. I seem to remember a few alternative energy bills passed by Congress and the Senate but were dead on arrival to the president's desk.

The goverment money Mississippi promised for the Silverado Green Fuel project was stopped dead in its tracks by Big Oil, its my understanding that the money never made it to the state goverment. President Bush in his last year in office stopped goverment money promised to help finish building a huge solar pannel project in the desert, that was half way built, they had to motthball that solar project. Many of the coal-to-liquid (CTL) plants that were expecting government subsidies to build their projects also experienced the same stone wal job from the government, money that never materialized.

I believe the current Presidential administration and Capital Hill may have a better chance at passing alternative energy bills to save the US economy from the new energy paradigm shift that is at the door step of the world. If America doesn't start build alternative energy projects soon, it could experience another economic crisis, this time the meltdown will be due to shortages of crude oil and the expected sky rocketing prices at the gas pump predicted by many experts.

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"Achieving energy independence and significantly reducing greenhouse gas emissions are two of the greatest challenges America faces. With the right technological innovations, coal has the potential to be a cleaner burning, domestic alternative to imported oil"......" "Moving forward, I believe we should invest in coal-to-liquid fuels..." - Barrack Obama

"We will accelerate the production of advanced coal technology." - Hillary R. Clinton

"We must adapt technologies to give our kids a better world"....."All sources of energy need to be developed."...."We have to reduce our dependence on foreign oil (Venezuela, Nigeria, Iraq, Iran, Russia, Saudi Arabia)." - John McCain

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(excerpts from old Silverado news)

"Silverado is a world leader in low rank coal to liquid fuel technology", states Garry Anselmo, President and CEO.

“High rank coals are three percent water and high energy. Low-rank coal is 50 to 55 percent water and low energy, so the coal industry has pretty much left it alone,” Anselmo said. “We need the high water content coal for our process to work.” The resulting product has a higher energy level than the original coal, and 2.5 barrels of green fuel are the equivalent of one barrel of oil. The difference is the price of producing those barrels.

“The cost is $15 to produce two barrels of our fuel, or a barrel of oil equivalent (BOE),” Anselmo said. One ton of coal can make two barrels of green fuel. While the product can be burned through spray injection as it emerges from the process, further refining afterwards will make it a feed stock for a list of products including rocket fuel, jet fuel, diesel, gasoline, plastics, explosives, urea and others.

“Once we gasify and liquefy the product, that becomes a feed stock for making all the things that oil makes. We have the ability to make those products without heavy metals and sulphur, and because we can do that, the next step will be for us or, more likely, those already in the refining business to join us and make more refined, down the line products,” Anselmo said.

The amount of low-rank coal in North America – U.S. deposits make up fully a quarter of the world’s stock – means that using the company’s technique, dependence on foreign oil could be cut back dramatically.

“Green fuel made from low-rank coal is a strategic fuel that can help our countries be less dependent on foreign oil and severely lessen the cost of energy,” he said. “America has enough coal to run its energy needs for 300 years.”

$$ Ka-Ching Ka-Ching $$