A California company called E-Fuel  wants you to ferment home brew  -- for your car.  It sells a $10,000 portable "MicroFueler" that plugs into home power and water supplies to ferment sugar into 100 percent ethanol at a rate of 35 gallons ( 132 liters) per week.  

For families that drive at least a combined 34,500 miles (55,520 km)  in cars that get average fuel efficiency, the MicroFueler will pay for itself in less than two years if gasoline prices stay near record levels, says Tom Quinn, the company's CEO and financial backer.

E-Fuels says it will link buyers to cheap supplies of sugar, such as inedible surplus sweetener from Mexico, and launch a carbon credit system to cut the feedstock cost of regular table sugar.

"This paradigm shift is not going to work unless we can knock out of the ballpark the cost of feedstock," Quinn said at the unveiling of the MicroFueler in New York. He said the credits could knock down the cost of fueling up to less than $1 per gallon (3.8 liters).

 E-Fuel says the unit will start shipping late this year.

Interesting product, but will it help ease motor fuel prices or fade the black eye corn-made ethanol has gotten for helping to push up grain and food prices? "This could be fun for tinkerers, but unfortunately it's not a quick solution for our problems," said Nathanael Greene, a resource specialist at green group the Natural Resources Defense Council.

What do you think? Pricey gadget or fount of bargain fuel?  

Drivers are feeling the pinch from record high gasoline prices in the United States, but they should be happy they’re not buying diesel.

The price of diesel has shot up nearly 50 percent since a year ago to $4.27 a gallon, touching off a rash of minor protests by U.S. long-haul truckers in recent weeks.

By comparison, gasoline prices have risen only about 21 percent since a year ago to a relatively modest price of $3.67 a gallon on average, according to the daily price survey from the AAA.

The price of both key fuels has been tracking the soaring cost of crude — which is up sixfold since 2002 because of increasing demand from China and other developing countries.

But why would diesel rise so much faster than gasoline?

One theory is that worsening electricity supply problems in countries like China, South Africa, Chile, Argentina, and parts of the Middle East has increased demand for middle distillates like diesel for use in temporary power generators.

Whatever the cause, the increase in world demand for diesel has boosted U.S. fuel exports to their highest since 1991 and helped push U.S. distillate supplies to 3 percent below a year ago, according to the most recent data from the U.S. Energy Information Administration.

U.S. gasoline supplies, meanwhile, are running at a surplus.

For farmer Dennis Shields, the fate of his new wheat crop is largely out of his control. In this first week of May - some 45-60 days from harvest - whether or not Shields makes a tidy profit or suffers a painful loss this summer is all up to the weather.

“It all depends on June,” said the 67-year-old Shields, who has been farming near Lindsborg, Kansas, more than 40 years.

If hot and dry weather settles into the U.S. Heartland as the newly emerging hard red winter wheat crop moves into the crucial grain filling period of development, kernels will likely shrivel and yield potential could shrink. But if mild conditions continue, the new crop could be a bin buster.

The crop is maturing later than normal this year with a more shallow root system due to late planting and a cooler-than-normal, wet spring, factors that have left the wheat crop more vulnerable than typical to the whims of weather.
“You get some 100-degree days … you’ll lose bushels and test weight will probably go down,” said Bob Bennett, Kansas State University grain quality specialist.

Efforts to determine the production potential for the new U.S. winter wheat crop, in particular the crop in top U.S. producer Kansas, is a near-obsession this season with an assortment of food industry players, from farmers to bakers, and export merchandisers to Mexican millers. Record wheat prices and short stocks around the world have generated high interest in this year’s wheat crop.

A group of more than 60 such industry representatives were taking part this week in a survey of hundreds of Kansas wheat fields as part of a Wheat Quality Council crop tour.

The tour will culminate on Thursday when participants come up with an estimated average yield and production tally for this year’s Kansas winter wheat crop.

A year ago at this time, the crop was looking very healthy, aside from some pockets of freeze-damaged fields. But high hopes were dashed when late-season heavy rains washed out many fields. So this year, even though the crop appears mostly healthy, with the potential for good production, few are willing to start counting on the bushels yet.

“We are a long way from getting this crop into the bin,” said ADM wheat quality specialist Dave Green.

The U.S. government will issue its first winter wheat production estimate on Friday.

Corn is really caught in a conundrum these days — evident by the price moves on the Chicago Board of Trade futures market the past week. One day corn is the darling of the trade, rising to a high of $6.41-1/4 per bushel for delivery in December, the first contract representing the 2008 harvest.
     The next day it struggles amid the bashing of corn-based ethanol production that seems to be gaining hold in Washington. Several senators including Kay Bailey Hutchison (R-Texas) said this week it’s time to take a serious look at the U.S. corn ethanol mandate calling for 15 billion gallons by 2015 and 36 billion gallons by 2022. The federal mandate for this year is 9 billion gallons.
    “It seems like all the politicians are ganging up on ethanol,” said Vic Lespinasse, with grainanalyst.com in Chicago.
    Even the USDA’s chief economist Joseph Glauber in his testimony to Congress on May 1 included ethanol among the reasons for the rising price of food:
    “In 2007, the Consumer Price Index for food in the U.S. increased by 4 percent. This was the largest annual increase in retail food prices since 1990. In 2008, the Department of Agriculture’s Economic Research Service projects retail food prices will increase by 4 to 5 percent.
    “Several key factors are shaping the current situation, including domestic and global economic growth; global weather; rising input costs for energy; international export restrictions; and new product markets, particularly biofuels.”
    But so far nothing has changed officially on the demand side for corn. Ethanol producers are projected to use 3.1 billion bushels of corn this year, or 24 percent of the 2007 crop.
    So a policy change slowing ethanol demand would spark waves of spec profit-taking — and a tidal wave of grain hedge selling to lock in $5-6 corn on the board.
    On the other side of equation you have a wet, cold spring that’s raising concerns about how much corn farmers will be able to plant before May 15 — farmer’s target to plant corn so the crop reaches its maximum yield potential.
    Soil temperatures need to be roughly 50 degrees to plant corn and fields are saturated with standing pools of water in many.
    Traditionally, the last week of April and the first week of May are the biggest corn planting weeks in the Midwest. Not this year. Planters have been scarce and basic prep like discing or fertilizer application also are weeks behind.
    So far, U.S. farmers are off to their slowest start since 1999. The U.S. Department of Agriculture will issue its next crop progress on Monday afternoon. One would have to guess that depending on how much corn is planted –  it will drive CBOT prices Monday night and Tuesday. Preliminary guesses is for USDA to report 25-30 percent of the crop seeded, versus the seasonal average of 63 percent.
    Granted U.S. farmers can plant corn quickly given today’s 24-row planters. But it’s got to stop raining and warm up.
    “There is no sign of a major change in the pattern which means no wide window for planting for the next week to 10 days,” said Mike Palmerino, forecaster with DTN Meteorlogix.
    “There will be occasional planting when there’s a break in the rains … the stronger sun will work to their advantage.”
    It rained again on LaSalle Street on Saturday though the sun finally came out again on Sunday with temps in the 60s F.