The Washington Post's Al Kamen has an
update on Randy Kuhl's junket. Yesterday, the delegation cruised the Amazon river. Kamen also reports that one more congressman, Clifford Stearns (R-FL-6) also tagged along. For those keeping track, Cliff is in his 10th term and won re-election by a safe 20% margin last election.
Randy's official blog also has a
post, dated Thursday, that discusses his trip. He makes the following point:
It is important to note that while Brazil developed ethanol from sugarcane, the natural resource available in Brazil, the US can learn to develop our natural resources, such as switch grass and other cellulosic feed stocks, in a similar fashion.
This is a bit of spin. As Massa
explained in his press conference on Wednesday, the process to produce ethanol from sugarcane is much different than the cellulosic process. The
cellulosic or enzymatic process uses bacteria to break down the cellulose into sugars that are then turned into alcohol. This first step is the "big deal", because it lessens the amount of energy used, and allows us to use many more crops to make ethanol.
(h/t: to
Rochesterturning on the Kamen column)