A bio-fuels future

HAD a most bizarre episode last week. A conversation with my daughter on man's inhumanity to future generations. It went a little something like this:

"Dad?"

"Is that you Reduced Emissions? You speak? But you're four months old!"

"Yes, well, I can explain. I'm speaking to you in the voice I'll have when I'm 18. I'm back from the future."

"That's balderdash. It disregards every law of physics, not to mention journalistic laws of suspending the disbelief of one's readers."

"Don't be silly. Do you not watch television at all? Stuff like this happens all the time."

"True. So what's up? The world of 2023 is a poisonous, fuel-depleted morass of pain thanks to our reliance on oil? Am I right?"

"Spot on. Smart cookie aren't you?"

"You can see I didn't lick it off the ground. And what do you want me to do about it?"

"I thought, as a revered member of society, you could urge a few folks to switch to using bio-fuels instead of petrol."

"Bio-fuels? Aren't they what tree-hugging crackpots use to power their tofu mills?"

"Don't be a bigot. You know as well as I do bio-fuels are the future. You can use all sorts of things to run your engines, from old chip fat to fish oils to wood to milk proteins to soya beans to alcohol. You can even melt down animal fat and mix it with your diesel."

"Put a tiger in your tank, eh?"

"Very funny. Not only are bio-fuels cheap as chips but you get to drive around on the moral high ground knowing you are being carbon neutral and there's no innocent blood on your hands."

"I appreciate all that, but surely if we all start using vegetable fat and fish oil and ethanol in our cars the whole country will end up stinking like a chipper or a pub? All we need now is some smartypants to process vomit into petrol and Ireland will permanently stink like Friday night at closing time."

"Why do I get the impression you're not taking this seriously? Even the Government is - they've introduced tax breaks for producing bio-fuels."

"But that's nonsense. I bet you any money some blaggard will take advantage, bribe some councillor to secure a multi-million euro grant to plant rapeseed on 1,000 acres in the Midlands and then turn it into a shopping centre instead. Then we'll have a tribunal, a token slap on the wrist for some political has-been, and everyone will forget about it because they're so stressed about which of their children they're going to sell into slavery next to be able to afford to drive their cars."

"You'd think that, wouldn't you? But, with the benefit of hindsight, I can tell you that it didn't happen. In fact, once you came round and hopped on the bio-fuel bandwagon, the whole country went environmentally conscious and took to bio-fuels like cows to rollerskating. With our optimal agricultural conditions, we became outstanding in our own field, so to speak, and world leaders in fuel production by 2017. You became a national hero."

"And about time. But Reduced, I've had a horrible thought. With all this lovely fuel, surely we put ourselves at risk from invasion by our trigger-happy chums across the Atlantic?"

"No, I think we'll be pretty safe. I didn't want to tell you this, but Martin Cullen's magnum opus, Why I'm Right And Everyone Else Is Wrong, published in 2018, proved unequivocally there was no God and he was, in fact, the Supreme Being. It was accepted universally, all governments and religions were disbanded and he became Emperor of The Universe."

"Aha, so it's not our over-reliance on oil that's at fault for the world of 2023 being an unmitigated disaster at all, is it?"

"Err, no. Sorry about that. I was just trying to help you write your column. Anyway, what manner of loodramawn are you to believe you're having a conversation with a baby?" Told you it was bizarre. I blame the bio-ethanol I was sent as a test sample. Nobody told me not to drink it.