A simple solution to pain at the pump?

Stone Phillips Anchor • Profile

Pain at the pump is the price of this country’s addiction to oil. Americans are feeling it intensely—outraged over oil company profits, fearful that another hurricane in the gulf, or a terror attack in the Middle East is all it would take to send prices even higher.

But what if there was one solution to all of this?  Something that could solve America’s energy crisis, strengthen our national security, and help save the planet at the same time?

Vinod Khosla:  I looked, did my research and found this was brain dead simple to do.

Stone Phillips, Dateline anchor:  Is it going to mean spending less at the pump?

Khosla:  Absolutely. The consumer would be paying a dollar a gallon or less.

At age 51, Vinod Khosla is one of the world’s most successful venture capitalists and a self-made multibillionaire.

He came to the U.S. from India in 1976, and over the next 25 years, is said to have created six new jobs for every day he’d been in the country. Though not a household name, Khosla was a co-founder of Sun Microsystems and renowned in business circles for his meticulous research and ability to spot the kind of innovative technology that can revolutionize an industry.   

Three years ago, he turned his attention to alternative fuels.

Khosla:  What could be better than a greener fuel that’s cheaper for consumers, that doesn’t feed Mideast terrorism, yet instead fuels rural America?

He’s talking about a new generation of ethanol— the fuel made from plants. It’s one fuel he says is just around the corner and will deliver 4 to 10 times the energy of today’s corn ethanol.  Khosla knows, because he’s talked to top scientists, visited labs and he’s a bio-medical engineer himself.  He believes this new ethanol can replace gasoline and eliminate America’s dependence on foreign oil.

Phillips: How long before you believe this country could be energy independent if it switched to homegrown bushels instead of imported barrels?

Khosla:  I think you’ll be surprised by my answer.  In less than five years, we can irreversibly start a path that can get us independent of petroleum.

Phillips:  What convinced you this was a must for America?

Khosla: I heard about Brazil.  I heard they were already doing it. Brazil’s proven it already.  How dumb can we be?

Sao Paulo, Brazil is a sprawling city of 18 million people.  Late last month, we flew there with Khosla to see what a country transformed by ethanol looks like.     

Phillips:  This has you pretty charged up, doesn’t it?

Khosla:  It is very exciting.

Here, ethanol is just part of life. It’s sold at every gas station, including some with very familiar names. Consumers can’t get enough.

Brazil’s been committed to ethanol for 30 years, but if you want to know how it became such a hot commodity lately, start by looking for this label: “flex”.  It means cars can run on gas or ethanol. The key to ethanol’s popularity here in Brazil is choice. If you drive a flex-fuel car, you get to choose every time you pull up to the pump.

The choices are gasoline, ethanol—or alcohol as they call it there,  or a mixture of the two.  You check the prices and make your choice.

Most drivers here choose ethanol, because it’s so much cheaper that even though they get fewer miles to the gallon, it still saves them money.

The flex-fuel cars that triggered the ethanol boom were introduced here three years ago. Already, three of every four new cars sold have the technology.

And who’s helping to feed Brazil’s flex-fuel fever?  American car makers like GM and Ford.  

Barry Engle, president of Ford Brazil: 70 percent of a particular model is sold with the flex engine.  And 90 days from now it will be 100 percent.

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