It shouldn't be about where it comes from...

On the way home today it struck me that there's a lot of noise in the media these days about "reducing our dependency on foreign oil." I don't think that people are thinking about the right problem description, though.

Here's how it breaks down:
What is the problem? Dependency.
What is it we are dependent on? Oil.
Does where that oil originate really make a difference to the problem? I don't think so.

So, to re-write the better target, it would be "Reducing our dependency on oil." Period.

Does converting farm land into a production method for biofuels really solve that issue? How much of the product would the production process use if it was powered by it's own end product? I mean, how much oil does it take to power the equipment to produce biofuel? How much biofuel would it take if it wasn't using regular petroleum based fuels? Is it a positive net gain?

And that's my food for thought this afternoon.