BioDiesel can be made as cheap as $0.90 per gallon in the comfort of your own garage. This processed fuel comes from vegetable oils and animal fats. It’s usually mixed with market diesel and 5%-40% biodiesel, with some cars running at 100%.

Etruk, a UK based company, produces several sizes that allow you to home brew a high quality biodiesel for your own cars. It’s simple, they say, you put virgin feed stock or used cooking oil in, you get excellent quality, cost-effective fuel that produces 60% less CO2.

Be careful not to go blabbing about how much money your rolling in to everyone. If your state finds out that your creating your own fuel they may try to hit you with back taxes. The idea is that if your not paying taxes at the pump and using public roads that they still want their cut.

Sizes come in 10.5 gallons – $1,825, 21 gallons – $3,050 and 53 gallons – $3,660. Like most renewable energy sources, an investment needs to be made until you start cashing in on the savings. Yet oh how sweet it will be when you can finally stick it to the gas man.

[Red Ferret]

It’s fascinating, large projects that used to be very costly are now completed free of charge by online communities. When fervor strikes the crowd, creativity hits the online production line. The most recent example is Harry Potter fans that have read, translated and posted versions of “Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows” online in both PDF and via a blog. Even the pictures and fonts match the original English version.

Widespread collaboration has been the theme of Web 2.0. Projects like Wikipedia, BitTorrent, and Flickr have redefined “working together.” They bring massive amounts of users together for one specific goal. The difference is that these are ventures that have a clear set vision and gained critical mass with the momentum of that vision.

A quote from a book I read recently, “Wikinomics: How Mass Collaboration Changes Everything,”

These changes, among others, are ushering us toward a world where knowledge, power, and productive capability will be more dispersed than at any time in our history—a world where value creation will be fast, fluid, and persistently disruptive. A world where only the connected will survive. A power shift is underway, and a tough new business rule is emerging: Harness the new collaboration or perish. Those who fail to grasp this will find themselves ever more isolated—cut off from the networks that are sharing, adapting, and updating knowledge to create value.

People banding together to translate Harry Potter in their native language within days of its release is pretty damned amazing. Copyright beware, impromptu projects like these will spring up more and more frequently as people envision value, with or without a ‘visionary.’

If you’re anything like me you vividly remember Back to the Future’s promise of hover boards and flying cars around 2015. The problem is that I still haven’t seen a flying Delorean overhead with T-Minus 8 years to go; until now.

The Moller M200G Volantor is entering production at a whopping height of 10 feet and max speeds of up to 50mph for 90 minute flights. Although this bad boy won’t be turning heads on the highway just yet, it is being marketed as a form of off roading. Dr. Moller is quoted,

It’s not a hovercraft, although its operation is just as easy. You can speed over rocks, swampland, fences, or log infested waterways with ease because you’re not limited by the surface. The electronics keep the craft stabilized at no more than 10 feet altitude, which places the craft within ground effect where extra lift is obtained from operating near the ground. This lets you glide over terrain at 50 mph that would stop most other vehicles.

It seems as if the crafts have ample orders, counting in at 67. Maximum payload is 250 pounds at a cost of about $90,000.

Maybe we are on track, now if we could just dig up a prototype hover board.

Link: Moller International