This is really cool. To sum up, a company in Silicon Valley eschewed the hardware and software their neighbors make their living on, and followed the money to fuel, and have now invented a microscopic bug that eats waste, woodchips for instance, and excretes crude oil. So far they have only managed small amounts, and are unsure if it will scale up to a system big enough to make a real difference in the world, but they are certainly hopeful.

There is something else significant to take away. The free market is doing exactly what free market advocates said it would do. While many people whine for the government to do something, other people saw dollar signs for anyone who could come up with a solution, and they are following the money to the possibility of solving our energy crisis. The free market does work! And the government is wasting our time and money talking about gas tax holidays and whether to strangle the oil companies which are owned by the pension plans and 401ks of tens of millions of average Americans, who will then become more dependent on social security, and thus the government.

And by the way, they also mention that it's greenhouse gas safe, in that the CO2 released is less than initially sequestered by the tree that is turned into wood for a house and then waste for the bugs to eat.

Go science! Go money! Go free market!