Or, how about caskets made of biodegradable materials.

“Biodegradable caskets lack contaminants that would otherwise seep into the groundwater and surrounding ecosystems,” said Ben Goldschmidt, a senior in biological engineering from Columbia, who is working the the project.

He said the goal of green burial is to return the deceased and casket materials to the earth, where they can enrich the soil. Green cemeteries spurn vaults, tombstones and manicured lawns in favor of trees and native plants, according to Goldschmidt.

Is bureaucracy, special interest and money speculators holding back America’s biofuels industry? The goal of biofuels has always been to displace a certain of foreign energy imports and never to totally replace oil as an energy resource. Two things will jump start the biofuel industry in the U.S. First, allow cars to use a greater blend of ethanol to gasoline other than E10. Forget E85. E20 will do the trick and not damage the U.S. vehicle fleet. Second, get going on another fuel source for ethanol other than corn. Cellulosic ethanol research needs funding and focus. It’s the kind of stimulus package that really counts. Also, before lending any more money to the Big Three Automakers, make them produce everyday fuel efficient cars that run on a greater blend than E10. A car that runs on E20 and gets 40 mph on the highway will do wonders in lowering overall fuel costs and foreign imports of oil.

Here’s what Brazil is doing with its ethanol industry in 2009. Hint: It’s just keeps growing.

According to this study, it may be wise to start reading the newspaper to see if the local city or county governments are hurting for cash. If, so, according to this study, the number of traffic citations go up to increase the local government’s revenue stream.

That’s according to a new study to be published in next month’s Journal of Law and Economics that finds statistical evidence that local governments use traffic citations to make up for revenue shortfalls.

So as the economy tanks, motorists may be more likely to see red and blue in the rearview, according to the authors of the study.

One of those authors, Thomas Garrett, assistant vice president at the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis, and Gary Wagner from the University of Arkansas Little Rock, examined 14 years of revenue and traffic citation data from counties in North Carolina. He and the other researchers  found that the number of traffic citations issued goes up the year following a revenue drop.

“Specifically, a one percentage point decrease in last year’s local government revenue results in roughly a 0.32 percentage point increase in the number of traffic tickets in the following year,” Garrett and Wagner write.

That number may sound small, but it’s a statistically significant correlation, the authors say.

The study controlled for demographic and economic differences in the sample, which contained data from 96 North Carolina counties collected from 1990 to 2003.

The finding adds credence to something many drivers have long suspected: Safety isn’t the only motive in traffic enforcement efforts, according to the authors. Since many municipalities retain the money generated by traffic fines, perhaps traffic enforcement also acts as a bit of a fundraiser, they write.

“There is ample anecdotal evidence that local governments use traffic tickets as a means of generating revenue…,” Garrett and Wagner write. “Our paper provides the first empirical evidence to support this view….”

And don’t expect to be able to throttle up when the economy recovers, the authors report. The study found no significant drop in tickets when revenues increased.

The U.S. Department of Agriculture reported Monday that U.S. corn ending stocks for 2008/09 are projected 316 million bushels higher this month on higher estimated production and lower expected use.

Corn production for 2008/09 is estimated 81 million bushels higher.  Feed and residual use is reduced 50 million bushels reflecting lower animal numbers and September-November disappearance as indicated by December 1 stocks.

The USDA reported that ethanol corn use is lowered 100 million bushels as sustained negative ethanol production margins since early December have reduced incentives for ethanol output.  Recent increases in trading values for Renewable Identification Numbers (RINs) that can be used in lieu of ethanol to meet mandated levels also indicate reduced demand for ethanol.

Projected food, seed, and industrial use is lowered an additional 35 million bushels on lower-than-expected
use for sweeteners and starch during September-November.

Exports are projected 50 million bushels lower based on the slow pace of sales and shipments to date. The projected season-average farm price for corn is lowered 10 cents on each end of the range to $3.55 to $4.25 per bushel.