Ted, in my experience, working with a number of inventors in the private sector (in a small Government program providing grant support for the development of inventions - DOE's Energy-Related Inventions Program), after the development and testing of the prototype, and this was particularly true of process development, these inventors each needed big money in order to get the technology into the marketplace. In order to get big money (usually millions of dollars) these inventors had to convince venture capitalists to provide that support. Aside from business management capabilities, venture capitalists want to see a proprietary position, because no way are they going to provide capital to market a process where the technology is available to anyone. What belongs to everyone really belongs to no one. So, "further development" is not going to take place without this proprietary position. And, as to "costing the public big time for what they have already in essense paid for," the public is not going to profit until the technology has gotten into the marketplace. And, my belief, and as I believe the historical record shows, technologies don't generally get into the marketplace without someone with a proprietary position bringing them there. With rare exceptions, most of the technologies that have impacted the marketplace and been responsible for our high standard of living have come from small business and the private sector. What are the instances of this happening without the proprietary position? Is Lockheed Martin going to market this particular technology? Not unless it falls within their mission interests to do so. Is the Government going to market this technology? I don't think so. Aside from building technology to suit their own purposes (NASA and DOD) I don't recollect them having much, if any, success in getting technology into the market. The National Labs haven't been that successful yet in marketing technology. They are great developers, e.g. nuclear power, but they sure haven''t been successful at marketing nuclear power. Maybe the group here will come up with a new system of getting biodiesel into the marketplace without requiring huge funding. But, my guess is that once you have developed a system that works and shows promise of capturing a good share of the fuels market, one of the biggies with production and distribution capabilities and copious capital will come in and take over, especially if you don't have a proprietary position. That is the way the capitalistic system works, and that is one big reason, as recently demonstrated in the case of Russia, that socialism can't compete. This is not to say, however, that the individual can't make and use his own biodiesel /wvo and enjoy some independence from the system, as I hope to do someday. Glenn Ellis
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