Besides the fact that beer is generated from a renewable resource while petroleum comes from a fossil fuel, there is also the sheer excitement of taking something that you drink and using it to run your car. The researchers at the University of Bristol have come up with the initial steps to create a sustainable fuel from the popular drink.

Alcoholic drinks are an ideal model for industrial ethanol fermentation broths. Ethanol for fuel is essentially made using a brewing process. The Chemists have been working on an alternative fuel source to replace petrol and have come up with a concoction that uses beer as it’s primary ingredient. They have converted the ethanol in the alcohol into butanol. While bio-ethanol has been used as a fuel alternative it is not as good as butanol.

Eventually they will have to scale up production and will not be using beer as a raw source. They will get the ethanol from other fermentation processes rather than competing with food grains that will be required to feed the many billions on the planet in the future. This is a science project  that shows great potential to creating a sustainable alternative fuel to petrol.