53. Britain Accelerates toward Cleaner Futurewith Wheat
1. Wheat never used to get Charlie Goldsack excited. He's got fields of the stuff down on his farm, but as a cash crop there was one big problem: it didn't generate much cash. Rock bottom prices saw to that.
1、小麦从未让查利戈德萨克开心过。虽然他的农场大片大片地种着这东西，但作为一种产品作物，它的一大缺点就是创收有限。最底价在那儿决定着呢。
2. But now, the farmer hopes his wheat might literally1 become the driving force of his 1,400-acre Friar Maine farm in southern England.
2、但目前，这位农场主期望小麦可以给他在南英格兰的1400英亩的费赖尔缅因农场带来活力。
3. Instead of heading to the bakery, Goldsack's harvest will now go to a nearby plant for conversion2 into bioethanolpart of accelerating British efforts to introduce cleaner car fuel.
3、以后，戈德萨克所收成的小麦将不再送往面包房，而是提供给附近一家工厂生产生物酒精这是英国加速引进清洗汽车燃料行动的一部分。
4. For a lot of farms, it was barely economic to grow wheat any more, he says. This is just what we needa new market. Hopefully it can soak up all the surplus and raise prices.
4、对很多农场来讲，再种小麦几乎已经无利可图了，他说，这正是大家所需要的一个新市场。但愿它能消化掉所有过剩的小麦，从而抬高小麦的价格。
5. The simple arithmetic looks compelling. Goldsack's roughly 250 acres could yield enough wheat to produce a million miles' of car fuel.
5、这个简单的算法看起来挺有说服力：戈德萨克的大约250英亩小麦，就足以生产供一辆汽车行驶100万英里的燃油。
6. Extrapolate that across all of Britain's farmland and you get enough bioethanol to account for 5 percent of all fuel used annually3 by British motoristsa target the government wants hit by 2010. In a pleasing symmetry, the amount of wheat required would be around 3 million tons, roughly equal to the excess produced each year that is unwanted by the domestic market.
6、以此推算，整个英国的农场足够提供每年全国5％的机动车辆燃料消耗量。英国政府期望到2010年达到这一目的。随之而来有哪些好处是，为此所需的小麦数目将在300万吨左右，大致等于国内市场每年的剩余量。
7. If this soaks up that surplus then it could add eight or nine pounds to the price of wheat, enthuses Goldsack, estimating that this would be worth about J 10,000 a year to his investment-starved farm.
7、假如该计划可以消化掉所有剩余小麦，小麦的价格就会上涨8、9英镑，戈德萨克开心地说，并且预计这会给他急切需要投资的农场带来每年1万英镑的收益。
8. While President Bush last week emphasized the need for cleaner cars for reasons of energy security, Britain's motivations are slightly different. As a signatory to the Kyoto pact4 on climate change, Britain must reduce carbon emissions5 by 20 percent by 2010. With motoring accounting6 for almost one-third of emissions, and greener fuels like bioethanol estimated to reduce greenhouse gas output by around two-thirds, the logic7 appears indisputable.
Will oil companies stand in the way?
8、布什总统上周强调推广清洗能源汽车的必要性，理由是出于能源安全上的考虑，而英国的动机则略有不同。作为有关气候变化的京都议定书的签署国，到2010年英国需要将碳排放量降低20％。因为汽车的排放量占总排放量的近1／3，而像生物酒精如此的绿色燃料预计可使温室气体的排放量降低约2／3，因而推广清洗燃料的合理性无可争议。
石油公司会出来阻挠吗?
9. But there is a snag. Experts warn that biofuels are very expensive to produceroughly twice as cosplaytly8 as gasolineand can only become viable9 with generous government subsidies10.
9、不过存在一个障碍。专家警告说，生物燃料的生产本钱特别高大约是汽油的两倍，除非政府提供慷慨的补贴，不然缺少可行性。
10. They also note that it will be difficult to create a network of gas stations selling bioethanol, since many of Britain's current gas stations are owned by petrochemical giants that have little interest in supplying a product that challenges their own hegemony. Britain's biggest energy producer, BP, says it is looking at introducing bioethanol, but none of its 1,300 gas stations throughout the United Kingdom sell the product yet.
10、他们还提醒说，打造销售生物酒精的加油站互联网也非易事，由于英国现有些加油站多为石化巨头所有，提供这种燃料将会挑战它们自己的霸权，因而它们对此没什么兴趣。英国最大的能源生产厂家BP表示，它们将会考虑引进生物酒精，但其旗下的1300个在英国境内的加油站尚无刚开始供应这一商品。
11. One man and his chip pan may be able to turn fat into petrol, but he's a long way from being able to take on BP, says Nick Matthews, principal fellow at the Warwick Manufacturing Group, a research body in central England.
11、一个人加上一口煎锅或许可以把脂肪转化成汽油，但要撼动BP则远非易事，英格兰中部一家研究机构华威制造工程学院的负责人尼克马修斯表示。
12. I can make black pop and sell it in bottles, he continues, but can I take on Coca-Cola? They have such massive branding and distribution that no one's going to buy my stuff.
12、我能生产黑色汽水并装瓶供应，他接着说，但我能撼动可口可乐吗?他们有雄厚的品牌和庞大的营销推广软件，无人会买我的东西。
13. Oil companies want to get the benefit of vertical11 integration12 in their system; therefore, unless there is the regulatory and fiscal13 framework to stimulate14 it, it won't happen of its own accord; Mr. Matthews adds. Still, some bioethanol is already creeping into usage here, not as a separate fuel with a pump of its own, but as a blend that is mixed with petrol in a ratio of about 1 in 20, for use in ordinary cars. Any richer mix than that and cars must undergo a relatively15 inexpensive adaptation to replace rubber and aluminum16 parts, which would be eroded17 by bioethanol.
13、石油公司期望将它纳入自己的商品链以获得好处，因此，除非有法规和财政方法作为勉励，不然这所有不会自然而然地发生，马修斯先生补充道。不管如何，已经有一些生物酒精日渐进入消费范围。不过不是单独供应，而是以1：19的比率与汽油混合供普通汽车用。超越这一比率，汽车需要稍事改装，换掉容易受生物酒精腐蚀的橡胶和铝制部件。
14. Ford18 and Saab have produced flex19 fuel cars that can run on either boiethanol or normal petrol, or any combination of the two. A pilot project in southwest England is introducing cars running on E85 within the local police force. Gas stations at supermarkets in the region are preparing to install E85 pumps to supply the new fleet. The US, generally acknowledged to be a step ahead of Britain on biofuel, has an estimated 600 stations that offer E85.
14、福特和萨博公司已生产出了既可用普通汽油、又可用生物酒精或两者混合物的弹性燃料汽车。在英格兰西南部的一个试验项目为当地警察配备了用E85燃料的汽车。当地超市的加油站正筹备安装E85加油机以提供这批新车所需。在生物燃料方面公觉得比英国领先一步的美国，已有大约600个加油站提供E85燃料。
A push from government
政府的推进
15. A recent government ruling could force oil companies to equip their gas stations similarly. Just as it did with electricity generation, the government has said it will order energy groups such as BP to ensure that a certain proportion of their products are made from renewable resources. It has yet to give an exact figure, but industry insiders predict it will be around 3 percent.
15、政府新近做出的规定将迫使石油企业的加油站拥有类似的能力。与过去对待发电问题一样，政府表示将命令诸如BP如此的能源集团确保它们肯定比率的商品来自可再生资源。虽然具体的数字尚未确定，但业内人士预测其将会在3％左右。
16. The Renewable Transport Fuel Obligation will come into operation in 2008. For Malcolm Shepherd, managing director of a company created last year to make bioethanol from farm produce, this could make all the difference.
16、《可再生交通燃料法》将于2008年生效。对于马尔科姆谢泼德先生来讲，所有将因此而改变。谢泼德先生是去年成立的一家借助农商品生产生物酒精的企业的总经理。
17. If they fail to fulfill20 the quota21, they will have to pay penalties, he notes. The obligation will open up forecourts to the biofuel industry.
17、假如它们未能达到这一限额，就得支付罚款，他说，这一法律将为生物燃油工业打开前场。
18. Mr. Shepherd's company, Green Spirit, is building one of Britain's first major bioethanol factorieswhere crops are turned into fuelin southern England. It estimates that as many as 10 others will be required nationwide to satisfy British demand alone.
18、谢泼德先生的公司Green Spitit正在英格兰南部建造的工厂，是英国首批大型生物酒精工厂之一，谷物在这里被转化为燃料。预计，单是为满足英国本国的需要，就需要再建设10个类似的工厂。
Enough land to feed the machine?
有足够的土地喂饱那些机器吗?
19. Matthews notes that the US and Brazil are world leaders in biofuel usage because of the formidable acreage at their disposal. Here it's completely uneconomic, he says. Oil prices would have to be astronomically22 high to make it worthwhile.
19、马修斯指出，美国和巴西之所以在生物燃料的借助方面领先世界，主如果由于它们拥有可任其支配的辽阔耕地。在英国，这一点毫无经济意义可言，他说，除非油价涨得不靠谱，才会使生物燃料变得有意义。
20. Professor Stephen Glaister, a transport expert at Imperial College London, takes an even broader view. It's all about the arithmetic, he says. Energy comes from the sun. It's just a question of whether there's enough sunlight and enough land to capture it to produce sufficient volumes of energy.
20、伦敦帝国学院的交通问题专家斯帝芬格莱斯特教授把眼光放得更远。他说：归根结底，这是一个算法问题，能源来自太阳。问题只在于是不是有足够的阳光，与是不是有足够的土地宋捕捉这类阳光，然后生产出足量的能源来。
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