Clean technology venture capitalist Vinod Khosla slammed energy magnate T. Boone Pickens’ plan to boost natural gas vehicles to sever America’s dependence on oil as a “dead end,” at an event sponsored by the Silicon Valley Leadership Group Wednesday at Santa Clara University.
Khosla, principal at clean tech venture capital firm Khosla Ventures, said despite emissions reductions of 20 percent compared to gasoline-powered vehicles and that natural gas is available today at relatively low prices, relying on another fossil fuel in vehicles is a flawed model.
“It’s a dead end,” Khosla said. “We shouldn’t do these interim dead-end technologies like natural gas. Let’s not spend public money at low rates of return.”
Khosla also said hydrogen will never be an economically viable alternative to gasoline.
“The technology with the largest carbon reduction possibility is the internal combustion engine powered by biofuels,” Khosla said. “And we should really focus on non-food biofuels and get out of food-based biofuels. It’s much cheaper and much more scalable,” than all other transportation options.
Khosla Ventures has several biofuels investments including those in LS9, Amyris and Mascoma and others.
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