pjc50 gets the large scale answer correct. On the individual scale a company in a >1 ratio line of business sells energy, which incidentally happens to be in t

pjc50 gets the large scale answer correct. On the individual scale a company in a >1 ratio line of business sells energy, which incidentally happens to be in the form of Jet-A or 93 octane but what really matters is they sell energy that runs the other economic sectors. Whereas a company in the <1 ratio line of business sells fascinating petrochemical feedstocks, which incidentally happen to be flammable and could be used as expensive fuels and they compete for needed energy with the rest of the economy. The ethanol debacle shows how important that is. Certainly aged 12 year crown royal is not energetically feasible as engine fuel and that doesn't matter as long as its affordable for drinking. The distillery produces human fuel, but not energy, in fact its a net sink of energy. Likewise you can build a plant to produce ethanol, and it will produce fuel, and as long as you don't worry about energy or CO2 that's OK. Inevitably after its built someone will point out that rather than importing 30 million barrels of crude oil energy per day, if you want to run cars on ethanol we'll have to import and burn 60 million barrels of crude oil energy per day and there will be freakouts. Part of the confusion is in the old days it was only possible to simultaneously produce both energy and fuel whereas we've burned the cheap oil such that now we're going to be deciding to make industrial plants and processes that produce energy OR fuel but often not both at the same time. In the old days it was impossible for a refinery not to produce and sell both fuel and energy at the same time...