Plant fuels that could power a jet AOW #20

http://www.ted.com/talks/bilal_bomani_plant_fuels_that_could_power_a_jet.html

This week I watched a speech made by Bilal Bomani on TED.com where Bomani described the work he and his coworkers had been doing.  They had been working on finding alternative fuel sources for jets.  They are using processes like climatic adaptation to create the perfect plant, then they take that plant to their "Open Pond" system to grow the plant large-scale.  They are mainly focusing on algae and halophytes, which are plants that can grow in saline environments.  Using halophytes is helpful because 97.5 percent of the world's water is saline, so finding a plant that doesn't have to grow off of the 2.5 percent of water that is freshwater would make it conserve useful resources.  Additionally, the facility is powered by solar cells and wind turbines, which aids the problem of renewable energy.  So far, the organization has been successful in finding many possible solutions some of the world's problems that include, water, fuel food and energy.  The speech that was given about this research is surrounded by a time where finding renewable resources is a huge issue.  This speech was given to show the world that new resources are being found, but the ways to produce them are still being perfected.  Some rhetorical elements used by Bomani were the use of humor, and an appeal to logos.  Bomani made jokes during his speech to keep it feeling lighthearted.  This made the boring parts of his speech, where he was listing facts, more interesting.  He appealed to logos through giving the scientific names of all of the plants involved and gave facts about their work and the environment.  By giving quantitative facts, people were shown how much work this organization has already done to a more accurate degree.  I believe he did accomplish his purpose because the speech has over 70,000 views, which means that many people have seen it and know that alternative resources are becoming a viable option.