The smouldering debate over biofuel

In the early 19th century, while a young Charles Dickens toiled for six shillings a week in a decrepit London boot-blacking factory and went home to a darkened room, the wealthy enjoyed the fragrant glow of spermaceti oil candles burning in their chandeliers. This remarkably clear and aromatic oil was harvested from the huge head of the sperm whale, driving the creature of Moby Dick fame toward the brink of extinction.
The beginning of the end of the whale oil age came in 1858, when James Miller Williams managed to produce what was then called “natural rock oil” from a well near the present-day towns of Oil Springs and Petrolia, Ont....