Last week, a post on the Hybrid Car Blog shouted (with seven exclamation points, no less) “Stop the Madness: Hybrid Vehicles Not E85!!!!!!! which, while interesting, completely misses the point in my mind. It also, unfortunately, is an illustration of the kind of either/or thinking that risks polarizing and confusing the issues surrounding the push for alternative transportation fuels.

Allow me to explain: Hybrid Car Blog argues that ethanol "will simply lead to more flex-fuel Hummers and little decrease in foreign oil dependency." The author goes on to say that "E85 is a feel-good way of accomplishing nothing, something both Democrats and Republicans love - talk, talk, talk, but do nothing."

In reality, both E85 and hybrid technology could be used in tandem to quickly change petroleum consumption patterns globally.

For argument's sake, let's use Chevy's upcoming Tahoe Hybrid as an example. Granted, this is a big, burly SUV, but that makes it exactly the kind of conspicuous consumer of petroleum that some say are the worst part of the problem.

But check this out: If you combine the Tahoe's hybrid technology with its Flex Fuel engine, you end up with a big, burly SUV that uses less petroleum per mile than a friggin' MOPED. Better still, this isn't science ficton: you'll be able to drive one off the showroom floor in about six months

Crazy? Let's break down the numbers. Chevy's posted MPG for the gas only version of the 2007 5.3L V8 Tahoe is 17.7 MPG combined (15/21MPG at 55% city, 45% highway). Pretty ugly, so far.

On the other hand, this Tahoe is a Flex Fuel vehicle, which means you can pump E85 into it today, and it'll run just fine. When you do, however, you incur a 23% fuel consumption penalty, over running it on pure gasoline, so you end up with a combined mileage figure of 13.6 MPG.

Here's where it gets interesting: When you're running E85, you're only burning 15% petroleum (E85 is 85% ethanol, 15% gasoline). So, using our Chevy Tahoe as an example, you're only burning as much PETROLEUM as a vehicle that gets 91 MPG! And we haven't even added hybrid technology into the mix.

In the middle of next year, when Chevy releases the dual-mode hybrid version of the Tahoe, it'll get approximately 25% better mileage than the non-hybrid version. So the hybrid version, running E85, will get 17MPG, but use the equivalent amount of petroleum as a vehicle that gets 114 MPG!

In the end, shifting away from dependence on foreign oil is not going to come about because of one killer technology. Like entrepreneur Steven Johnson said in Matter's recent interview, "It is important that people realize that there will not be any single silver bullet solution to either oil supply limitations or the problem of climate change. There are, however, a lot of silver BBs."

Both hybrid technology and E85 are BBs we can employ immediately. Neither of them may be the be-all, end-all solution, but both of them, intelligently combined and applied, can play a big part in moving things in the right direction, right away.