We see articles vaguely along these lines all the time. What’s interesting about this one is that the technology is already up and running on a small scale, and plans are for a commercial plant to be online by 2011…just a couple years out.

Scientists find bugs that eat waste and excrete petrol – Times Online

He means bugs. To be more precise: the genetic alteration of bugs – very, very small ones – so that when they feed on agricultural waste such as woodchips or wheat straw, they do something extraordinary. They excrete crude oil.