ID:30500
 
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ Biological_hydrogen_production_%28Algae%29

According to this link, algae can be used to produce large amounts of hydrogen, quoting from the article,
"An algae-farm the size of the state Texas would produce enough hydrogen to supply the energy needs of the whole world. About 25,000 square kilometers is enough to displace gasoline use in the US. (less than a tenth of what the US devotes to growing soya)" To cover the entire United States oil usage, it would require a algae farm the size of New Hampshire.

According to what I can come up with the entire US oil imports at the moment are worth about 344,127,840,000 US Dollars. Or roughly a 3% increase in US GDP if oil imports were completely eliminated. Not only would this create huge amounts of new jobs, it would reduce automobile pollution to 0. An added side effect of this is the tremendous decrease in the price of oil. As many of you know the plastics we use in our every day products are made from oil. As oil gets more expensive, the prices of many ordinary goods increase. So a decrease in the cost of our commodities, puts more money into the hands of the consumer, and more money into the hands of businesses. Increasing pay, margins, and performance.

The only problem is there is not enough research into this form of growing currently a university announced a 6% return of energy from the sun into hydrogen. To make this economically feasible, at least a 10% return of energy is needed. If we can further increase efficiency, we can remove the entire US dependence on foreign oil, we can tremendously improve the economy, and have a viable way to produce hydrogen for the future.