The Big, the Bad and the Biofuels
by Jenna Watson, Barcelona on 06.26.07
At the recent meeting of Friends of Trees held in Barcelona, Vandana Shiva made some interesting comments about biofuels, which lead us to wonder why we don’t see more about it even here on Treehugger. She said that it takes more energy to produce 1 litre of biofuels than the energy that is given by that same litre and that . Coming from this renowned physicist, ecologist, seed activist and eco-feminist we thought we should look further into the topic. Not coincidentally, later on during the conference a Spanish NGO called Debt Watch passed out a one page flyer that answers “5 questions about biofuels or agrofuels.”
In short here is what they say (they also provide references which you can see on their website ):
1. Are agrofuels clean and do they protect the environment?
All of the agrochemicals and the petroleum necessary to produce and transport biofuels contaminate air, soil and water adding to the greenhouse effect. Numerous studies show that the energy balance for these crops is negative.
2. Don’t agrofuels imply deforestation?
In Brasil alone the deforestation of 80 million hectares of Amazon forest is planned. When the organization calculated the deforestation (for cutting and burning) the total emissions per unit of palm oil is approximately double that of gasoline.
3. Do agrofuels aid in rural development?
In the tropics 100 hectares used for family agriculture generates 35 jobs, where as for palm oil and sugar cane only 10 jobs are created, eucalyptus 2, soy 1.5. Small land owners cannot access loans and do not own enough land that would make the production of biofuels worthwhile. Hundred of thousands of farmers and indigenous people have been displaced in Latin America.
4. Won’t agrofuels cause hunger and thirst?
The demand last year for corn to produce ethanol caused an increase in the price of this crop, as well pig-farmers noted the rising cost of grain needed to make feed (soy, corn and barley) along with rising costs of rice and wheat. The millions of people suffering from hunger are rising in number while we are using grain to produce fuel.
5. Are second generation agrofuels within our reach?
The flyer notes that industrial processes are being studied (as we know) to obtain ethanol from cellulose, which would eliminate the use of grains to create biofuels.
George Monbiot also tackled the issue in recent issue of The Guardian and we covered it in March. He also warned of the social, economic and environmental impacts of biofuels. After searching life cycle assessments of biofuels we found there are varying views remembering that LCA is generally limited to environmental impacts and rarely incorporates social or economic aspects.
It seems this issue will be an ongoing one, so before we can give thumbs up or thumbs down on biofuels more investigation needs to happen. Beyond all of this talk about biofuels are we really just avoiding the real issue of reducing consumption and our dependence on vehicular motion? Walk, ride your bike, take your skateboard, and if need be use a car-sharing program – get rid of your addiction to the automobile. Isn’t that where the real changes need to be made before we consider alternative fuels? Biofuels are obviously not going to be the solution unless properly managed. It is a sustainable development issue: environment, economics and society are all being hurt by the current race to create biofuels. Check out the Debt Watch website if you are a Spanish-speaker or our coverage of Monbiot's article. Inform yourself about biofuels and tell us what you think. Good, bad or ugly? Read the full flyer in Spanish (sorry English-speakers!)here. Image credit: The Age
If you want an organisation that deals with biofuels then you are probably looking for biofuelwatch.
http://www.biofuelwatch.org.uk
They are superb! Also, you are right this topic is often neglected, perticularly in the usa so more please!
David Tilman and colleagues have done some of the most in-depth peer-reviewed work on the subject. In short, corn is bad for a variety of ecological and social reasons, while fast-growing, no-input varieties of grasses and the like which grow naturally could be beneficial.
This paper, published in PNAS, lays out the argument:
http://www.pnas.org/cgi/content/abstract/0604600103v1
The abstract:
"Negative environmental consequences of fossil fuels and concerns about petroleum supplies have spurred the search for renewable transportation biofuels. To be a viable alternative, a biofuel should provide a net energy gain, have environmental benefits, be economically competitive, and be producible in large quantities without reducing food supplies. We use these criteria to evaluate, through life-cycle accounting, ethanol from corn grain and biodiesel from soybeans. Ethanol yields 25% more energy than the energy invested in its production, whereas biodiesel yields 93% more. Compared with ethanol, biodiesel releases just 1.0%, 8.3%, and 13% of the agricultural nitrogen, phosphorus, and pesticide pollutants, respectively, per net energy gain. Relative to the fossil fuels they displace, greenhouse gas emissions are reduced 12% by the production and combustion of ethanol and 41% by biodiesel. Biodiesel also releases less air pollutants per net energy gain than ethanol. These advantages of biodiesel over ethanol come from lower agricultural inputs and more efficient conversion of feedstocks to fuel. Neither biofuel can replace much petroleum without impacting food supplies. Even dedicating all U.S. corn and soybean production to biofuels would meet only 12% of gasoline demand and 6% of diesel demand. Until recent increases in petroleum prices, high production costs made biofuels unprofitable without subsidies. Biodiesel provides sufficient environmental advantages to merit subsidy. Transportation biofuels such as synfuel hydrocarbons or cellulosic ethanol, if produced from low-input biomass grown on agriculturally marginal land or from waste biomass, could provide much greater supplies and environmental benefits than food-based biofuels."
A follow-up paper, published in Science, explains that diverse grassland perennials are much more efficient (where's the grassland perennial lobby when you need it?!): http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/abstract/sci;314/5805/1598
Abstract:
"Biofuels derived from low-input high-diversity (LIHD) mixtures of native grassland perennials can provide more usable energy, greater greenhouse gas reductions, and less agrichemical pollution per hectare than can corn grain ethanol or soybean biodiesel. High-diversity grasslands had increasingly higher bioenergy yields that were 238% greater than monoculture yields after a decade. LIHD biofuels are carbon negative because net ecosystem carbon dioxide sequestration (4.4 megagram hectare–1 year–1 of carbon dioxide in soil and roots) exceeds fossil carbon dioxide release during biofuel production (0.32 megagram hectare–1 year–1). Moreover, LIHD biofuels can be produced on agriculturally degraded lands and thus need to neither displace food production nor cause loss of biodiversity via habitat destruction."
***
They lay out the argument against corn-based biofuels for the layman in an op-ed in the Washington Post published in March:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/03/23/AR2007032301625.html
ETHANOL HYPE
Corn Can't Solve Our Problem
By David Tilman and Jason Hill
Sunday, March 25, 2007
Just as a side-note, I really dislike the term eco-feminist.
Using that work makes it sound like women somehow have a deeper connection with the environment, or that the two causes are intertwined in some way. The environment is EVERYONE's responsibility.
Good link Calvin :)
I dont get all the fuss about biofuels anyway. Whether it has a bit negative or a bit positive balance, it stays a highly ineffective method of fighting off climate change.
All the subventions that go into biofuels from plantations (not talking about waste here) could be used so much more effeciently:
1) Preventing deforestation of rainforest
2) Getting electricity from somewhere else but black or even brown coal
3) Energy efficiency: stopping wasting energy on light-bulbs, old freezers etc..
4) Isolating homes etc,
5) Hot water from the solar heating...
Why should we waste our money on measures that are highly ineffective. As long as brown coal and rainforest is still burned somewhere, we shouldnt waste our time on oil.
Treehugger should focus on stuff like this more often. I love the environment, and I'm glad it has a great movement, but sometimes I think a lot of environmentalists are easily taken for a ride. Once the movement falls for an idea that doesn't make sense, people like Penn and Teller catch us on it and try to make our entire cause look stupid.
Ethanol makes for a great commercial, and many average people still think that it is better than gas, when it really doesn't look too good in practice. Neither is hydrogen. The world really needs to focus on different technologies, even though they don't seem as easy to market.
I agree with most on this, its starting to look like ethanol is a poor alternative fuel, especially when you factor in the risk of rising food prices. With evidence mounting that hydrogen is just too expensive to make and store, I think our only viable alternative is electric, garnered from a variety of sources (clean coal, nuclear, solar, wind). Luckily were starting to see electric making inroads in transportation, hopefully its just a matter of time....
It is nice to see this discussion of LIHD biofuels and prairie grasses. It is true that prairie grasses do not have a lobby (with the exception of monocultures of cordgrass and switchgrass).
Those interested in LIHD might be interested in the LIHD blog: http://testone.okstate.edu/debo/blogs/
--Michael Palmer, Professor of Botany, Oklahoma State University