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- yaddayaddayoda, on 10/09/2008, -4/+21Cellulostic ethanol. Rapeseed. Soybeans into biodiesel. There are lots of good alternatives that actually make sense, and help the problem instead of hurting it.
Corn into ethanol is just stupid... it's a political game to subsidize corn farmers. Cutting down the rainforest to plant more corn in Brazil and Central America was only one of the unintended consequences... they calculate that it's 94x as bad for the earth to cut down vegetation and plant corn, than to just burn straight gasoline in the first place. Oops. - niccha, on 10/09/2008, -1/+16The point of the article is that, regardless of how you feel about biofuels, they aren't going away. Instead of belaboring how awful they are, a better use of energy would be to make biofuels of all types better and figure out they can coexist with food crops.
- exspasticcomics, on 10/09/2008, -15/+28i'm sorry.. but biofuels are stupid... save the planet by cutting down the trees & ...making gas out of them? how about some good alternative power sources instead? or at least.. more cars that run on used disgusting fryer grease that no one wants to touch to begin with. or in short- there's gotta be better ideas out there than this...
- ratexla, on 10/09/2008, -1/+11CONDOMS! 8D
*cough* *cough*
Oh, and go carfree if you can. - DerekJackson, on 10/09/2008, -0/+10While I disagree with corn ethanol or any other alternative fuel that costs as much in energy to create as it produces, I do see great potential in algae-based diesel fuel. Of course, 'great potential' doesn't equate to cheap enough till it can be produced in huge quantities and doesn't have a negative offset like poor fuel mileage. Additionally, it can't be cheap because we're subsidizing it.
- tbhurst, on 10/09/2008, -1/+11It is far more pragmatic to figure out the best way to incorporate some use of biofuels than to argue they shouldn't exist at all.
- AlbinoRaven, on 10/10/2008, -0/+9Ummmm, less people? Not that hard.
- aquireworth, on 10/09/2008, -3/+12I agree. We're supposed to eat our food, not use it to make our cars run. Creating competition between food land and fuel land is not going to turn out good.
- daonlyfreez, on 10/10/2008, -0/+8There is "good" bio-fuel and there is "bad" bio-fuel (oils, gasses).
Bad:
- palm oil: causes deforestation/destruction of the remaining jungle(s), secondary food source, needs massive amounts of water, fertilizers and pesticides
- corn, soy: are primary food sources, need massive amounts of water, fertilizers and pesticides
- rapeseed, sunflower and others: are secondary food sources, need massive amounts of water, fertilizers and pesticides
(chemical, industrial fertilizers are created from... crude oil)
Good:
- bio fuels from bio waste (e.g. landfills, used cooking oil, animal fats, manure, any bio mass that would normally be thrown away) if properly filtered. Concern: filtering leaves new waste.
- algae: "low maintenance", multiply naturally, perfect for transforming bio waste, small on needed space
- (industrial) hemp, oily weeds: grow fast, hardly need water/fertilizers, don't need pesticides, can grow on previously unused land
- some other, yet to be discovered alternative.
Gasoline engine: (bio) fuel gets burned in car, filtering: poor
Diesel engine: (bio) fuel gets burned in car, filtering: poor
Natural gas engine: (bio) fuel gets burned in car, filtering: poor, but comparably clean burn
Hybrid engine: combination of the above with electrical engine, (bio) fuel gets burned in car/power plant, filtering: poor
Electrical engine: (bio) fuel gets burned in power plant not car, filtering: extremely poor
Essential flaw: none of the techniques prevent the general extremely poor filtering of the waste that seriously impacts our planet.
The problem with burning fuels (which is what all do) is the burning: it creates waste, partially toxic and destructive waste that has not been effectively filtered out of the process, and this for at least 100 years already.
That is the essential flaw.
There have never been sufficient efforts to force creators of "fuel burners" to take care of the waste. It is blown into the sky (usually).
One advantage of electrical engines is the (possible) centralizing of the power plants, replacing (slowly unfortunately) the millions of fuel engines around, so one could fix the core of the problem: the filtering of the waste.
Millions of engines burning crude oil derivatives (gasoline, or the so-called "Diesel" fuel) is what we have now... and it ain't good...
Electricity? It has to be created somehow:
- Coal plants are the worst, there is hardly any filtering done (capture the ***** that escapes from the chimneys).
- Nuclear plants are expensive (there wouldn't be any were it not for massive government subsidies), they produce very dangerous waste, are very dangerous in case of an accident and are dependent on uranium, which is not plenty and in some "problematic" countries.
- "Alternative" plants, wind-, water-, solar-, geothermal-, tidal plants are a good alternative (there is no burning of fuel: no waste).
In the short run: since Diesel engines were built to burn bio fuels, the most environmentally friendly (small) solution would be to burn bio fuels (the ones in the "good" category) in a Diesel engine (with good filtering please), and convert it into electricity to (later) use that for an electrical engine (car).
In the long run: replacing fuel engines with electrical engines, and investments in "alternative", "non-burning" plants instead of in nuclear plants, let alone coal plants.
If the essential flaw is not fixed: the use of fuel burning engines, nothing will change to the better.
Remember this if you plan on investing in "self-sufficient" energy. - inactive, on 10/10/2008, -0/+8The majority of corn being raised to day is essentially not food. Take a look at the film "King Corn". The corn must be processed before it is usable. And the corn used to make ethanol can still be used as livestock feed and fertilizer.
- Volatile36, on 10/10/2008, -0/+7The only really promising biofuel seems to be algal. The algae aren't part of anyone's food supply which is great since food prices are rising already without taking MORE food out of the picture. And can be grown and maintained indefinitely with little cost or land use, they need only nutrient rich water and sun.
- waspbr, on 10/10/2008, -0/+7except that they don't plant corn in brazil and central america, they use sugar cane instead, and it the crops are thousands of kilometre away from any rain forest
- michaelpinto, on 10/10/2008, -0/+6You can't have biofuel without a healthy water supply and this is already a huge issue in the west and now even in places like Georgia. It's also a false argument to assume that "biofuels are here to stay" - as it is they can't exist without gov. funding which isn't the case with wind and solar.
- cr42yr1ch, on 10/10/2008, -0/+6Current "corn into ethanol" biofuel is unsustainable, however this is a very minor biofuel source in the overall scheme of things. New technologies, for example "cellulosic ethanol" will be sustainable. These new technologies concentrate on using the inedible components of the plant (the leaves, stem, etc.) instead of the corn itself to produce ethanol.
- inactive, on 10/10/2008, -0/+5It's not biofuels that are lame, smart guy... It's our current methodology for generating them. Another reply already mentioned algae. Cyanobacteria is another potential solution. Guess what...there aren't any trees being cut down to grow either of these because the best place to grow them is the desert. Not only that, biofuel generating crops like algae and cyanobacteria will be completely within the carbon cycle...meaning the emissions they generate very well may have zero net effect on our atmosphere and environment. A more perfect solution doesn't exist, yet...and ....that's BIOFUEL.
- johnpaul191, on 10/10/2008, -0/+5Corn is not an efficient way to make biofuel. It's used because it's a political crop more than anything to appeal to the midwest. It's only $2.59 because of massive subsidies.
There are other things that can be grown on the same fields that allow the whole plant to be used, and are not as destructive to the land as corn.
I'm all for the government investing in alternative energy (look how much tax money goes to "bail out" the ailing oil industry), but i wish it was based on science and not political dealmaking. - ratexla, on 10/09/2008, -0/+5Lester R. Brown has a plan!
http://www.earthpolicy.org/Books/PB3/index.htm
I just haven't finished reading it yet. - niccha, on 10/10/2008, -0/+4You're looking at it from a US and Europe-centric viewpoint. To many parts of the world, biofuels are a reality without government subsidies (Brazil, many parts of Asia, India).
- GRTWHT, on 10/10/2008, -0/+4avasol & ricksite - I don't know about your situation, but I actually have friends that are farmers/ranchers and the cost of feed for them has skyrocketed since ethanol production shot up - the reason(s) that I'm being told is:
1. Many of the farmers that used to grow feed corn, alfalfa, etc are now growing corn for ethanol.
2. There is no cheap feed byproduct from ethanol production. Perhaps they are producing feed as a byproduct, but if so, it's not available around here for less than the remaining feed producers are now selling their feed for (up significantly due to supply and demand).
In short, ethanol production HAS pushed out food crops (livestock food) already and it's just getting started. While I'm a big supporter of alternative fuels (including biodiesel), I'm not a supporter of ethanol at all (this doesn't even include the 'use more energy to make it than it produces when burned' argument). - johnpaul191, on 10/10/2008, -0/+4Look up the statistics at how much land is used to grow food for human consumption. Meat is an incredibly inefficient way to feed people.
- GRTWHT, on 10/10/2008, -0/+4Rationally thought out and expressed...I'm amazed you haven't been buried! I guess there's still hope for digg.
- johnpaul191, on 10/10/2008, -0/+4They are 100% right. It takes 10 pounds of grain to make 1 pound of meat. Add all the fresh water that is used to grow that grain, and for the animals to live off of. Then add the environmental impact of all the cows (including the runoff of their waste and how it infects vegetables.... e.coli @ taco bell for example). Vegans to do eat anywhere near 10x the volume/mass of food that omnivores do. They are not unhealthy. I've been vegetarian since 1993 and vegan since 2001 and i am in the best shape of my life.
It may not be the solution you want to hear, but more people adopting a veg*n diet would lead to a massive excess of farmland. More than is needed for biofuels.
People taking that solution off the table is not much different than saying "screw that, i want a massive SUV that gets 6 mpg". - atact88, on 10/10/2008, -0/+3Well, the hope and aim of scientists in this are is to move biofuel production into microorganisms like algae, bacteria, or yeast. Yeast can easily produce ethanol, algae can use a photosynthetic process like plants to make oil or hydrogen gas, and bacteria can be modified to do this as well. Of course, in the long term it would be preferable to move to things like solar power, but it's not practical in terms of cost and size right now. Some of the best and most "green" solar panels (such as Gretzel) use ionic liquids, whose properties are still being studied for practical application, especially in batteries because the material can be reclaimed,doesn't decompose over many charge/discharge cycles, and is less flammable than lithium batteries (exploding laptops, anyone?). The problem with these technologies is that they're extremely expensive. Six years ago a solar powered Suburban that Virginia Tech was building was worth $7.1 million. I haven't checked on it since, but I doubt it's down to my affordability range. I'm not a big fan of wind turbines (no pun intended) and don't find nuclear to be a particularly practical option.
Number two on the list is to embrace genetically modified foods that are designed to direct the most resources into the food portion of the plant (e.g. corn with shorter stalks, bigger ears), increase protein yield, and enrich the nutrients in the food. It doesn't necessarily mean getting more bushels per harvest, as some pundits would argue. It's about needing less of it. This is the only way the whole world can be fed on the land that we have available. In addition, nutrient supplements are going to become more important. While studies have shown that One-a-Day's can actually be more harmful, a nutrient supplement that gives you much smaller, natural doses of vitamins and minerals would be good. I recently read an article in Chemical and Engineering News that talked about how DuPont, Dow Agrosciences, and Monsanto (the names that people love to hate) were exploring new sustainable ways of supplying Omega-3 fatty acid supplements by using algae to produce them and encapsulating the oils in a dietary supplement. This is preferable to the current method of harvesting fish for them, because it's not actually the fish that make them - it's the algae they eat that make the Omega-3 fatty acids. As we know, there's a problem with overfishing throughout the world. - shanealeslie, on 10/10/2008, -0/+3And the byproducts can be used as feedstock for animals, or processed for humans (mmmm algae paste).
As an added bonus, some strains can probably be coaxed into cleaning up Superfund sites by converting
all those pollutants into something less toxic. - waspbr, on 10/10/2008, -0/+3at the moment food prices are a lot more influenced by oil prices then by bio-fuels. almost every bit of the agricultural and manufacturing process depends on oil, if oil goes up production costs go up and food prices also go up.
aside from the silly use of corn, no other bio-fuel has had any significant impact on food prices. To think otherwise is pure ignorance. - gospe1337, on 10/10/2008, -0/+3I thought I had read biofuels are inefficient net gains when all processes and stages are considered?
- DrNemo, on 10/10/2008, -0/+3Biofuels were pushed by government and those who invested heavely in them will probably fail miserably. With all the hybrids coming out next year and the prospect of affordable electric cars in a few years, biofuels won't last very long. I don't know what's so big about them. The price or the fact that they're renewable? We'll still have affordable petrol for a good awful lot of years, the problem isn't the reserves but the fact that governments limit the supply and tax it. In Switzerland/France, approx 60% of the price of gas at the pump is taxes. We're only paying 40% or less to the "greedy oil companies" and the middlemen, the guys who are really responsible for the product.
- ratexla, on 10/09/2008, -0/+3EDIT: Here is the table of contents...
http://www.earthpolicy.org/Books/PB3/Contents.htm
...including a link to a PDF OF THE ENTIRE BOOK, sorry, I didn't find that earlier:
http://www.earthpolicy.org/Books/PB3/pb3book.pdf - MicrosoftBob, on 10/10/2008, -0/+3You are misinformed. Read "The China Study" (or even just the parts about animal-based protein and disease). It's the most long-term and exhaustive study ever conducted about diet and health.
- Naieve, on 10/10/2008, -1/+4I agree, the problem being there is no discussion...
It's not those angry that biofuel is being prematurely used before valid ones like algae come to fruition, but those who are pushing it and the fact they made it a political issue that is going forward despite the fact it does more harm than good in its current form.
Telling us to figure out the best way to deal with it is pointless, we have no say what is going to happen.
We are just pointing out the idiocy of the current plan, which is all we can do.
We aren't the ones who pushed the premature technology onto everyone through use of politicians... - avasol, on 10/10/2008, -2/+5Everything that contains starch is a renewable source of energy.
Ethanol, for you ***** that don't know what it really is, is the same as alcohol.
If the above argument, which comes exclusively from the car and oil industry and is essentially completely false, would be true, then this would have happened many many decades ago already because alcohol (liqour, beer, etc) comes from the same grain now being turned into fuel. This has not and will never affect "the poor". The fact that prices are rising is because transports OF FOOD today are delivered through the primary means of oil-based consumption. Oil goes up, so does food prices. Ethanol can be produced in your backyard, not so with oil. Get your facts straight.
The whole article is ***** and is the kind of argument proposed by those who want us to stick with using non-renewable, polluting sources.
Which is worst, a tanker of oil breaking up or a tanker of ethanol?
Sheeples. - MacParrot, on 10/10/2008, -0/+3You going to volunteer for the chopper? Let me know how that works out.
- Naieve, on 10/10/2008, -0/+3The problem with that is they are not worrying about long term plausibility in most of those cases....
On the whole, world wide, bio fuel using traditional crops is simply not a long term solution, and will only hasten the water shortages being felt across much of the world. - CaffieneMan, on 10/10/2008, -0/+3one word for this
mistake - hoisonsauce, on 10/10/2008, -0/+2Have you ever been by a vehicle that runs used cooking grease? It actually smells like a batch of fries or chicken cooking.
- slantyeyed, on 10/10/2008, -0/+2there isn't enough land on the earth to produce the amounts of biofuel needed
- MicrosoftBob, on 10/10/2008, -0/+2Once was enough.
- cfuse, on 10/10/2008, -0/+2How can the global community prevent millions of people from falling into famine? Same way we always do, by doing nothing. Most people in the first world don't understand that the cheapest and most expendable quantity on Earth is human lives - just look for the dangerous jobs that cannot be done by machines to find these people.
- inactive, on 10/10/2008, -2/+4"costs as much in energy to create as it produces"
That is oil company propaganda. Do some research. An average acre of corn will yield 370 gallons of ethanol. I can grow and harvest corn for average on-farm fuel use of less than 1 gallon. Fertilizer and transportation costs are not going to be greater than 369 gallon/acre. In fact, I would guesstimate the actual fuel use to be less than 10 gal/acre.
There are better yielding crops for alcohol, but corn is being used because there has been a glut of product. - Khast, on 10/10/2008, -0/+2What would Captain Planet do?
- ricksite, on 10/10/2008, -0/+2@michaelpinto Gasoline has been around a long time and it can't exist without government funding. Do you think securing oil is free?
- toomanyhandles, on 10/10/2008, -0/+2There are in hand methods (and there are demo plants producing fuels) to do this from waste materials.
Business can't resist the fast burn and churn so crops are being used at the moment.
This isn't supportable long term. - inactive, on 10/10/2008, -0/+2There are other ways of getting bio-fuels.
Termites give off hydrogen as a waster product, for example. - MicrosoftBob, on 10/10/2008, -0/+2Diesel also contributes significantly to the longevity of an engine. That's why truckers use it.
- KingGorilla, on 10/10/2008, -0/+2yes and yes.
- exspasticcomics, on 10/12/2008, -0/+2the original word for 'hell' was Gehenna. Gehenna was the name of the dump outside of Jerusalem where everybody used to throw their trash. the trash rotten & after a couple of hundred years- made the soil fertile- as such.. I'd be happy to go to hell... it's a park-- here are some pictures---
http://what-the-hell-is-hell.com/HellPhotos/ - AlbinoRaven, on 10/10/2008, -1/+3Go read the article and then come back to the conversation.
- wasanasan, on 10/10/2008, -0/+2Supply Depot
- ratexla, on 10/10/2008, -0/+2UN report:
"LIVESTOCK'S LONG SHADOW"
http://www.fao.org/docrep/010/a0701e/a0701e00.htm - Mightbiteyou, on 10/10/2008, -1/+3with one vegan you can make 14 gallons of fuel, just grind one up and add 2 parts of water
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