The Trouble With Biofuels
Maybe it was simply too good to be true. For proponents, biofuels — petroleum substitutes made from plant matter like corn or sugar cane — seemed to promise everything. Using biofuels rather than oil would reduce the greenhouse gases that accelerate global warming, because plants absorb carbon dioxide when they grow, balancing out the carbon released when burned in cars or trucks. Using homegrown biofuels would help the U.S. reduce its utter dependence on foreign oil, and provide needed income for rural farmers around the world. And unlike cars powered purely by electric batteries or hydrogen fuel cells — two alternate technologies that have yet to pan out — biofuels could be used right now.
But according to a pair of studies published in the journal Science recently, biofuels may not fulfill that promise — and in fact, may be worse for the climate than the fossil fuels they’re meant to supplement. According to researchers at Princeton University and the Nature Conservancy, almost all the biofuels used today cause more greenhouse gas emissions than conventional fuels, if the full environmental cost of producing them is factored in. As virgin land is converted for growing biofuels, carbon dioxide is released into the atmosphere; at the same time, biofuel crops themselves are much less effective at absorbing carbon than the natural forests or grasslands they may be replacing. “When land is converted from natural ecosystems it releases carbon,” says Joseph Fargione, a lead author of one of the papers and a scientist at the Nature Conservancy. “Any climate change policy that doesn’t take this fact into account doesn’t work.” … [more]
There is some sense to this article, although there is some nonsense, too.
What does the author mean by “rural” farmers? Is there any other kind?
What is “virgin land”? Islamo-martyr heaven?
It is clear that the Nature Conservancy is opposed to rural residency and “rural” farming. It seems global warming is a handy rationalization for their policies. But TNC is also a strong proponent of whoofoos, megafires, and burning public and private land. Don’t those fires contribute greenhouse gases?
TNC puts what it wants first, and their “science” is a malleable tool for justifying and promoting their land grabbing ways. That being said, biofuels do have a lot of defects and limitations.