Surprise! Biofuels Do More Harm Than Good
Regular readers know I have been pointing this out for quite some time now. But two new studies finally admit that biofuels are worse for the environment – and produce more greenhouse gas – than fossil fuel.
These studies for the first time take a detailed, comprehensive look at the emissions effects of the huge amount of natural land that is being converted to cropland globally to support biofuels development.
The destruction of natural ecosystems — whether rain forest in the tropics or grasslands in South America — not only releases greenhouse gases into the atmosphere when they are burned and plowed, but also deprives the planet of natural sponges to absorb carbon emissions. Cropland also absorbs far less carbon than the rain forests or even scrubland that it replaces.
Together the two studies offer sweeping conclusions: It does not matter if it is rain forest or scrubland that is cleared, the greenhouse gas contribution is significant. More important, they discovered that, taken globally, the production of almost all biofuels resulted, directly or indirectly, intentionally or not, in new lands being cleared, either for food or fuel.
“When you take this into account, most of the biofuel that people are using or planning to use would probably increase greenhouse gasses substantially,” said Timothy Searchinger, lead author of one of the studies and a researcher in environment and economics at Princeton University. “Previously there’s been an accounting error: land use change has been left out of prior analysis.”
These plant-based fuels were originally billed as better than fossil fuels because the carbon released when they were burned was balanced by the carbon absorbed when the plants grew. But even that equation proved overly simplistic because the process of turning plants into fuels causes its own emissions — for refining and transport, for example.
The clearance of grassland releases 93 times the amount of greenhouse gas that would be saved by the fuel made annually on that land, said Joseph Fargione, lead author of the second paper, and a scientist at the Nature Conservancy. “So for the next 93 years you’re making climate change worse, just at the time when we need to be bringing down carbon emissions.”
Just search the word biofuel if you want to see all the times I've posted about this. Biofuels are one of the "and then a miracle happens" so-called solutions touted by certain interested parties that ignore basic laws of physics. Those laws are not arbitrary – they actually apply. Wishing them away does not work.
These studies focus on only part of the disaster of biofuels. The negative impact on the world's food supply is already being felt, the water issues are only beginning to be seen. Yet there are still bureaucrats pushing to put another glossy coat of lipstick on the biofuel pig.
Energy, Environment | Gaius February 8, 2008
By Neo, February 8, 2008 @ 2:34 pm
This has been coming for a while now.
Just a few weeks ago the EU Commission got a report saying the same thing, but found it politically distasteful, so they did their best to ignore it.
I guess it was one of those “inconvenient truths“.
By terrence, February 8, 2008 @ 2:47 pm
Biofuels are like most, if not all, eco-fascist “solutions’ – they are poorly thought out, if thought out at all; they create bigger problems then they were intended to solve; but, and this is the really important part, they make eco-fascists FEEL good. What happens in the real world is no significance to these emotional cretins; their FEELINGS are all that matters.
By Mockinbird, February 8, 2008 @ 4:39 pm
It is great that these studies came as soon as they did.
Corn was invented to be drunk. Oh, yeah you’re right, and to be eaten, too.
By feeblemind, February 8, 2008 @ 5:11 pm
Another article on Global COOLING has appeared at IBD. http://ibdeditorial.com/IBDArticles.aspx?id=287279412587175