[SustainableTompkins] 'Fuels gold': New Scientist on biofuel risks

[Tony Del Plato]

In a nutshell, biofuels, especially corn, will raise food prices, consume
more land and water. Time to walk & bike or hop on the bus.
Tony Del Plato


From: larrylohmann at gn.apc.org
Date: October 2, 2006 11:13:08 AM EDT

Fuels gold: Big risks of the biofuel revolution
Fred Pearce
New Scientist 2570 25 September 2006, page 36-41

The gold rush has begun. Ditch oil and buy corn - as much as you can.
It's asure-fire investment. At least that's the message you might have
picked upfrom the headlines in recent months. Soon, we're told, corn
crops will be asvaluable as black gold. Not because tortilla chips are
the next big diet fad,but because corn and a handful of other crops
are being hyped as the fuelsources of the future.

There are many reasons for this sudden excitement surrounding
"biofuels"(see "Biofuel basics", beneath this article, for a look at
exactly what thiscovers). Not only have soaring oil prices made
biofuels economically viablefor the first time in years, but they
could also help countries reduce theirdependency on fossil fuel
imports. However, the real PR coup for biofuels istheir eco-friendly
image.

Supporters claim they will dramatically slash our net greenhouse gas
inputs,because the crops soak up carbon dioxide from the atmosphere as
they grow.Given this, it's no surprise politicians and
environmentalists the world overare backing the idea, hoping we will
all soon be using this green alternativeto power our cars, buses and
trains. Even former oilman President George W.Bush is behind them. In
his State of the Union address on 31 January, hecalled for a national
drive to run vehicles on biofuels.

But before you join in the celebrations, all is not as it seems.
Scientists have begun to question the environmental and social
arguments for bioethanoland biodiesel (see "Biodiesel backlash"),
casting serious doubts on whethereither can meet such high hopes. And
environmentalists find themselves in aparticularly excruciating
quandary, with half the green communityembracing biofuels to the last
corn kernel, and the other half desperate toslam on the brakes.

Far from solving our problems, say the dissenters, biofuels will
trashrainforests, suck water reserves dry, kill off species and raise
food prices.They will also accelerate the corporate takeover of
agriculture, create famines and could leave fuel importers as dependent
as ever on other countries.Worst of all, many biofuels will barely
slow global warming at all if thetechnology behind them does not
improve. The biofuels supporters counterthat it's still early days,
and we should give this technology the time andinvestment to deliver
on its promise. So who's right?

The controversy may be brand new, but biofuels themselves are an old
idea.The Model T Ford, first produced in 1908, was designed to run on
ethanol,and Rudolf Diesel, who invented the diesel engine in 1892, ran
hisdemonstration model on peanut oil. Biofuels fell out of favour as
petroleum- based fuels appeared and became cheaper to produce, but
after the oil crisisof the early 1970s, some countries returned to
biofuels. For example, Brazilhas been producing large quantities of
ethanol from sugar cane for over 30years, and last year produced about
half of the world's bioethanol (seeGraphic). Brazilian law now
requires that 20 per cent of fuel at the pumps beblended with
bioethanol, which all gasoline-powered cars can tolerate. Over15 per
cent of Brazil's cars can even run on pure bioethanol.

According to a study published in June by the Worldwatch Institute,
forBrazil to produce 10 per cent of its entire fuel consumption
requires just 3 per cent of its agricultural land, so it's not
surprising other places want toemulate Brazil's approach. The problem
is that in most other countries, thenumbers don't add up.

------------------------- "Bioethanol production is forecast to double
between 2005 and 2007, bywhich time it will consume a fifth of the US
corn crop" -------------------------

The same Worldwatch study estimated that to meet that 10 per cent
target,the US would require 30 per cent of its agricultural land, and
Europe astaggering 72 per cent. It's no secret why things stack up so
differently. Notonly do Brazilians drive far less than Europeans and
Americans, their fertileland and favourable climate mean their crop
yields are higher, and theirpopulation density is lower.

The US and Europe aren't the only ones hoping the Brazilian model will
be aquick fix for environmental and fuel-security woes. China plans to
cut oilimports and CO2 emissions by running its cars on ethanol made
fromcassava, while Cuba hopes to revitalise its moribund sugar
industry byturning the crop into ethanol, and Hungary wants to replace
Russian energyimports with corn-based ethanol.

What few yet appreciate is that biofuels are not all made equal. In the
US, the immediate plan is to ramp up production of corn bioethanol.
America's 100thcorn-to-ethanol distillery came online in May, and a
further 30 are underconstruction across the Midwest. Bioethanol
production is forecast to almostdouble between 2005 and 2007, by which
time the bioethanol business willbe consuming around a fifth of the US
corn crop. But when you try to assessthe environmental benefits of
bioethanol, things are not clear-cut. It takes alot of energy both to
grow corn and to convert it to ethanol, and cultivating a crop demands
large quantities of fertiliser and pesticides, which themselveshave
environmental and energy costs. So is it actually worth it?

Several research groups have tried to take all this into account and
comparefossil fuel emissions with those of corn bioethanol at every
stage ofproduction from seed to engine. The studies have been beset by
scientificuncertainties, such as how much of the greenhouse gas
nitrous oxide isproduced by the nitrogen fertiliser used in growing
corn. Opinions aredivided as to what should and should not be included
in the calculation,which means the results vary widely, but one study
by David Pimentel atCornell University in New York concluded that corn
ethanol creates moregreenhouse gases than burning fossil fuels.

------------------ "Biofuels will trash rainforests, suck water
reserves dry, kill off species and, worst of all, barely slow down
global warming" -------------------

Others aren't so pessimistic. In a review of several studies published
inScience in January, Alexander Farrell of the University of
California,Berkeley, estimated bioethanol would produce 13 per cent
less greenhouseemissions than an equivalent amount of gasoline.
However, Farrell arrives atthis more favourable figure by assuming the
leftover biomass from makingthe bioethanol is used as a dry fuel in a
furnace or fed to animals, and not all bioethanol refineries do this.

Another reason a growing number of people oppose biofuels is that
growingcorn for ethanol uses up land that is currently supplying food
to the world.Americans won't go hungry if surplus US corn is converted
to ethanol ratherthan exported, but the resulting slump in the global
grain supply willprecipitate a rise in prices, and many see that as
unethical. According toLester Brown, veteran commentator and activist
on food politics, the cornrequired to fill an SUV tank with bioethanol
just once could feed one personfor a year. He describes the boom in
bioethanol as a competition between the800 million people in the world
who own automobiles and the 3 billionpeople who live on less than $2 a
day, many of whom are already spendingover half their income on food.

According to the UN Food and Agriculture Organization, the competition
hasalready begun. The FAO says the conversion of corn to ethanol is a
primaryreason for a sharp decline in world grain stocks and a
commensurate rise ingrain prices in the first half of 2006. The trend
was echoed in a report toinvestors by the bank Goldman Sachs in July,
which predicted corn priceswill rise further as biofuels grow. Eric
Holthusen, a senior official with oilgiant Shell, recently described
using food crops to make fuel while peoplewere starving as "morally
inappropriate".

It is striking how much land will be needed for biofuels to make a
significantcontribution to fuel usage. In a paper published in the
Proceedings of theNational Academy of Sciences in July, Jason Hill and
colleagues at theUniversity of Minnesota, St Paul, calculated that
even if the US diverted itsentire current corn harvest to biofuels it
would meet only 11 per cent of itscurrent gasoline demand. The
Worldwatch Institute estimates that toproduce 10 per cent of the
world's transport fuels would require 9 per cent ofthe planet's
agricultural land. "Producing 10 per cent of the world's transport
fuels from crops would require 9 per cent of the planet's agricultural
land."

Promoters of biofuels say such calculations are misleading. They claim
highprices stimulated by demand for biofuels will encourage both more
intensivecultivation of corn and the spread of corn fields onto land
that is now idle.Unfortunately, both scenarios would undermine the
already slender climatebenefits of corn-based ethanol. More intensive
growing means more chemicalinputs, increasing the energy consumption
and greenhouse emissions pertonne of corn. And Hill points out that
clearing and ploughing virgin landwill also release more CO2, quite
possibly resulting in a net increase ingreenhouse emissions from
biofuel production.

So much for corn, but could other crops fare better? Lawrence Eagles at
theInternational Energy Agency in Paris, France, says making ethanol
fromsugar cane is better for the environment than using corn because
it avoids thefirst phase of the corn process - converting the plant
starch into sugar. Interms of litres of fuel per hectare of crop, and
net greenhouse gas benefit,sugar cane beats corn, says Eagles.

Some bioethanol producers have caught on to the idea. As a result,
worldsugar prices have doubled in the past 18 months, says Richard
Oxley, headof industry consultancy Sugaronline. "All the major
producers round theworld - Brazil, India, Thailand, etc - are just
rushing out and planting asmuch cane as they can," he says.

Trouble is, the high price is encouraging growers to clear land and
plantsugar cane without regard for the ecological impact.
Environmentalists fearthat as demand for sugar cane rises on the
global market, Brazilian farmerswill push ever deeper into the Amazon
rainforest, either to grow sugar caneitself or crops displaced by it.

As if that weren't enough, sugar cane plantations put huge pressure on
watersupplies - this is a thirsty crop. In countries without plentiful
rainfall,farmers must draw water from rivers or underground reserves.
So althoughirrigation isn't a problem in Brazil, other countries
aren't so lucky. For example, in the

Indian state of Maharashtra, farmers are scrambling to grow more cane
totake advantage of the high prices, yet existing plantations already
take two- thirds of the state's water and have lowered water tables by
up to 50 metresin places.

Globally, no one is considering how much water biofuels will require,
saysOxley. India is already drawing down its water reserves fast, and
this willlead directly to dry wells, parched fields and empty
granaries. While sugarcane may be a more greenhouse-friendly feedstock
than corn for makingethanol, it is markedly worse in terms of its
demands on the world'sdwindling water reserves.

So are we utterly mistaken to think that bioethanol could usher in an
era ofgreener energy? The way things are developing, it certainly
looks that way,but it needn't be so.

The technology for producing biofuels is still in its infancy, and
scientistsworking on it have grander things in mind. They want to
perfect a way tomake biofuels from non-food crops and waste biomass,
saving the corn andother fuel crops for food use, and to do it without
wrecking naturalecosystems. Given time, they think they can achieve
this.

Already researchers are discovering clever ways to produce
bioethanolwithout using food crops, and focusing instead on converting
cellulose-richorganic matter into ethanol. Cellulose is the main
structural component of allgreen plants. Its molecules comprise long
chains of sugars strong enough tomake plant cell walls. If you could
break down those molecules to release thesugars they contain, you
could ferment them into ethanol.

Developing an efficient process to convert cellulose into ethanol could
openthe door to many non-food materials such as switchgrass - a wild
grass thatthrives in the eastern states and Midwest of the US - straw,
crop residues like stalks and hardwood chips. Its supporters say
cellulose feedstocks coulddeliver twice as much ethanol per hectare as
corn, and do it using land that is today neither economically
productive nor environmentally precious. Somethink municipal waste
such as paper, cardboard and waste food could evenbe used as a
feedstock.

A road map to making ethanol from cellulose set out in June by the
USDepartment of Energy estimated the US could produce a third of its
fuelneeds in this way by 2030. It recommends genetically modifying
crops suchas switchgrass and poplar to make hardy, pest-resistant
varieties that arevery high in cellulose. This would mean
low-maintenance feedstock,dramatically cutting energy and chemical
inputs compared with existingfeedstocks. The catch is that it would
also require much more efficientenzymes to break the cellulose down
into sugars, and better varieties ofyeasts that ferment the sugars
into ethanol faster and more efficiently thanexisting strains. "We can
engineer crops to grow on dry and saline soil. This is going to be a
revolution. For agriculture it is going to be a very exciting time,"
says Raymond Orbach, Under Secretary for Science at the DoE.

But so far most companies have been hesitant about investing in the
researchnecessary to tackle these problems. So the DoE is setting up
two new researchcentres, into which it will plough $250 million over
the next five years, withthe aim of developing the next generation of
biofuel feedstocks. "It's too risky for the private sector. That's why
government is doing this," says Orbach. But one Canadian company is
already on the case. Iogen, based in Ottawa,has built a pilot plant
that has been producing cellulose ethanol in smallquantities for the
last two years. It uses a tropical fungus geneticallymodified to
produce enzymes that break down cellulose, and can "digest" allsorts
of biomass.

"Cellulose feedstocks could produce twice as much ethanol per hectare
ascorn"

Iogen recently attracted investment of $30 million from Goldman Sachs,
andin January it announced it would investigate the feasibility of
building a full -scale commercial plant in Germany in partnership with
Volkswagen andShell. If the numbers add up, Iogen could kick-start the
revolution that mayyet deliver us from our dependence on oil, without
costing the Earth in theprocess.

Biofuels basics

Biofuel is an umbrella term used to describe all fuels derived from
organicmatter. The two most common biofuels are bioethanol, which is a
substitutefor gasoline, and biodiesel, which speaks for itself. Both
are seen ascomplementary ways of cutting greenhouse gas emissions
quickly withminimal modification to existing vehicles and fuel
infrastructure.

Bioethanol is produced by processing starchy or sugar-rich crops such
assugar cane, wheat or corn. In the case of starchy crops, the starch
is converted into sugars using enzymes. The sugars are fermented by
yeasts to produceethanol, which is then distilled. The resulting
highly pure ethanol can beblended with petrol to various percentages.
Most cars can burn petroleumfuels blended with up to 10 per cent
bioethanol without any modifications tothe engine, and some new cars
can burn pure bioethanol.

Biodiesel covers the fuels produced by processing a variety of
vegetable oils -

including soybean, palm and rapeseed (canola) - and animal fats. The
oil istreated in a process called transesterification. Oil is mixed
with ethanol and a catalyst (usually sodium hydroxide) to break it down
and then reform it asesters. Biodiesel can be used in place of normal
diesel without modification to the engine. Although these oils can also
be mixed with standard dieselwithout processing and burnt in a diesel
engine, this is not recommended bymost car manufacturers and this
mixture is not, strictly speaking, "biodiesel".

Biodiesel backlash

Some time during the summer of 2002, Welsh police caught the first
whiff ofa new tax dodge. It smelt of fish and chips. Shoppers across
south Wales hadfor some months been stocking up with suspiciously
large quantities ofvegetable cooking oil from the Swansea branch of
Asda, part of the Walmartchain. But rather than taking the oil home
for a deep-fried feast, they werepouring it into the fuel tanks of
their diesel-engine cars and trucks.

The vehicles ran happily on the cooking oil, provided it was filtered
and alittle methanol added to help get going on cold mornings. With
fuel pricesclimbing skywards, cooking oil had become cheaper than
diesel at thepumps, and it was not long before word spread of the
ingenious fuelsubstitute. Unfortunately, the crafty scheme was illegal
because the driversweren't paying fuel tax. The police hastily
assembled a "frying squad" wholiterally sniffed out cars running on
vegetable oil - the oil burns with adistinctive scent - and quickly
cracked down on the practice.

Still, entrepreneurs realised these bootleggers were on to something
big andset up legitimate processing plants to convert vegetable and
animal fats intobiodiesel. Biodiesel is not only cheaper than
petroleum diesel, it is also more environmentally friendly. A wide
range of vegetable oils can be used,including soya, palm, rapeseed
(canola) and sunflower. All produce netgreenhouse gas reductions
similar to those from sugar cane ethanol andmuch better than corn
ethanol. Jason Hill at the University of Minnesota, StPaul, estimates
that biodiesel typically reduces carbon dioxide emissions by41 per
cent, more than three times the reduction from corn ethanol.
What'smore, many oil crops can be grown without major inputs of
eitheragrochemicals or irrigation.

Germany is currently the biggest manufacturer of biodiesel. In 2005
itproduced more than all the rest of the world put together (see
Chart). Butthere are problems with the sudden rise of biodiesel as a
substitute for diesel.

Land use is still an issue. For example, sunflower and rapeseed, the
mainfeedstocks for biodiesel today, produce fewer litres per hectare
than cornproduces bioethanol.

European Union law now states that all fuels be blended with 5.75 per
centbiofuels by 2010, but member states don't have enough land to
supply thefeedstock locally, so massive imports of vegetable oils will
be needed to helpmeet this target.

Enter Malaysia and Indonesia, which together dominate the world
marketfor palm oil. Palm produces significantly better yields of fuel
per hectare than other crops. Both countries are now falling over
themselves to increaseproduction and, in late July, announced a joint
plan to set aside 40 per cent of their palm oil output for biodiesel
production.

Last year Indonesia, which already has 6 million hectares of palms for
oilproduction, announced plans to expand this by 3 million hectares,
partly byconverting 1.8 million hectares of forest in Borneo - almost
the size ofMassachusetts - into what would be the world's largest palm
oil plantation. The expansion plan was condemned by Friends of the
Earth and WWF. Thepalm oil boom will "sound the death knell for the
orang-utan and hamper thefight against climate change, the very
problem biofuels are supposed to helpovercome", says Ed Matthew,
Friends of the Earth's palm oil campaigner.FoE claims palm oil
plantations are the most significant cause of rainforestloss in
Malaysia and Indonesia.

While the small-scale production of biodiesel from waste oil and
low-levelconversion of oil crops to biodiesel could certainly deliver
a modest reduction in greenhouse emissions, it seems the environmental
benefits of biodieseldon't scale up.

***********
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