WHAT? Bio-ethanol and other biofuels NOT CO2 free?

[peterloo]

The newest reports conducted by University shows that biofuel is actually twice as dirty as gasoline, since the forested are being cleared for corn plantations, and the industralized argiculture, relying the use of fertilizers, machines, and the later processing to turn corn to alcohol, releases more CO2 than what the corn absorbs. Furthermore, the biofuel stuff also drives up food price. Yet, companies still promotes them, for the great profit.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/6636467.stm
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/5369284.stm
(For those who read Times, you will get a featured article about this as well. Unfortunately, since Times is copyrighted, I'm afraid that I can't put scannings of it here.)

A UN report warns that a hasty switch to biofuels could have major impacts on livelihoods and the environment. Produced by a cross-agency body, UN Energy, the report says that biofuels can bring real benefits.
But there can be serious consequences if forests are razed for plantations, if food prices rise and if communities are excluded from ownership, it says.
And it concludes that biofuels are more effective when used for heat and power rather than in transport.
"Current research concludes that using biomass for combined heat and power (CHP), rather than for transport fuels or other uses, is the best option for reducing greenhouse gas emissions in the next decade - and also one of the cheapest," it says.
The European Union and the US have recently set major targets for the expansion of biofuels in road vehicles, for which ethanol and biodiesel are seen as the only currently viable alternative to petroleum fuels.
Forest clearance
The UN report, Sustainable Bioenergy: A Framework for Decision Makers, suggests that biofuels can be a force for good if they are planned well, but can bring adverse consequences if not.
"The development of new bioenergy industries could provide clean energy services to millions of people who currently lack them," it concludes, "while generating income and creating jobs in poorer areas of the world."
But the prices of food, land and agricultural commodities could be driven up, it warns, with major impacts in poorer countries where people spend a much greater share of their incomes on food than in developed nations.
On the environmental side, it notes that demand for biofuels has accelerated the clearing of primary forest for palm plantations, particularly in southeast Asia.
This destruction of ecosystems which remove carbon from the atmosphere can lead to a net increase in emissions.
The report warns too of the impacts on nature: "Use of large-scale mono-cropping could lead to significant biodiversity loss, soil erosion and nutrient leaching."
This has been avoided, the report says, in the Brazilian state of Sao Paulo where sugar cane farmers are obliged to leave a percentage of their land as natural reserves.
Water is also a concern. The expanding world population and the on-going switch towards consumption of meat and dairy produce as incomes rise are already putting pressure on freshwater supplies, which increased growing of biofuel crops could exacerbate.
In conclusion, UN Energy suggests policymakers should take a holistic look before embarking on drives to boost biofuel use.
"Only through a convergence of biodiversity, greenhouse gas emissions and water-use policies can bioenergy find its proper environmental context and agricultural scale," the report concludes.

Biofuels could end up damaging the natural world rather than saving it from global warming, argues Jeff McNeely in the Green Room. Better policies, better science and genetic modification, he says, can all contribute to a greener biofuels revolution.
With soaring oil prices, and debates raging on how to reduce carbon emissions to slow climate change, many are looking to biofuels as a renewable and clean source of energy.
The European Union recently has issued a directive calling for biofuels to meet 5.75% of transportation fuel needs by 2010. Germany and France have announced they intend to meet the target well before the deadline; California intends going still further.
This is a classic "good news-bad news" story.
Of course we all want greater energy security, and helping achieve the goals (however weak) of the Kyoto Protocol is surely a good thing.
However, biofuels - made by producing ethanol, an alcohol fuel made from maize, sugar cane, or other plant matter - may be a penny wise but pound foolish way of doing so.
Consider the following:

• The grain required to fill the petrol tank of a Range Rover with ethanol is sufficient to feed one person per year. Assuming the petrol tank is refilled every two weeks, the amount of grain required would feed a hungry African village for a year
• Much of the fuel that Europeans use will be imported from Brazil, where the Amazon is being burned to plant more sugar and soybeans, and Southeast Asia, where oil palm plantations are destroying the rainforest habitat of orangutans and many other species. Species are dying for our driving
• If ethanol is imported from the US, it will likely come from maize, which uses fossil fuels at every stage in the production process, from cultivation using fertilisers and tractors to processing and transportation. Growing maize appears to use 30% more energy than the finished fuel produces, and leaves eroded soils and polluted waters behind
• Meeting the 5.75% target would require, according to one authoritative study, a quarter of the EU's arable land
• Using ethanol rather than petrol reduces total emissions of carbon dioxide by only about 13% because of the pollution caused by the production process, and because ethanol gets only about 70% of the mileage of petrol
• Food prices are already increasing. With just 10% of the world's sugar harvest being converted to ethanol, the price of sugar has doubled; the price of palm oil has increased 15% over the past year, with a further 25% gain expected next year.

Little wonder that many are calling biofuels "deforestation diesel", the opposite of the environmentally friendly fuel that all are seeking. With so much farmland already taking the form of monoculture, with all that implies for wildlife, do we really want to create more diversity-stripped desert?
Others are worried about the impacts of biofuels on food prices, which will affect especially the poor who already spend a large proportion of their income on food.
Biotech boost
So what is to be done? The first step is to increase our understanding of how nature works to produce energy.
Amazingly, scientists do not yet have a full understanding of the workings of photosynthesis, the process by which plants use solar energy to absorb carbon dioxide and build carbohydrates.
Biotechnology, its reputation sullied by public protests over GM foods, may make important contributions. According to the science journal Nature, recombinant technology is already available that could enhance ethanol yield, reduce environmental damage from feedstock, and improve bioprocessing efficiency at the refinery.
The Swiss biotech firm Syngenta is developing a genetically engineered maize that can help convert itself into ethanol by growing a particular enzyme.
Others are designing trees that have less lignin, the strength-giving substance that enables them to stand upright, but makes it more difficult to convert the tree's cellulose into ethanol.
Some environmentalists are worried that these altered trees will cross-breed with wild trees, resulting in a drooping forest rather than one that stands tall and produces useful timber and wildlife habitat.
In the longer run, biotech promises to help convert wood chips, farm wastes, and willow trees into bioethanol more cheaply and cleanly, thereby helping meet energy needs while also improving its public image.
Public stake
But that is not nearly enough; bioenergy is too important to be left in the hands of the private sector.
Many of the social and environmental benefits of bioenergy are not priced in the market, so the public sector needs to step in to ensure these benefits are delivered.
An easy immediate step would be to mandate improved fuel efficiency for all forms of transport, beginning with the private automobile. A 20% increase in fuel-efficiency standards is feasible using current technology, and would save far more energy than Europe's biomass could produce.


Governments also need to provide leadership in the form of economic incentives to minimise competition between food and fuel crops, and ensure that water, high-quality agricultural land, and biodiversity are not sacrificed on the altar of our convenience.
Calculations of energy return on investment need to include environmental impacts on soil, water, climate change, and ecosystem services.
The bottom line is that biofuels can contribute to energy and environmental goals only as part of an overall strategy that includes energy conservation, a diversity of sustainable energy sources, greater efficiency in production and transport, and careful management of ethanol production.

How do you think? Does biofuel still the hero in the 21st century which helps us to sort out the global warming problem, or are they just worsening the problem?

[danlisa]

Biofuels are %100 CO2 free, at least B100 grade is.

What is not free, as they have now found by actually thinking about it, is the damage caused by the felling of natural resources to aid in the production of Biofuels.

The solution is to develop technology that uses waste/used oils or esters instead of trying to grow/develop a dedicated 'crop' that will provide the performance people require.

I still think Biofuels are the way forward but we must develop the tech from the 'other side' of the equation.

[joea]

It's combustion of course it creates CO2 the point is it is supposed to be a closed circle. Pyrolysis is actually carbon negative compared to conventional biofuels. Well look at my post here:

http://www.subsim.com/radioroom/show...27&postcount=6

First gen biogas has a big disadvantage of competing for land with food crops, which is partly responsible for driving food prices up lately. Not good.

There is a new process called pyrolysis, actually an old method called slash and char used in Europe and apparently in the Amazon rain forest. Pyrolysis is the decomposition of organic materials by heating in the absence of oxygen. You can convert biomass or waste (even urban organic trash) into bio-oil and bio-char. Biochar is just charcoal bascially, inert and can increase the fertility of soils and ... serve as a carbon sink. So this is a carbon negative process. The bio-oil can be refined to make fuels, both for transport or heating (this is a good process on small scale for farms etc. as well as industrial) and as stock for plastics etc.

Check out the links in my post above. Pyrolysis is the way forward.

[seafarer]

Well, many people still think hydrogen is the ultimate answer. This despite the fact that most of hydrogen (in NA at least) is extracted from Natural Gas, using electricity that comes primarily from coal and oil fired generating plants. Even if you do use sea water, the energy to extract hydrogen has to come from somewhere, and that almost assuredly means electricity demand.

There is no free lunch when it comes to energy. Every form of energy we have or are working on has some costs (environmental, social, economic, whatever) that come with it. The thing is we've just been blissfully ignorant of having to face the costs, but now the crunch is here.

[peterloo]

I know, combustion always gives out CO2, but now, the problem is that

TO GROW CROPS FOR ETHANOL, the farms use fertilizers, machines which requires energy to run, and clears out forests for farmland

And the CO2 created in the process is affecting the environment, making biofuel twice dirty as gasoline. Despite these facts politicans, and business entrepreneurs still avocate the use of biofuel, for VAST PROFIT

I know that my topic is a bit misleading, yet I can't change it. Can anyone tell me how to modify it?

[peterloo]

Originally Posted by joea

It's combustion of course it creates CO2 the point is it is supposed to be a closed circle. Pyrolysis is actually carbon negative compared to conventional biofuels. Well look at my post here:

http://www.subsim.com/radioroom/show...27&postcount=6

First gen biogas has a big disadvantage of competing for land with food crops, which is partly responsible for driving food prices up lately. Not good.

There is a new process called pyrolysis, actually an old method called slash and char used in Europe and apparently in the Amazon rain forest. Pyrolysis is the decomposition of organic materials by heating in the absence of oxygen. You can convert biomass or waste (even urban organic trash) into bio-oil and bio-char. Biochar is just charcoal bascially, inert and can increase the fertility of soils and ... serve as a carbon sink. So this is a carbon negative process. The bio-oil can be refined to make fuels, both for transport or heating (this is a good process on small scale for farms etc. as well as industrial) and as stock for plastics etc.

Check out the links in my post above. Pyrolysis is the way forward.

Pyrolysis looks promising. It would be better if no heating is required due to advent of new technology. At this moment, as what the word suggests, pyrolysis needs energy input to heat up and break down the waste to "biochar".

fermentation of manure and other waste produce methane and it is absolutely green if no additional inputs are required. Yet, methane is a greenhouse gas and it causes problem if leaked to environment. Hope that this problem can be eliminated as our technology improves

[seafarer]

One summer during college, I worked in the lab of our local sewage treatment plant. They use anaerobic digestion for tertiary treatment of the sludge - and they use the methane produced to heat the whole plant, and keep the digesters at optimal temperature in the winter (this was southeastern Ontario).

There was a news story a few weeks back about Pacific Gas & Electric and BioEnergy Solutions working with California dairy farmers to use methane from their herds' manure to feed into the natural gas pipeline distribution system. They are using controlled bacterial digestion of the manure on the farm to produce the gas and render the sludge for agricultural disposal (technically does not rate as a fertilizer, but as a soil conditioner). This process also avoids groundwater contamination from manure pile runoff. BioEnergy Solutions plans to provide 3 billion cubic feet of gas a year to PG&E (supposedly enough to meet the needs of 50,000 homes).

Some people are thinking truly creatively about energy.

[Sailor Steve]

I'm confused with all this talk about CO2. CO (Carbon Monoxide) is a deadly poison emitted by gasoline engines. CO2 (Carbon Dioxide) is what we humans and all other mammals exhale with every breath. CO2 isn't deadly, or dangerous, at all. You can't live on it, so if it's all you breathe you'll suffocate, but it's not poisonous. In fact, it's what plants breathe to live.

Yes, internal combustion engines do give of CO2, but isn't it CO that's the real danger?

I know I sounded factual, but actually I'm still just confused.