Posted on 02/08/2008 4:29:12 AM PST by TigerLikesRooster
Biofuels emissions may be 'worse than petrol'
19:00 07 February 2008
NewScientist.com news service
Jim Giles
Biofuels, once seen as a useful way of combating climate change, could actually increase greenhouse gas emissions, say two major new studies.
And it may take tens or hundreds of years to pay back the "carbon debt" accrued by growing biofuels in the first place, say researchers. The calculations join a growing list of studies questioning whether switching to biofuels really will help combat climate change.
Biofuel production has accelerated over the last 5 years, spurred in part by a US drive to produce corn-derived ethanol as an alternative to petrol.
The idea makes intuitive environmental sense plants take up carbon dioxide as they grow, so biofuels should help reduce greenhouse gas emissions but the full environmental cost of biofuels is only now becoming clear.
Extra emissions are created from the production of fertiliser needed to grow corn, for example, leading some researchers to predict that the energy released by burning ethanol is only 25% greater than that used to grow and process the fuel.
(Excerpt) Read more at environment.newscientist.com ...
Snort. Paging John McCain...
Don’t matter, we’re gonna anyway.
I predict they will mandate more food types to be grown for fuel. I read a few months back that apples would be better than corn because of the higher sugar content.
They would starve us all if it meant building the walls of their own fortresses higher and thicker.
Until we find a way to eat oil, we should not be burning food.
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Tuesday, January 22, 2008
Conagra Drops Plan for Ethanol Plant at Clovis
By Sue Major Holmes/ Associated Press
ConAgra Foods said Tuesday it has dropped plans to build an ethanol plant in Clovis in eastern New Mexico.
Humans have a history of making things worse everytime they try to help Mother Nature. Someday, we’re going to have to learn the old rule “All things in moderation” and let nature take care of itself.
It is amazing to me that as scientifically advanced as we are today, our knowledge of science is more primitive than that of the earliest civilizations on earth.
The environmentalists will only be satisfied with walking.
Guess I’ll buy a horse and buggy.
Unfortunately we are talking about severe economic hits to the most economically destitute yet politically conservative areas of New Mexico and Texas. At any rate the demise of any jobs and opportunity in these areas is extremely bad timing.
On another note, any smart FReepers here know what it would take to change ethanol or some other carbon based fluid to gasoline? I know it can be done in some fashion, I just don't know how it would be done, or at what cost.
If the left were for real they be sitting in Long Beach Harbor and every other US port blocking Chinese imports. Talk about bad carbon a footprint, no pollution regulation and human rights violations. See the goal here is for the government to take over all natural resource and the means of production. Like China, Russian, Venezuela. That is why they get a pass from the Sierra Club and other such organizationa they prefer the political systems.
This study is brought to buy the Leftwing and their proud sponsors, Mobil, Exxon and Texaco.
BTTT.
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