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Biofuels: running on empty

MARGARET WENTE

From Tuesday's Globe and Mail

Latest comment posted at 6:43 PM EDT 03/05/08

They've been fingered as a culprit in the global food crisis ...Read the full article

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  1. Robert Dussault from Montreal, Canada writes: Bravo Margaret.

    I could not agree more. It is high time we put an end to this ethanol madness. It is simply wrong. A potentialy catastrophic famine across many countries the likes of which we have not seen in decades may not solely be blamed on biofuel production in developped countries but the link here is quite clear. We are diverting massive amounts of agro production away from precious food staples. Shame on all governments (including our own) who are subsidizing this mess.

    Furthermore ethanol is not the magic solution to greenhouse gases we all thought it was afterall. As you said quite clearly, ethanol may actualy be a net contributor to global warming. Especialy if we are destroying forests to produce this garbage. In the mean time we have convinced ourselves that we are on the right tract and therefore are not actively pursuing truly environmentaly-sound energy alternatives. This is pure folly.

    What gets my goat is these cute adds by hybrid automobile manufacturers about how envirionmentaly friendly their products are.
  2. Globe Insider subscriber content
    Ken DeLuca from Arnprior, Canada writes: Actually, many environmentalists said much the same years ago when bio-fuel was first tauted in the US. It looked counter-productive except, as MW points out, for the agri-business giants who made sure government subsidies fueled their tanks.
  3. Globe Insider subscriber content
    Mike Baker from Iqaluit, Canada writes:
    An odd set of circumstances when moving machines takes priority over feeding people. The difference between those who operate machines and those who eat is that everyone eats; and some eat more than others. Paradoxically, it's the former group - who consider themselves citizens of the dominant "first world" - who are less likely to adapt to a world in which food has become scarce.

    If we have somehow succumbed to the bizarro promotion of collective illogic whereby fear of an energy crisis trumps the consequences of mass food shortages, then we are bound by today's mistake to start preparing for a brutish future.

    "We'll inherit the earth, but who'll want it?"
  4. Globe Insider subscriber content
    Allan McElroy from Winnipeg, Canada writes: Ken Deluca, once again a pleasure to read your comments. I'm glad I wasn't the only one reading those articles 3 years ago. Ethanol was and remains a crock, as Ms. Wente has pointed out. It doesn't save on greenhouse gases once the cost of production is added in (what do those tractors run on anyway?). So now, to pacify a few ranting pseudo environmentalists, we are starving a few million people to death with our tax dollars. Oh well, back to working for a living.....
  5. Globe Insider subscriber content
    A Peon in the golden boy's court from SK, Canada writes: Yes it certainly is amazing how quickly politicians got onboard the biofuel bandwagon & had no qualms about throwing away billions of dollars in taxpayers’ money to appease a few ill-informed environmentalists & a bunch of agribusiness giants. I was involved in a project about 8 years ago to bring biofuel (ethanol) production to Saskatchewan &8211; what a joke that was. All any of the so called stakeholders were interested in was how much money various governments were going to throw on the table.
  6. Just In from Canada writes: “Not everyone has cooled to biofuels. Farmers love them. So do agribusiness giants like Archer Daniels Midland, which are harvesting a bumper crop of profits from taxpayers' money. Government subsidies are so enormous they could amount to half or more of ethanol's cost of production.” ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Thanks to Margaret Wente for pointing this out. Agri-giant Archer Daniels Midland (ADM) happened to have none other than our own Right Honorable Brian Mulroney as the most prominent director, and in googling, apparently as early as 2005, a blog was written about it: Monday, July 18, 2005 The Ethanol Scam: ADM and Brian Mulroney http://plawiuk.blogspot.com/2005/07/ethanol-scam-adm-and-brian-mulroney.html
  7. elainehr - from Canada writes: Very one sided article.
    In Canada only 5 % of farmers will be growing corn for ethanol this year. Does that affect our food supply, NO.
    Farmers only want to sell their product for a decent price, it does not have to be ethanol.

    The blending of ethanol in gasoline results in environmental benefits in both air quality and reductions in green house gas emissions.
    There are a number of recent examples demonstrating the environmental benefits to ethanol blending.

    A reduction of smog-forming emissions in the city by 25 per cent since the introduction of ethanol-blended reformulated gasoline in 1990. The American Lung Association of Metropolitan Chicago.

    The Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources reports a 16% drop in ozone exceedance days since it adopted 10% ethanol (E10) in southeastern Wisconsin in 1994.

    In the six years before the State of New York replaced MTBE ( a petroleum derived oxygenate) blends with ethanol blended fuels, New York averaged 17 EPA 8-hour ozone exceedance days per year. In the two years leading up to the use of ethanol (2002/2003), New York averaged 21.5 ozone exceedance days per year. In the two years since the switch to ethanol, New York has averaged 5.5 exceedance days per year, a 68% reduction.

    The State of Connecticut replaced MTBE blends with ethanol on January 1, 2004. In the six years leading up to the use of E10, Connecticut averaged 25 8-hour ozone exceedance days per year. In the two years leading up to the use of E10 (2002/2003), Connecticut also averaged 25 exceedance days per year. Since the introduction of E10, Connecticut has averaged 13 8-hour ozone exceedance days per year, a 48% reduction.
  8. Russell Barth from Nepean, Canada writes: look up hemp on google, and all this balderdash fades away.
  9. Alastair james Berry from Nanaimo BC CANADA, Canada writes:

    Bang on.........
  10. elainehr - from Canada writes: What a one sided view everyone has!!!

    To Mike Baker from Iqaluit, who wrote: "An odd set of circumstances when moving machines takes priority over feeding people"

    All your highways are build on land that was once used for crops.
    The urban sprawl is never ending and is eroding crop land much faster.
    Any concerns about that?
  11. elainehr - from Canada writes: Hemp can be grown in Canada but under strict circumstances and that's only since 1998.
    Is there enough information for growing large quantities of hemp for industrial purpose?
    Back everything up with statistics and not only conjecture.

    It may be fine for a few growers right now but widespread markets are not available.
  12. Russell Barth from Nepean, Canada writes: Hemp produces more ethanol per acre than corn, and does so at a lower cost and with less damage to the soil. Also, one acre of hemp can produce up to 1,000 gallons of Methanol in just four months. In warmer climates, like the southern U.S., that could mean 3,000 gallons per acre, per year. If the U.S. were to sow just 10% of its current farmland as hemp, for example, it wouldn't need to buy any foreign oil.

    What about food? The hemp tops go to food, and the stalks go for fuel, fibre and building materials, so it is like growing two crops in one field. Hemp will even grow on damaged, exhausted or marginal soil, so we don't need to use our prime farmland to grow car fuel. We could even reclaim thousands of acres of unused and abandoned land, and create jobs.

    Hemp doesn't need the chemical fertilizers and pesticides that other crops need, which saves fuel and lowers soil runoff pollution. Hemp fuel burns clean, which would lower air pollution and reduce associated health and environmental issues. Hemp also refreshes the soil, so putting it into rotation with other crops will actually heal - -- not deplete -- the soil.

    So why do we keep using corn for fuel when hemp is cheaper, better, healthier and cleaner? Because governments don't want to "send the wrong message to youth" about marijuana, and because if there were small hemp methanol-producing facilities in every small town in North America, Big Oil would lose its total control over the prices of everything.

    But wente would never admit that. In fact, i bet she won't even go to this site to learn about hemp

    rata.ca/hemp
  13. E. Biggs from Canada writes: Russell I have looked at hemp over the years and it is a fantastic product for a plethora of uses and can grown almost anywhere.

    My question to you is can you direct me to a site where they have actually proven that it is better than the corn etc. If true, it would really be something look into.

    Unfortunately my friends the Yanks are myopic when it comes to hemp as all they can see is a bunch of pot heads staggering around.

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