By Andy May This post is a follow up to my previous post on biofuels, here we discuss the impact of biofuels on food prices in more detail. Ethanol has been produced in large quantities in the United States for fuel since 1978. That was the year the Congress passed the Energy Tax Act (Tyner…
By Andy May According to Exxon-Mobil, 9% of the world’s energy came from biofuels in 2017. They do not expect this percentage to increase by 2040, and it may go down. For the most part it is a developing world fuel. Primary biofuels include dung, wood, wood chips and pellets. Secondary, or manufactured biofuels include…
Biofuels are unsustainable in every way, but still demand – and get – preferential treatment Guest post by Paul Driessen, The Big Oil-Big Biofuel wars rage on. From my perch, ethanol, biodiesel and “advanced biofuels” make about zero energy, economic or environmental sense. They make little political sense either, until you recognize that politics is…
Guest post by Jim Steele What’s Natural Brazil’s Fires and Biofuels. Published in the Pacifica Tribune September 11, 2019 From leaf cutting ants that cultivate fungus gardens to flowers that fool potential pollinating insects into having sex, the magic of rainforest ecology always inspired my love for nature’s creativity. So, it’s no surprise that any…
Opponents make compelling case but can’t derail or even slow this well-protected industry Guest opinion by Paul Driessen Like most people I’ve spoken with, I have no innate, inflexible antipathy to ethanol in gasoline. What upsets me are the deceptive claims used to justify adding mostly corn-based ethanol to this indispensable fuel; the way seriously…
From FUNDAÇÃO DE AMPARO À PESQUISA DO ESTADO DE SÃO PAULO and the “great gasoline famine of 2032” department Brazilian ethanol can replace 13.7 percent of world’s crude oil consumption Expansion of sugarcane cultivation for biofuel in areas not under environmental protection or reserved for food production could also reduce global emissions of carbon dioxide by…
While demand for biodiesel is down, senators and crony corporatists deep-six proposed EPA reductions in biodiesel mandates Guest opinion by Paul Driessen Despite what I thought were persuasive articles over the years (here, here and here, for example), corn ethanol and other biofuel mandates remain embedded in US law. As we have learned, once a…
Sandia Labs News Releases August 21, 2017 From Sandia National Labs Sandia helps HelioBioSys understand new clean energy source LIVERMORE, Calif.—You might not cook with this sugar, but from a biofuels standpoint, it’s pretty sweet. A Bay Area company has patented a group of three single-celled, algae-like organisms that, when grown together, can produce high…
From Eurekalert Public Release: 7-Aug-2017 Sandia tests Salton Sea-grown algae as new fuel source and pollution solution DOE/Sandia National Laboratories BRAWLEY, California — Sandia National Laboratories is testing whether one of California’s largest and most polluted lakes can transform into one of its most productive and profitable. Southern California’s 350-square-mile Salton Sea has well-documented problems…
From the UNIVERSITY OF ILLINOIS COLLEGE OF AGRICULTURAL, CONSUMER AND ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCES Regulating the indirect land use carbon emissions imposes high hidden costs on fuel Farmers earn more profits when there is demand for corn for biofuel instead of for food only. This can lead some to convert grasslands and forests to cropland. This conversion,…
From the UNIVERSITY OF ILLINOIS AT URBANA-CHAMPAIGN and the “don’t burn your food” department. Corn is grown not only for food, it is also an important renewable energy source. Renewable biofuels can come with hidden economic and environmental issues, and the question of whether corn is better utilized as food or as a biofuel has persisted…
Guest post by David Middleton From 2005 to 2012, dozens of companies managed to extract hundreds of millions in cash from VCs in hopes of ultimately extracting fuel oil from algae. CEOs, entrepreneurs and investors were making huge claims about the promise of algae-based biofuels; the U.S. Department of Energy was also making big bets…