Fwd: [Food-news] Is there any prospect for biofuels in a sustainable and food-secure world?

[Guest guest]

>

> *Editor's Note:** Some praise biofuels as the way of

> the future, others

> acknowledge the challenges and even

> counter-productive costs in pursuing

> plant-based energies. Oil and agrifood giants are

> developing biofuels

> and governments are setting targets for renewable

> energy to make up an

> increasing proportion of the overall percentage of

> energy utilized. But

> if biofuels offer energy solutions that contribute

> less CO2 into the

> atmosphere, they are controversial for the

> counter-efficiency and

> potential risk involved in their production: Forests

> are burned to clear

> land to grow biomass, emitting great amounts of

> carbon dioxide; the

> biotechnology industry is now applying itself to the

> production of

> " franken-fuels, " producing corn not intended for

> human consumption but

> without guarantees that it won't enter the human and

> animal food supply

> chains; and, finally, there is the long-standing

> debate about using land

> to grow crops for cars versus people. We invite

> reader responses:

> foodnews. *

>

> GM WATCH daily

> http://www.gmwatch.org

>

> Frankenstein fuels

> Mark Lynas

> New Statesman, 7th August 2006

> http://www.newstatesman.com/200608070031

>

> Pioneered by bearded hippies running clapped-out

> vans on recycled chip

> fat, biofuels now mean big business, sold to us as a

> solution to global

> warming. We must not be fooled, argues Mark Lynas

>

> Late every summer, large areas of central Borneo

> become invisible.

> There's no magic involved - most of the densely

> forested island simply

> gets covered with a pall of thick smoke. Huge areas

> of forest burn,

> while beneath the ground peat many metres thick

> smoulders on for months.

> These trees are burning in a good cause, however.

> They are burning to

> help save the world from global warming.

>

> Here is how the logic goes. As the natural forest is

> cleared, land opens

> up for lucrative palm-oil plantations. Palm oil is a

> feedstock for

> biodiesel, the " carbon-neutral " fuel that the

> European Union is trying

> to encourage by converting its vehicle fleet. By

> reducing use of fossil

> fuels for its cars and trucks, the EU believes it

> can reduce its carbon

> emissions and thereby help mitigate global warming.

> Everyone is happy.

> (Except the orang-utan. It gets to go extinct.)

>

> It's a con, of course. In 1997, the single worst

> year of Indonesian

> forest- and peat-burning, 2.67 billion tonnes of

> carbon dioxide were

> released by the fires, equivalent to 40 per cent of

> the year's entire

> emissions from burning fossil fuels. That was a

> particularly bad year:

> most summers, the emissions are only a billion or so

> tonnes, or about 15

> per cent of total human emissions. The biggest

> Indonesian fires, in 1997

> and 1998, took place on plantation company land,

> while in neighbouring

> Malaysia 87 per cent of recent deforestation has

> occurred to make way

> for palm-oil plantations. It is stretching credulity

> to argue that

> biofuels produced through this destructive process

> are helping combat

> climate change.

>

> The EU is undaunted (though it has undertaken a

> public consultation),

> and persists with a target that 5.75 per cent of its

> vehicle fuels

> should be " renewable " by the year 2010. Not all of

> this will come from

> tropical sources such as palm oil - but nor can

> their importation be

> restricted on environmental grounds. The campaigning

> journalist George

> Monbiot has discovered that world trade rules would

> prevent the EU

> taking any measures to restrict imports of palm oil

> produced on

> deforested lands. Free trade comes first.

>

> Some of this " deforestation diesel " will be

> processed and refined in the

> UK. A company called Biofuels Corporation has just

> finished building a

> biodiesel plant at Seal Sands, near Middlesbrough,

> and supplies fuel

> throughout the UK. With an annual production

> capacity of 284 million

> litres of biodiesel, it is strategically located

> next to a deep-water

> port to ease its access to imports of palm and other

> vegetable oils. A

> spokesman confirmed that imported palm oil from

> Malaysia is being used

> as feedstock, and that the source cannot at present

> be guaranteed as

> " rainforest-free " . A second company, Greenergy

> Biofuels, is putting up a

> GBP13.5m plant at Immingham on Humberside, and plans

> another. Palm oil

> is again expected to be one of the main feedstocks

> imported.

>

> As the promise of profits increases, the big players

> are beginning to

> get involved. The two largest external stakes in

> Greenergy Biofuels are

> held by Tesco and Cargill. Tesco will shift the

> product on its petrol

> forecourts, while Cargill - one of two giants that

> dominate the world

> food market - will supply the feedstock. Gone are

> the days when biofuels

> meant bearded hippies running their clapped-out vans

> on recycled chip fat.

>

> Even the oil majors are sniffing around this new

> market. BP has teamed

> up with DuPont to develop a liquid fuel called

> biobutanol, derived from

> sugar cane or corn starch, which they aim to launch

> in the UK next year

> as an additive to petrol. In the meantime, the oil

> giant is ploughing

> half a billion dollars into biofuels research at a

> new academic

> laboratory called the Energy Biosciences Institute.

> Indeed,

> " biosciences " are what it's all about. Speak to

> anyone in the corporate

> energy or agricultural sectors and they will

> probably go dewy-eyed about

> the technological " convergence " of energy, food,

> genetics - in fact,

> just about everything. In the biotechnology industry

> the atmosphere is

> reminiscent of the heady days of genetic

> modification, before the

> companies realised that consumers didn't want to eat

> " Frankenstein

> foods " . Frankenstein fuels, however, might prove an

> easier sell.

>

> The GM industry now plans to reinvent itself,

> following the example of

> the nuclear industry, on the back of climate change.

> " Producing

> genetically modified crops for non-food purposes, as

> a renewable source

> of alternative fuels, may provide the basis for a

> more rational and

> balanced consideration of the technology and its

> potential benefits,

> away from the disproportionate hysteria which has so

> often accompanied

> the debate over GM foods, " suggests the Agricultural

> Biotechnology

> Council, an umbrella organisation for the biggest

> biotech companies.

>

> The Swiss corporation Syngenta is already marketing

> a variety of GM corn

> - one not approved for human consumption or animal

> feed - specifically

> intended for ethanol biofuels. It has just applied,

> with support from

> the UK, for an EU import licence - even though it

> admits it " cannot

> exclude " the possibility that some of this corn will

> find its way into

> the normal supply chain. The European biotech

> association EuropaBio is

> delighted with the EU's biofuels initiative.

> " Biotechnology will help to

> meet Europe's carbon-dioxide emission reduction

> targets, reduce our

> dependence on oil imports and provide another useful

> income stream for

> our farmers, " enthuses its secretary general, Johan

> Vanhemelrijck.

>

> In the United States, biofuels are welcomed as a way

> to help wean the

> country off its dependence on oil produced by shady,

> Allah-obsessed

> Arabs. " Every gallon of renewable, domestically

> produced fuel we use is

> a gallon we don't have to get from other countries, "

> beams Congressman

> Kenny Hulshof, a Republican sponsor of the Renewable

> Fuels and Energy

> Independence Promotion Act being considered by

> Congress. Not

> surprisingly, the American Soybean Association is

> also a supporter. " ASA

> is urging all soybean growers to contact their

> members of Congress and

> ask them to co-sponsor this legislation, " says its

> president, Bob Metz,

> in a press release. " The toll-free number for the

> Congress operator is

> 1-888-355-3588. "

>

> In America, biofuels combine patriotism with

> economic self-interest in a

> seamless match. Farmers love it because biodiesel

> and ethanol are brewed

> from agricultural commodities, helping drive up

> farm-gate prices.

> Red-state senators love it because federal tax

> subsidies keep

> Republican-voting farmers happy. Even George W Bush

> loves it: " I like

> the idea of a policy that combines agriculture and

> modern science with

> the energy needs of the American people, " the

> president told the

> Renewable Fuels Association in April.

>

> Democrats and Republicans are united in touting

> ethanol. " All incumbents

> and challengers in Midwestern farm country are by

> definition

> ethanolics, " the agricultural policy adviser Ken

> Cook told the New York

> Times. There are 40 ethanol plants under

> construction, and the US is

> poised to overtake Brazil (which uses sugar cane on

> a large scale to

> make the fuel) as the world's largest producer

> within a year. Cargill's

> CEO compares the transformation to " a gold rush " .

>

> But not everybody loves biofuels. David Pimentel,

> professor of insect

> ecology and agriculture at Cornell University, hates

> them. " There is

> just no energy benefit to using plant biomass for

> liquid fuel, " he

> complains. Pimentel's own studies have concluded

> that making ethanol

> from corn uses 30 per cent more energy than the

> finished fuel produces,

> because fossil fuels are used at every stage in the

> production process,

> from cultivation (in fertilisers) to transportation.

> " Abusing our

> precious croplands to grow corn for an

> energy-inefficient process that

> yields low-grade automobile fuel amounts to

> unsustainable, subsidised

> food burning, " he fumes.

>

> Pimentel is not alone in thinking that burning food

> in cars while global

> harvests decline is not necessarily a good idea.

> China, with its

> enormous population, is already having second

> thoughts about going down

> the biofuels path. " Basically this country has such

> a large population

> that the top priority for land use is food crops, "

> says Dr Sergio

> Trindade, an expert on biofuels. The same problem

> will doubtless hamper

> the biofuels revolution in Europe. According to one

> study, meeting the

> EU's 5.75 per cent target for its vehicles will

> require about a quarter

> of Europe's agricultural land. For the even more

> car-dependent US, it

> would take 1.8 billion acres of farmland - four

> times the country's

> total arable area - to produce enough soya biodiesel

> to cover annual

> petrol consumption.

>

> So which gets priority: cars or people? A very

> simple answer to this

> land/fuel conundrum would be for people to use their

> cars less, and to

> cycle and walk more. But discouraging car use is not

> at the top of any

> politician's agenda, either in Europe or the US.

> Meanwhile, our leaders

> must be seen to be doing something about the rising

> greenhouse-gas

> emissions from road tran sport, so biofuels are the

> perfect technofix.

>

> The dilemma might bring to mind Douglas Adams's

> Hitchhiker's Guide to

> the Galaxy, where the alien Ford Prefect took the

> name of a car because

> - looking down from above at all the busy roads and

> motorways - he had

> mistaken them for the dominant life form. If cars

> chug happily around

> between massed ranks of starving people in our

> biofuelled future, then

> perhaps Ford Prefect won't have got it so wrong

> after all.

>

> For more about biofuels, log on to

> [http://www.biofuelwatch.org.uk]

> <http://www.biofuelwatch.org.uk%5D>

>

> The basics of biofuels

>

> The term biofuels covers a wide range of products,

> some of which are

> already commercially available, some of which are

> still in the research

> and development stage.

>

> A biofuel is made from biomass - organic material

> with stored chemical

> energy. Agricultural products specifically grown for

> use as biofuels

> include corn and soybeans, flaxseed and rapeseed,

> and hemp.

>

> Biofuels are renewable, and can be stored

> indefinitely and safely,

> though their " feedstocks " can require vast areas of

> land and their

> generation produces pollution.

>

> The two main types of biofuel currently in use are

> biodiesel, made from

> new or used vegetable oils and animal fats, and

> ethanol, produced by

> fermenting grain, sugar cane, grass, straw and wood.

>

> This article first appeared in the New Statesman.

> For the latest in current and cultural affairs take

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> online subscription.

>

> --

>

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