NationStates Jolt Archive

http://www.spiegel.de/international/europe/0,1518,508089,00.html
A team of researchers led by Nobel-prize winning chemist Paul Crutzen has found that growing and using biofuels emits up to 70 percent more greenhouse gases than fossil fuels. They are warning that the cure could end up being worse than the disease.

Biofuels, once championed as the great hope for fighting climate change, could end up being more damaging to the environment than oil or gasoline. A new study has found that the growth and use of crops to make biofuels produces more damaging greenhouse gases than previously thought.

German Nobel-prize winning chemist Paul Crutzen and his team of researchers have calculated the emissions released by the growth and burning of crops such as maize, rapeseed and cane sugar to produce biofuels. The team of American, British and German scientists has found that the process releases twice as much nitrous oxide (N2O) as previously thought. They estimate that 3 to 5 percent of nitrogen in fertilizer is converted and emitted, as opposed to the 2 percent used by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) in its calculations.

Crutzen is widely respected in the field of climate research, having received the Nobel Prize in 1995 for his research into the ozone layer. The study, published in the scientific journal Atmospheric Chemistry and Physics, finds that the growth and use of biofuels produced from rapeseed and maize can produce 70 percent and 50 percent more greenhouse gases respectively than fossil fuels.

"One wants rational decisions rather than simply jumping on the bandwagon because superficially something appears to reduce emissions," Keith Smith, a professor at the University of Edinburgh and co-author of the study, told the London Times.

The findings come in the wake of an OECD report earlier this month, which warned against rushing to grow reneweable energy crops because they cause food shortages (more...) and damage biodiversity while producing limited benefits.

The growth of corn for ethanol in the United States has already overtaken its cultivation for food, while in Europe the main biofuel crop is rapeseed.

I can't find the actual journal article, mainly because I'm clueless when it comes to atmospheric chemistry, so the titles make no sense to me. If someone could find it, that would be great.

So, if it turns out that biofuels are not in fact any better than fossil fuels (except that they probably won't run out as fast), where does that leave us?

So, if it turns out that biofuels are not in fact any better than fossil fuels (except that they probably won't run out as fast), where does that leave us?

Water-skiing in shit creek?

I don't think Biofuels were ever a credible way to reduce greenhouse gases. They're more of a way to end dependency on foreign oil. To reduce greenhouse gases, we need to focus our efforts on solar, hydroelectric, wind, fusion, and clean fission power.

Actually it's been documented for sometime.... The problem is, biofuels emit LESS Carbon monoxide and carbon dioxide, but emit a hell of alot more nitrous oxide... nitrous is multiple times more potent of a greenhouse gas than CO2.

http://www.spiegel.de/international/europe/0,1518,508089,00.html


I can't find the actual journal article, mainly because I'm clueless when it comes to atmospheric chemistry, so the titles make no sense to me. If someone could find it, that would be great.

So, if it turns out that biofuels are not in fact any better than fossil fuels (except that they probably won't run out as fast), where does that leave us?

I probably could find it, but posting it here would be a great big breach of copywright. I'll see if I can find the abstract though.

EDIT: No luck, it may not be online until next month.

As for the question: it leaves us where we were before biofuels became fashionable - with a pressing need to reduce carbon emissions via all means that work, and biofuels never really offered that.

I've never really thought about biofuels as being much cleaner or better then the stuff we're using now. In the US, at least, it seems to be looked at more as an economics thing, trying to use less oil and more fuels availible domestically.


AND...
Lulz, Rapeseed.

Seriously, who thought that Rapeseed would be a good name?

This is almost as bad as the environmental damage the making of hybrids cause.

Is there nothing that can be done about the environment while maintaing our decadent amoral lifestyle?

This is almost as bad as the environmental damage the making of hybrids cause.

Is there nothing that can be done about the environment while maintaing our decadent amoral lifestyle?

Thus why hybrids are marketed to save money on gas, not to save the environment.

Actually it's been documented for sometime.... The problem is, biofuels emit LESS Carbon monoxide and carbon dioxide, but emit a hell of alot more nitrous oxide... nitrous is multiple times more potent of a greenhouse gas than CO2.

More like 100 times.

This is almost as bad as the environmental damage the making of hybrids cause.
True, true.

Is there nothing that can be done about the environment while maintaing our decadent amoral lifestyle?
Shut yo damn hippie piehole.

But seriously, for a long, long time there have been a few dissenters, skeptics who have questioned these "solutions" but always get shouted down. Biofuels have to be produced, not just pulled out of the ground almost ready to go like oil but actually produced before transportation.

E85 is making gas with gas. Anyone else see the problem here? This isn't like making plutonium out of uranium waste, this doesn't offer significant gains. It doesn't even end dependency on oil because you need oil to run the equipment to harvest the plant material and turn it into gas. This is like recycling paper instead of composting or burning it. If this were really the fuel of the future then why does it need to be so heavily subsidised? If something can't turn a profit it's usually a dead giveaway that it is a fairly wasteful practice.

I already knew this. My thermo prof told us about this the first day of the semester.

A little misleading with the title there, but the study is ultimately a good thing. It's important not to replace one problem with another.

For this reason I never liked corn as a source.

From Reuters (http://www.reuters.com/article/environmentNews/idUSL2790018020070927?pageNumber=1)

However the study did not condemn all biofuels, suggesting that scientists and farmers should focus on crops needing little fertilizer, and harvesting methods that were not energy intensive.

"In future if you use low nitrogen demanding crops, and low impact agriculture, then we could get a benefit," Smith said.

The study singled out grasses and woody coppice species -- like willows and poplars -- as crops with potentially more favorable impacts on the climate.

You'll forgive my hippiesh tendencies when I mutter "hemp"...


Aaaannyway...

So, if it turns out that biofuels are not in fact any better than fossil fuels (except that they probably won't run out as fast), where does that leave us?

With a lot more food that can, you know, feed the poor :) [/hippy]

I was never a fan of biofuel, more due to the implications on the cost of food then the possible environmental damage. Though I don't like a lot of these supposedly 'ethical' goods that, for example, don't need batteries but are very intensive and damaging to make.

I probably could find it, but posting it here would be a great big breach of copywright. I'll see if I can find the abstract though.

EDIT: No luck, it may not be online until next month.


I've always found it funny that frequently journalists get to see academic articles before the academics.

I wish the world can just introduce hydroeletric power, solar power, wind power.

In the country I live, the wind power is getting so common that by 2010, wind power will acount for 7% of the electricty.

In the country I live, the wind power is getting so common that by 2010, wind power will acount for 7% of the electricty.

My god, what Utopia is that?

My god, what Utopia is that?

somewhere in southeast asia.

For this reason I never liked corn as a source.

has anyone come up with an even marginally plausible reason why we don't just tell the corn lobby to go fuck itsef? i mean, honestly, what are they gonna do?

My god, what Utopia is that?
Hardly a utopia...it's actually quite common. The technology is already there and developing rapidly, you just need the right places to do it (out at sea (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:DanishWindTurbines.jpg) usually).

It's 20% in Denmark, 9% in Spain and 7% in Germany.

The problem here is that excessive fertiliser use leads to more ammonium ions in the soil. This is converted to nitrites and then nitrates by bacteria. Nitrates are the form of nitrogen which plants absorb to use in amino acids - very important.

However, some bacteria also convert nitrates into nitrogen and release it into the atmosphere in its gaseous form. One of the steps along this process is turning the nitrate into Nitrous Oxide - some of which inevitably escapes.

Simple solutions are to keep the area of cultivation rich in oxygen as denitrification is more common in areas where oxygen is depleted. The other is to get build some solar powered Tesla coils above the area of cultivation. The electrical discharge by the Tesla coil fixes atmospheric nitrogen compounds into nitrates and ammonia. A third solution would be to genetically engineer nitrogen-fixing bacteria to favour living among the roots of rapeseed - this would counter the effect of the denitrifying bacteria.

I don't know what all the fuss is about.

Hardly a utopia...it's actually quite common. The technology is already there and developing rapidly, you just need the right places to do it (out at sea (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:DanishWindTurbines.jpg) usually).

It's 20% in Denmark, 9% in Spain and 7% in Germany.

I know.

Commenting on the fact 7% wind power by 2010 won't really do anything and isn't particuarly impressive.

Obviously I'm not good at irony :)

Obviously I'm not good at irony :)
It just doesn't translate well over the web. :p

has anyone come up with an even marginally plausible reason why we don't just tell the corn lobby to go fuck itsef? i mean, honestly, what are they gonna do?

Withdraw their support of corn belt politicians making them unelectable? Single industry states are hard to change...just like tobacco states.

If we gave them an alternative crop, one that turns over fast and is highly useful for a number of applications, that doesn't need fertilizer and is easy on the soil...

But nooooo...

The problem here is that excessive fertiliser use leads to more ammonium ions in the soil. This is converted to nitrites and then nitrates by bacteria. Nitrates are the form of nitrogen which plants absorb to use in amino acids - very important.

However, some bacteria also convert nitrates into nitrogen and release it into the atmosphere in its gaseous form. One of the steps along this process is turning the nitrate into Nitrous Oxide - some of which inevitably escapes.

Simple solutions are to keep the area of cultivation rich in oxygen as denitrification is more common in areas where oxygen is depleted. The other is to get build some solar powered Tesla coils above the area of cultivation. The electrical discharge by the Tesla coil fixes atmospheric nitrogen compounds into nitrates and ammonia. A third solution would be to genetically engineer nitrogen-fixing bacteria to favour living among the roots of rapeseed - this would counter the effect of the denitrifying bacteria.

I don't know what all the fuss is about.
The idea of Tesla coils snapping in the middle of crops is cool. I don't really care about its practicality, it's just cool. Fuck scarecrows...

I probably could find it, but posting it here would be a great big breach of copywright.


Not if you post the link to the web site instead of the article itself.

Biofuels are bad?

Who'd have thought. And here I was believing that cutting down more woods (Turning them into CO2 and furniture), and transforming more grasslands into monocultures whose biodiversity is inferior to that of Manhatten would improve the environment.

Another dream crushed ;_;

http://www.spiegel.de/international/europe/0,1518,508089,00.html


I can't find the actual journal article, mainly because I'm clueless when it comes to atmospheric chemistry, so the titles make no sense to me. If someone could find it, that would be great.

So, if it turns out that biofuels are not in fact any better than fossil fuels (except that they probably won't run out as fast), where does that leave us?

Well, stop using biofuels. They destroy the rainforrests and produce more CO2

My vehicle requires no fuel, is easily fixed, is inexpensive, uses existing technology, reduces traffic congestion, and doesn't need insurance.

Reducing demand on all fuels is one of the key solutions to the coming energy crisis. It is unfortunate that this will be bad for the economy.

I don't think Biofuels were ever a credible way to reduce greenhouse gases. They're more of a way to end dependency on foreign oil. To reduce greenhouse gases, we need to focus our efforts on solar, hydroelectric, wind, fusion, and clean fission power.


Solar: Yes, but the Return On Investment is low. Not all countries are located in the Sahara. I know that the cells itself are improving, but so is their price.

With Solar you could have too much curves in "no production -> too much production". I'll tell later more about this issue.

Hydro: Not every country can do it. And depending the solution you selected, it could destroy local fauna and entire populations will have to move (which is expensive)

The advantage is that the production is stable.

Wind: Can't be used everywhere. It's polluting the skyline (better that than the environment) and those things are making lots of noise. You can't put them near high density populated areas. Best locations would be near or in the ocean.

Too much curves in production as well.

Cold Fusion: Maybe we will never find a commercial working solution. We already spend some time and effort on it and till now...it isn't looking good.

Clean fission: Till now, it's not clean. The nuclear waste is a real pain.

But there are other solutions as well:

* Energy derivated from sound (yes, really!)
* Passive houses and offices (expensive, but it works)
* Energy from sewer gasses.

The problem with electricity is the storage. Currently we can't store it cheaply and in huge volumes. So what is produced should be used and we can only use what is produced.

That's why wind and solar systems alone will not do the trick. You always need a kind of fast reaction gas turbine.

Of course there are all kind of Risk Management systems to predict the future but sometimes they fail. If it is failing too often, lots of businesses would disappear.

This is almost as bad as the environmental damage the making of hybrids cause.

Is there nothing that can be done about the environment while maintaing our decadent amoral lifestyle?

Yes.

Don't make children anymore. All of you.

The idea of Tesla coils snapping in the middle of crops is cool. I don't really care about its practicality, it's just cool. Fuck scarecrows...

Yay! :D

Biofuels are bad?

Who'd have thought. And here I was believing that cutting down more woods (Turning them into CO2 and furniture), and transforming more grasslands into monocultures whose biodiversity is inferior to that of Manhatten would improve the environment.

Another dream crushed ;_;

actually, it turns out that we could get far more energy from far less inputs if we changed over to using diverse native perennial grasses and such. the monoculture corn thing is an obviously stupid idea for this, just like it is for everything else we treat it like an answer to.


http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/abstract/314/5805/1598
Carbon-Negative Biofuels from Low-Input High-Diversity Grassland Biomass
David Tilman, Jason Hill, Clarence Lehman

Science 8 December 2006:
Vol. 314. no. 5805, pp. 1598 - 1600

Biofuels derived from low-input high-diversity (LIHD) mixtures of native grassland perennials can provide more usable energy, greater greenhouse gas reductions, and less agrichemical pollution per hectare than can corn grain ethanol or soybean biodiesel. High-diversity grasslands had increasingly higher bioenergy yields that were 238% greater than monoculture yields after a decade. LIHD biofuels are carbon negative because net ecosystem carbon dioxide sequestration (4.4 megagram hectare–1 year–1 of carbon dioxide in soil and roots) exceeds fossil carbon dioxide release during biofuel production (0.32 megagram hectare–1 year–1). Moreover, LIHD biofuels can be produced on agriculturally degraded lands and thus need to neither displace food production nor cause loss of biodiversity via habitat destruction.

Erm they were never meant to be a way to reduce emmisions, more as a stopgap fuel before something better comes along, no?

*Peers at article*

How's the habitat not destroyed when the local biomass is harvested...? Well, I suppose they mean 'Not permanently destroyed'...

Not that it really matters (And I don't mean this because there's no way the agricultural lobby can be convinced of this). Biofuels are a tad silly insofar as they're still CO2 producers. And while this - just as modern engines & power plants in general - is definitely a vast improvement to NxOy producing processes back a few decades ago, it isn't overly helpful for the problem at hand. Sure, some forms thereof might be somewhat less CO2-happy than conventional energy sources...

But they're still producing it, and the planet's energy needs are, well, exploding (Have been for a while, and aren't stopping anytime soon). Bring these two together, and we still get a net-CO2 increase.

Finding a greenhouse gas friendly alternative to petroleum really isn't our big problem though, is it? I mean, give the scientists a decade or so, and they'll find something. Now, changing the attitudes of the people using the most of the resources will be the tough part. I've seen people in my apartment complex get into their SUV, drive their garbage 200 meters to the dumpster, and drive straight back to their apartment. I knew people who shared an apartment and worked at the same building drive two different cars to work, just in case they had errands they needed to run during their lunch hour.

Getting those people to cut back will be the truly difficult part of the equation...

*Peers at article*

How's the habitat not destroyed when the local biomass is harvested...? Well, I suppose they mean 'Not permanently destroyed'...

two things. its in the nature of the sort of community they're discussing for the above ground parts to die off each year anyways. and what they are really getting at is that doing this actually works to improve the soil of already degraded land, and so doesn't require us to clear more land or shift huge amounts of farming over to it.

Biofuels are a tad silly insofar as they're still CO2 producers. And while this - just as modern engines & power plants in general - is definitely a vast improvement to NxOy producing processes back a few decades ago, it isn't overly helpful for the problem at hand. Sure, some forms thereof might be somewhat less CO2-happy than conventional energy sources...

But they're still producing it, and the planet's energy needs are, well, exploding (Have been for a while, and aren't stopping anytime soon). Bring these two together, and we still get a net-CO2 increase.

how? where does this extra carbon come from?

(and less generally, this particular process is carbon negative)

Getting those people to cut back will be the truly difficult part of the equation...

jacking up the gas prices seems to be doing the trick.

which is why we really shouldn't be fucking subsidizing the cornfuckers to make their shitty gas cheap at the pump the way we are.

I'm glad that biofuels or specifically corn derived ethanol for use in cars is bad for the environment. It's just not a very good idea to turn food into energy sources just so some people can drive their SUV's at a lower cost. I can just image some people starving just so another could drive to work in a truck they never use for hauling.

I'm starting to sound more and more like you liberals everyday. But really I just want food prices to go down, especially beef. Cow is so tasty!

actually, it turns out that we could get far more energy from far less inputs if we changed over to using diverse native perennial grasses and such. the monoculture corn thing is an obviously stupid idea for this, just like it is for everything else we treat it like an answer to.
Crop biofuel is the shittiest biofuel possible. But don't count on anything else being researched realistically, nothing else has one of the largest lobbies in existence.

two things. its in the nature of the sort of community they're discussing for the above ground parts to die off each year anyways. and what they are really getting at is that doing this actually works to improve the soil of already degraded land, and so doesn't require us to clear more land or shift huge amounts of farming over to it.Mhm... I suppose so. Don't really have much knowledge about, erm, vegetation.related issues.

how? where does this extra carbon come from?From burning the fuel? Burning carbon-based substances tends to release CO2 - now increase the amount of burniation occuring in the world appropriately for, as a vaguely guideline, the economic growth expected in various third-world and transitional countries, and you get a vast increase. Well, or you run out of biomass, but I don't think it's quite that bad.

(and less generally, this particular process is carbon negative)The author's definition of 'Carbon-negative' would interest me. Seeing as burning biomass for energy, err... Produces carbon dioxide... A carbon sink requires some of the plant growth not to be burned, end of story.

From burning the fuel? Burning carbon-based substances tends to release CO2

yes, but where did the carbon for those carbon-based substances come from?

The author's definition of 'Carbon-negative' would interest me.

"less carbon in the atmosphere after using the stuff for fuel" is the standard definition.

I don't think Biofuels were ever a credible way to reduce greenhouse gases. They're more of a way to end dependency on foreign oil. To reduce greenhouse gases, we need to focus our efforts on solar, hydroelectric, wind, fusion, and clean fission power.

More or less but wouldn't we have to get the sugar cane mostly from Brazil (i.e. in America). So we'd still be foreign dependant. Or I could be wrong, do we really have vast amounts of sugar cane growing here? I'm not an agriculturalist although I'm interested to find out. What I do know is that ethanol from corn is not as good as sugar cane, something about the energy output.