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Forests paying the price for biofuels Biofuel “renewables” a New Scientist perspective
Fred Pearce, New Scientist
THE drive for “green energy” in the developed world is having the perverse effect of encouraging the destruction of tropical rainforests. From the orang-utan reserves of Borneo to the Brazilian Amazon, virgin forest is being razed to grow palm oil and soybeans to fuel cars and power stations in Europe and North America. And surging prices are likely to accelerate the destruction.
The rush to make energy from vegetable oils is being driven in part by European Union laws requiring conventional fuels to be blended with biofuels, and by subsidies equivalent to 20 pence a litre. Last week, the British government announced a target for biofuels to make up 5 per cent of transport fuels by 2010. The aim is to help meet Kyoto protocol targets for reducing greenhouse-gas emissions.
Rising demand for green energy has led to a surge in the international price of palm oil, with potentially damaging consequences. “The expansion of palm oil production is one of the leading causes of rainforest destruction in south-east Asia. It is one of the most environmentally damaging commodities on the planet,” says Simon Counsell, director of the UK-based Rainforest Foundation. “Once again it appears we are trying to solve our environmental problems by dumping them in developing countries, where they have devastating effects on local people.”
The main alternative to palm oil is soybean oil. But soya is the largest single cause of rainforest destruction in the Brazilian Amazon. Supporters of biofuels argue that they can be “carbon neutral” because the CO2 released from burning them is taken up again by the next crop. Interest is greatest for diesel engines, which can run unmodified on vegetable oil, and in Germany bio-diesel production has doubled since 2003. There are also plans for burning palm oil in power stations.
Until recently, Europe’s small market in biofuels was dominated by home-grown rapeseed (canola) oil. But surging demand from the food market has raised the price of rapeseed oil tool. This has led fuel manufacturers to opt for palm and soya oil instead. Palm oil prices jumped 10 per cent in September alone, and are predicted to rise 20 per cent next year, while global demand for biofuels is now rising at 25 per cent a year.
Roger Higman, of Friends of the Earth UK, which backs biofuels, says: “We need to ensure that the crops used to make the fuel have been grown in a sustainable way or we will have rainforests cleared for palm oil plantations to make bio-diesel.” … Thats all we got, subscription required for the rest.
(19 November 2005)
Demand climbs for biodiesel fuel
Peggy Andersen, Associated Press via Seattle Times
SEATTLE — The Pacific Northwest loves being green. Recycling got an early start here. Seattle-based coffee giant Starbucks has scrambled to provide bird-friendly, shade-grown coffee. State forest lands were the first in the West to earn “green certification” for environmentally sound management.
Now, with gasoline prices fluctuating in wallet-busting ranges and petroleum tainted in many minds by violence in the Mideast, demand for biodiesel is booming. …
But there have been supply problems, said Jim Boone, maintenance manager for Metro Transit in Seattle, which runs 340 of its 1,400 buses on B5 biodiesel, a mix of 5 percent biodiesel and 95 percent ultra-low-sulfur petroleum diesel. “They’re not making enough of it yet,” Boone said. “Sometimes we can’t get it.”
With two new 35-million-gallon-a-year plants coming on line in Minnesota and more in other states, shortages shouldn’t be a problem, said spokeswoman Jenna Higgins at the National Biodiesel Board in Washington, D.C.
Washington officials are interested in canola oil as a source of biodiesel because it isn’t as vulnerable to jelling at low temperatures as soy oil, the source of about 90 percent of U.S. biodiesel.
(20 November 2005)
Jungle Rot: the Future of Ethanol
Jeremy Faludi, WorldChanging.com
Researchers at the Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy lab (EERE) and National Renewable Energy Lab (NREL) have been working for years on making ethanol out of cellulose–straw, corn stalks, and other agricultural waste leftover from growing food crops. This would mean ethanol would finally make sense as a fuel, because its Energy Return On Energy Invested would be positive (since the cellulose would be waste from food, it would be “free” in terms of energy), it could be produced in large quantities (since it would not compete with food for land), and it would be cheap.
The main obstacle to making ethanol from cellulose is that cellulose doesn’t break down easily or quickly. But some years ago, people found that jungle rot (the fungus Trichoderma reesei) did it quite well. Since then, NREL, EERE, and many universities and companies have been trying to make it even more effective. …
And from the Comments:
Canadian company SunOpta, in partnership with Abengoa Bioenergy of St. Louis, is currently building the world’s first true commercial-scale biomass to ethanol plant in Salamanca, Spain. This plant will produce over a million gallons of cellulosic ethanol per year from wheat straw starting in 2006. …
(17 November 2005)
Fire in the hole!
Byron W. King, Whiskey & Gunpowder
“FIRE IN THE HOLE!” yelled our host, his hands cupped to his mouth.
We were deep in the midst of uninhabited woodlands, several miles from the nearest structure, so the shout was meant for no one in particular. But it is as much tradition as it is the law of Pennsylvania to give a clear and distinct audible warning of what was about to occur. And what was about to occur was also part of an old oil field tradition, dating back to the earliest days of the industry, in the 1860s, called “shooting a well.”
Long narrative on America’s stripper well operators, making good points about the importance of this production to meeting US supply.
(18 November 2005)
Spoonful of sugar makes biofuel greener
Zeeya Merali
Take a vat of vegetable oil and add a scorched sugar lump – the mixture could speed up the production and use of biodiesel in vehicles
TAKE a vat of vegetable oil and add a scorched sugar lump. It might not catch on as the latest cocktail, but the mixture could speed up the widespread production and use of biodiesel in vehicles.
Converting vegetable oils to fuel requires a catalyst. Most existing catalysts are derived from petrochemicals, but using them defeats the environmentally friendly object of biofuels. Liquid sulphuric acid is an alternative, but it is expensive and wasteful because it is hard to remove after the conversion. Now a team led by Masakazu Toda at the Tokyo Institute of Technology in Japan has developed a cheap, renewable catalyst from glucose.
The Tokyo chemists heated glucose and sucrose in a chamber without oxygen to remove some of the oxygen and hydrogen atoms. Then the charred remains were treated with sulphuric acid, which sticks to the sugars in place of the hydrogen and oxygen. This creates a …
(12 November 2005)
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Can nuclear power become just another business?
Tim Gray, NY TImes via International Herald Tribune
The nuclear-power sector has been enjoying something of a revival, because of its operating-cost advantages over other forms of electricity production.
…No new plant has been ordered in the United States since the Three Mile Island accident. But existing plants have kept operating: The United States has 104 reactors, which make a fifth of its power. Lately, though, the nuclear power sector has been having a revival, because of its operating-cost advantages over other forms of electricity production. That may prompt investors to bet on its resurgence.
The economic appeal of nuclear power has risen as prices for natural gas and coal have climbed. The price of natural gas, especially, has soared. In October, it touched $14 per million British thermal units, nearly double the price from October 2004. “There’s a big advantage for operating a nuclear plant when gas prices are in the $5 range, much less where they are today,” said John Kohli, portfolio manager at Franklin Utilities fund. …
Exelon, based in Chicago, has made a hefty wager on nuclear generation, he noted. It has 17 reactors at 10 sites. If it completes a pending acquisition of Public Service Enterprise Group, based in Newark, New Jersey, it will have 20 reactors at 12 sites. Exelon’s stock is up more than 15 percent this year.
“Several years ago, when the industry started to deregulate, many companies decided to sell off their nuclear plants, and very few companies had the bright idea to buy them, though they were being sold pennies on the dollar,” said Judith Saryan, portfolio manager at Eaton Vance Utilities fund. “Exelon was one of the companies that had the good sense to buy.” …
(20 November 2005)
