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Is cellulosic ethanol the dream fuel or a pipe dream?
Kevin Anderson, Guardian
GM shifts gears and supports ethanol
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At the Detroit auto show last week, car makers engaged in a high-stakes battle to prove their green credentials. Toyota announced that it would produce a plug-in hybrid by 2010. GM continued to show off its plug-in petrol-electric Volt (without adding much new about it) and a Saturn SUV plug-in hybrid, and General Motors also made a dramatic announcement that it would diversify “away from petroleum”
GM also announced an investment in cellulosic ethanol start-up Coskata. The company is promising inexpensive ethanol that produces 84% less greenhouse gas emissions than burning a gallon of petrol.
There has been a biofuels backlash of late. Feed crop-based biofuels have pushed up the price for staples such as corn, and biofuel critics have said they cause environmental damage in the form of deforestation and larger dead zones in the Gulf of Mexico due to fertiliser run-off from increased corn production.
But cellulosic ethanol does not rely on feed crops but can break down and transform cellulose into ethanol with the help of special enzymes or microbes.
…I’d love to see cellulosic ethanol live up to the hype. In the US, transportation is the second leading contributor to greenhouse emissions. If you could scale up cellulosic ethanol production and distribution quickly, you start to see a dramatic cut in emissions and with far fewer environmental issues than corn or sugar-based ethanol or palm oil based bio-diesel.
(21 January 2008)
A lot of if’s. -BA
MPs’ warning on biofuels angers Brussels
Ian Traynor, Guardian
The EU yesterday denounced a House of Commons report calling for a moratorium on the increased use of biofuels and made plain it would stick to mandatory targets for the use of biofuels in transport when it unveils a climate change package today.
Yesterday’s report from the Commons environmental audit committee warned that biofuels were too expensive, environmentally damaging and making a negative contribution to cutting greenhouse gases, and said British government and EU plans to force greater use of biofuels should be rethought. In an unusually strong criticism of the Commons committee, Andris Piebalgs, the EU commissioner for energy, insisted that biofuels had to be supported as the “most immediately feasible way” of reversing greenhouse gas discharges from cars.
(22 January 2008)
Hologram prince hails new money for alternative energy
John Vidal, Guardian
Abu Dhabi — Prince Charles upstaged the world’s largest oil companies, politicians and presidents today by appearing out of the ether at an alternative energy summit, saying a few words and then vanishing back into thin air.
The full-size, walking, talking, fiddling hologram of the prince appeared on the world stage to gasps from the 2,500 delegates to the World Future Energy summit. Most had flown thousands of miles to Abu Dhabi to discuss renewable energy and climate change and how to save emissions.
But Prince Charles also surprised many people by referring to a common “creator” figure.
“Scientists are now saying that the problem of climate change is now so grave and so urgent that we have less than 10 years to slow, stop and reverse greenhouse gas emissions.
“Common actions are needed in every country to protect the common inheritance that has been given to us by our creator,” said the prince.
He welcomed an announcement by Abu Dhabi of an investment of $15bn of new money immediately, and far more later, into alternative energy projects including wind, solar, and carbon capture technologies.
(21 January 2008)
