[Greenbuilding] [BULK] Re: bio fuels and ethanol

[Lawrence Lile]

I hear these arguments, and can see many of the points, but respectfully disagree with some of them.  Biofuels are one of the steps we should take, in my opinion, toward a diverse and sustainable energy strategy.  

Today, I have a choice between buying gasoline to run my vehicle or buying a mix of gasohol.  Or I can conserve, which I do as much as possible.  Compared to the impact of oil, I believe that ethanol and biodiesel have a lower impact.  Ideally I'd like to be using an electric vehicle driven by solar power, with a good bike rack on the back of it, but it isn't happening today.  I'm working on it though. 

"Third World USA" is a song by a local activist, describing the conditions in a rural community in the late '70's.  Let me tell you it was bleak around here, plants were closing, farmers were selling out, land prices dropping, price of corn and wheat dropping.  Although I am concerned about food prices in another country because of consumption of corn and soybeans here, I am doubly concerned when one of my neighbors is feeling it.  Fuel ethanol is turning that around for rural communities in the Midwest.  Something is finally going in the right direction for us.  I'd like to see this trend continue.  

Admittedly, the impact of soybeans and corn on the land are immediate and easy for someone in the Midwest to go look at.  However farmers can grow these crops in many different ways.  There is a farmer here in Mid Missouri who grows a rotation like this:  Clover, which is grown through a year and then plowed in, just in time to plant soybeans in late spring.  In early summer, he sows clover between the soybean rows, which doesn't really take off until the soybeans are harvested.  The clover is grown until the next summer, when it and the grasses that sprout along with it are taken for hay.  The crop is left to grow until the next spring, when it is plowed under and the soybeans go in again.  The guy is farming 1000 acres organically with this rotation, his soil organic matter measurements increase every year, and except for one month out of 24 his soil is covered with plant material. He plows in a crop every other year, but makes a cash crop off his land every single year.  He isn't losing soil, and he isn't pouring fertilizer and herbicides on his soil. Both soybeans and clover are Legumes, and return nitrogen to the soil, which is why he buys no fertilizer.  The problem with soybeans is in common farming practices, not anything inherent in the bean plant itself.  Conventional farming is not sustainable, and it will remain unsustainable whether we buy soybeans for oil or farmers sell them to Archer-Daniels to make other stuff out of.  The fight to move farming in a sustainable direction is a whole 'nuther discussion, which I will leave for another mailing list.   
 
That being said, I do admit these are very valid and serious concerns you have expressed, Dan, and I want you to realize that they are being heard.  The food-vs-fuel argument has consistently been raised when discussing biofuels.  I believe that most of the biproducts of ethanol and biodiesel production are corn and soy protien, which end up in ADM's labs being turned into cosmetics and paints, or back in the food chain feeding cows, where most of the corn and soybeans were headed in the first place.  Now you can debate whether cows are a good idea too, and that's also a good discussion for another list (I am a vegetarian, so you can guess where my vote is) but you can see how the whole subject gets a lot more complicated than a simple A vs B debate.  
 
Lawrence Lile


>For example, if one really researches the topic, s/he learns that soybeans are a real soil killer, returning far less organic matter to 
the soil than they use up and resulting in large losses of soil to erosioin as 
the roots do not hold soil and the canopy offers little protection from sun 
and rain.   Also, yield per acre is low,   as nitrogen fixers have to divert 
photosynthesis into fixation of N into energy rich forms that function as 
fertilizer.   Moreover, if we divert large acreages to soybean cultivation, we 
further jack up the price of food.   If you figures are correct (and I'm skeptical 
about any industrialized crop that claims to contain more energy than used to 
produce it), then the incentive to produce transport fuel for the rich will 
further take food from the poor.   As the price of corn goes up (because it is 
fermented and distilled and/or because less is grown to produce soybeans), 
fewer people worldwide will be able to afford to eat.   This is real.   If the US 
were remotely food self-reliant, the ethical issue would be moderated, but of 
course we are not.   We export calories, and import protein, vitamins and 
minerals.   So the real question is, is it better for even more people to die each 
year from undernutrition causes so we can drive 'affordably,' continuing to 
create air pollution, causing massive soil losses, and eventually threatening 
our own food security, or is it better for the price of gasoline to rise to the 
point where people are forced to drive much less, often not at all, and 
undertake as much conservation as they can?   

Again, as I said before, there is a place for biodeisel and ethanol, 
especially on farm as a way to sop up surpluses in good crop years. But it should be 
just a tiny fraction of our energy mix.   

Dan Hemenway



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