Skeptics argue that if biofuel demand and production increases significantly, the nation's food supply will suffer as a result. Using selective bad examples and worst-case statistics from irrelevant studies makes it possible to draw this conclusion. However, most skeptics ignore the dramatic new developments in cellulosic ethanol and butanol, flex fuel and clean diesel vehicles and biodiesel from algae, which offer a realistic and practical path to clean and renewable alternatives to petroleum and coal without any negative effect on food supply.
Most biofuel skeptics divide and conquer by focusing on the subsidized and failing corn ethanol industry, which threatens to raise the price of food because of the competition of supply and dramatic growth in demand. This is an easy target because it's true. Corn (starch) ethanol has very limited potential and is a growing and serious threat.
When skeptics bother to mention cellulosic ethanol, they usually talk about how expensive it is and how ethanol has less energy content than gasoline, which lowers mileage. However, they usually fail to point out the many benefits of cellulosic biofuel, which far out weigh the weaknesses.
Cellulosic ethanol is dramatically different and doesn't use the food part of corn but can use the higher volume of corn residue (stalks and cobs) as well as many other farm crop residues, wood chips and energy crops like switchgrass and miscanthus, which actually remove and sequester CO2 from the atmosphere because of their deep root structure. Because cellulosic ethanol comes from many plentiful sources that don't compete with food crops, the price will go down over time.
This will also make more corn supply available for food, bringing the price of food down. Corn farmers won't mind the price coming down because they will be making money on both the food and crop residue, instead of just the food part and that's why Iowa farmers are building several different models to figure out the best way to transition to cellulosic.
By focusing only on corn ethanol, skeptics are able to paint a weak picture for all biofuels but ethanol is only part of the equation. Skeptics rarely mention cellulosic butanol, which has a higher energy content than ethanol, is made from the same cellulosic sources, can use existing gasoline pumps and pipelines and can be used at 100% in any gasoline vehicle. Dupont, BP and Richard Branson from Virgin are invested heavily in cellulosic butanol.
Biobutanol
http://www2.dupont.c...
Skeptics rarely include biodiesel, which has a higher energy content than gasoline and can be produced in massive quantities from algae, enough to replace all petroleum, without using any farm land. Very few people are aware that the combination of biodiesel and new clean diesel vehicles offers a realistic path to 99% clean and 100% renewable energy at a fraction of the cost of all other alternatives on the drawing board.
The skeptics also tend to skim over the success in Brazil where they have transformed their economy by scaling up the use of locally grown ethanol, which now sells for 45% less than gasoline because of economies of scale. Ethanol accounts for more than 40% of the fuel for 16.5 million Brazilian drivers. An estimated $69 billion that would leave Brazil each year to pay for foreign petroleum now stays in Brazil to revitalize once-depressed rural areas.
Commercial scale cellulosic ethanol is well underway:
New Processing Promise More Economical Ethanol Production - Virginia Tech
http://www.scienceda...
Mixed Prairie Grasses Better Source of Biofuel than Corn Ethanol and Soybean Biodiesel
http://www.nsf.gov/n...
According to SunOpta:
"The SunOpta BioProcess Group is supplying the biomass pretreatment process system for Abengoa's wheat straw to ethanol plant in Babilafuente(Salamanca), Spain. This facility will be the first commercial cellulosic ethanol production plant in the world.
Click on: Cellulosic Ethanol for Road Fuel (PDF)
http://www.sunopta.c...
Commercial Cellulosic Ethanol Plant Announced for Iowa Location
http://www.treehugge...
Iogen reveals ideal commercial cellulosic ethanol plant site - Idaho
http://www.ethanolpr...
New York Awards $25.1 Million for Two Cellulosic Ethanol Plants
http://www.eere.ener...
Marubeni - Osaka, Japan
The Osaka Project will utilize wood waste as feedstock in producing up to 1.3 million liters of cellulosic ethanol annually. A second phase, planned for completion in 2008, will increase production to 4 million liters per year.
http://www.celunol.c...
Cellulose Ethanol Demonstration Facility - Ottawa, Canada
http://www.iogen.ca/...
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Obviously we need to find alternatives to fossil fuels, and corn ethanol may well be part of the answer.
Cellulosic processing comes from farm residue, wood chips and energy crops like switchgrass, which are perinials that can be grown locally in less than ideal food crop soil, with very little fertilizer and pesticide. Switchgrass and miscanthus are also drought and flood resistent and provide a higher yeild than corn. The processing is more intensive but that is changing right here in Virginia:
New Processing Promise More Economical Ethanol Production - Virginia Tech
http://www.scienceda...
Mixed Prairie Grasses Better Source of Biofuel than Corn Ethanol and Soybean Biodiesel
http://www.nsf.gov/n...
Regarding cellulosic ethanol, I'm favorably inclined towards it as long as the technology can be worked out. But I'm far more favorably inclined towards the lowest of low-hanging fruits, that being energy efficiency technologies. The fact is, there is no reason why we can't build cars that get 40, 50, 60, even 100 miles per gallon. What we need is for the government to provide the necessary incentives and disincentives to make this happen. The planet's entire ecology depends on it.