By Darren Smith, Weekend Contributor
According The Telegraph the United Nations will officially warn that growing crops to make “green” biofuel harms the environment and drives up food prices, The Telegraph can disclose. A leaked draft of a UN report condemns the widespread use of biofuels made from crops as a replacement for petrol and diesel. It says that biofuels, rather than combating the effects of global warming, could make them worse.
The draft report represents a dramatic about-turn for the UN’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC).
Its previous assessment on climate change, in 2007, was widely condemned by environmentalists for giving the green light to large-scale biofuel production. The latest report instead puts pressure on world leaders to scrap policies promoting the use of biofuel for transport. The summary for policy makers states: “Increasing bioenergy crop cultivation poses risks to ecosystems and biodiversity.”
The report into the impact of man-made climate change is the most authoritative of its kind. For the first time, it considered the impact of biofuels on the environment. Biofuels were once billed as the green alternative to fossil fuels, but environmental campaigners have voiced concern about them for some time. They note that growing biofuel crops on a large scale requires either the conversion of agricultural land used for food crops or the destruction of forests to free up land, possibly offsetting any reduction in carbon emissions from the use of biofuels. Other concerns include increased stress on water supplies and rising corn prices as a result of increased demand for the crop, which is fermented to produce biofuel.
A European Union directive set a target for biofuels used in transport to double to 10 per cent by 2020, although it has limited the amount from food crops to 5 per cent.
Referring in part to deforestation, it says any benefit of biofuel production on carbon emissions “may be offset partly or entirely for decades or centuries by emissions from the resulting indirect land-use changes”. On biofuel production from corn, it adds: “Resulting increases in demand for corn contribute to higher corn prices and may indirectly increase incidence of malnutrition in vulnerable populations.”
An IPCC spokesman said she could not comment until the final report is published on March 31.
This certainly underscores the need for consideration of all matters and the notion of the law of unintended consequences. While the effort to produce biofuels for purposes of the environment, cost, and geopolitical issues care must be exercised when making public policy.
By Darren Smith
Sources:
The Telegraph
Photo Credit: Mariordo Mario Roberto Duran Ortiz (Fuel Pump)
The views expressed in this posting are the author’s alone and not those of the blog, the host, or other weekend bloggers. As an open forum, weekend bloggers post independently without pre-approval or review. Content and any displays or art are solely their decision and responsibility.
Giovanna De La Paz
Petroleum is our best source of energy.
…
==================
I am sure that you are not quoting from the IPCC report, but more like pontificating from OIl-Qaeda’s reports to that effect.
The IPCC report, first phase, already came out, and is utterly contrary to the falsehood you asserted.
The one coming out Monday, has been seen already by some:
(Guardian). An associated story was posted here recently which pointed out that 7,000,000 people a year die from inhaling air polluted by fossil fuel use.
The analysis is simple.
You don’t burn food for fueling purposes. Food is at a lower entropic level than other burnable fuels, it is a waste and a sin on many economic levels.
So, the push to grow corn, to turn it into burnable liquid fuels (i.e. alcohol), or even to burn it directly as in pellet stoves, inherently wrong in so many ways, not just morally.
But, to grow crops that are inedible for fuel, well that is just fine, and in fact a great method for generating renewable resources.
(Also, windmills are wonderful and aesthetic and grand. They are actually living up to the promise of generating electricity economically from renewable sources. I am amazed and shocked that anyone in the environmental movement would have an issue with them – bats, birds and hums are not harmed by them on the whole.)
Veronica, You are a selfish individual to think that your life is worth more than any other, including the unborn. You only believe in what you can see, but are truly blinded in love of humanity. Don’t blame the unborn for our mistakes. Don’t take away their chances of life, because we need more fuel and worldly things. If we really were concerned about the environment, we wouldn’t be driving as much, and biking more. We wouldn’t be so wasteful and over indulgent in our worldliness.
You’re idea of life is taking what you want, over self-indulgence, and sacrificing others, particularly the unborn, for your own pleasure. You are the unloving person for humankind and the real nutcase.
Petroleum is our best source of energy. Wind and solar are a good place in producing energy for certain purposes, but are in need of improvement. We do need to go forward with biofuels also. They can be made of many different plants, even animal and human waste give off gases that can possibly be made into biofuels. What we may have to look at is reclamation of our waste. Plant trimmings and grasses and other throw-away products may be able to be used in biofuels. We should also consider plants that can survive in desert or wasteland areas.
Thanks Dredd I learned a new word….
nick spinelli
All the IPCC crooked bureaucrats obviously have their money in solar and electric stock. Just get their emails!!
nick spinelli
Birds would respectfully request time for rebuttal regarding wind power.
=================
Why the competition to assert the most ignorant statements straight out of an Agnotology textbook?
“UN To Declare Biofuels Cause More Harm Than Benefit To The Environment” – Daren Smith
Actually it is the growing of flora that is the problem, not the biofuels themselves.
The problem is more a problem of efficiency and waste than one of biofuels being pollutants.
The problems with bio-fuels in the US is that they are corn-based, and that (a) does drive up the cost of food (both meat and alternate crops), and (b) is an incredibly inefficient way to create ethanol (only a 2:1 return). An answer would be to switch to bio-fuels based on sugar cane since we’d import the sugar from, say, Brazil, and sugar has a 9:1 return (highly efficient).
But the political realities (with Obama in the White House and Democrats controlling the Senate) are that the US will not be allowing the economically feasible importation of sugar cane from abroad, and will not cut the subsidy for corn-based bio-fuel.
How often do we see the politics screwing up a worthwhile solution. And some people wonder why libertarians want less government.
Raff,
It has indeed driven up prices in all areas…. Fuel or food….. Is what it boils down to….
The observations by Barbra & Jack Donachy and Veronica are correct. There is only so much arable land, and so much fresh water for fertilization. Additionally, the birth rate, globally, is exploding. Fossil fuel is a finite resource, and even if they scrape the Appalachians as flat as a Kansas Walmart parking lot, someday it is going to run out.
I am not a big fan of windmill power because they can be a danger to migrating birds, not to mention anything near them if they have a failure. People don’t realize just how big those things are until you see an 18-wheel flatbed truck whose entire load is a single windmill blade, the end of it sticking so far off the rear of the truck it requires a safety escort vehicle.
The problem, as I see it, is twofold. Too many people, and not enough energy sources that are not harmful to the environment. That is why recent developments in fusion and alternate energy sources are encouraging. I do understand the oil maggots are upset, even to the point where they appear to have convinced one Republican governor to ban cars built by Tesla Motors.
Base problem really is too many of US – we need to make sure we get the population stabilized FIRST or even look at ways to make sure it goes DOWN – not an accepted point of view I know that, but since we do not mourn for babies that are NOT conceived, since we do not know them, maybe we should stop the current nonsense by right wing conspirators who encourage bigger families by preventing access to birth control – (encouraging abortion btw – desperate people resort to desperate means!). We were on the right path to control the population until this recent hysteria. You know all you RWnuts that God is NOT actively participating in this – it is ALL up to us – all this destruction of the planet is NOT god’s plan !
Another thing we have to consider is letting people decide when they will gracefully retire OFF the planet – I want to go when I become too helpless to look after myself – others would too – let us make that decision – stop making it a CRIME to want to get out of the way and leave the planet for our children, we are going eventually anyway, why is it a crime to choose to go ? Help me do what I consider is the right thing !
We have to stop expecting a God to intervene – that is NOT going to happen and all we are doing is killing the whole planet slowly but surely –
this beautiful blue orb, how could we be so greedy and careless ?
If one weighs the potential negatives of biofuels against the known negatives of fossil fuel, biofuels still seems preferable.
maybe if you’re using corn or soy beans not if you’re using palm oil. deforestation maybe, but with palm oil you can grow plants nearby that fertilize the palm plant and you don’t kill the plant to harvest the seed pod.
there is not going to be any one thing to take the place of petroleum. but you have to start somewhere. there are positives and negatives for any replacement. not replacing isn’t an option.
We feel this was an easy one to predict going back to when it was first proposed that these fuels would be a “solution” on a large scale. That being said, we’ve said the same of wind power and solar as well. With 7 billion people and more coming each day, there is no sustainable solution to the problem of fuel supply.
Not to mention GMO and Roundup/Glyphosate contamination of our food. And the killing off of beneficial insects like bees and butterflies.
Birds would respectfully request time for rebuttal regarding wind power.
On a small scale biofuels make sense, but to meet the demand it would require a huge foot print in agricultural land. Solar and wind and geothermal are the way to go.
All the IPCC crooked bureaucrats obviously have their money in solar and electric stock. Just get their emails!!
They are doing the turn about because they see the day coming when hemp will be used for biofuel. It will grow on marginal land, and will not cause food to cost more. HOWEVER it will cut into the globalist monopoly on energy and that can not be allowed.
http://yiuyu6blogspot.hk