[Peakoil] FW: [CANAchat] biodiesel beats ethanol

Tue Aug 1 11:13:19 EST 2006

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From: CANAchat at yahoogroups.com [mailto:CANAchat at yahoogroups.com] On Behalf
Of Julie-Anne Richards CANA
Sent: Monday, 31 July 2006 6:55 PM
To: canachat at yahoogroups.com
Subject: [CANAchat] biodiesel beats ethanol

an interesting article that I missed earlier in the month (sorry if everyone
else already caught it), the clincher:

"Even if the US devoted all its corn to ethanol and all its soybeans to
biodiesel production – which would cause widespread food shortages – the
resulting biofuels would cover less than 5% of US gasoline and diesel fuel
needs, they calculate."

Biodiesel beats ethanol in biofuel battle

*	22:00 10 July 2006 

*	NewScientist.com news service 

*	Bob Holmes 

In the battle of environmentally friendly biofuels for cars and trucks,
biodiesel beats ethanol hands down, new research concludes – but neither
will go very far toward reducing the demand for petroleum. 

Both ethanol biofuel, made from corn, and biodiesel, made from soybeans,
have been touted as alternative fuels that can reduce greenhouse gas
emissions, because they remove carbon dioxide from the atmosphere as they
grow. 

But making these fuels takes a lot of oil – to make and run farm machinery,
to produce pesticides and fertilisers, and to process the harvest into fuel.
Some sceptics have argued that the emissions produced are so high that using
biofuels may not reduce overall emissions at all. 

To test whether these two biofuels are viable, David Tilman, an ecologist at
the University of Minnesota, US, and his colleagues calculated the total
environmental costs of their production. When all these costs are factored
in, corn-based ethanol does indeed reduce greenhouse gas emissions, but only
by about 12% compared to gasoline, they found. 

In contrast, biodiesel reduces emissions by 41% over diesel fuel, largely
because it does not need distillation to be processed into fuel. Also, far
fewer fertilisers and pesticides are used in growing soybeans, giving
biodiesel a further edge in reducing environmental impact.

Food or fuel?

But all this is barely a splash in the tank of energy demand. Even if the US
devoted all its corn to ethanol and all its soybeans to biodiesel production
– which would cause widespread food shortages – the resulting biofuels would
cover less than 5% of US gasoline and diesel fuel needs, they calculate. 

"Those two sources are always going to be minor supplies of those fuels,"
says Tilman. "Turning what is already a globally limited quantity of food
into energy is not a very good option in the long term."

A better solution in the long run, Tilman suggests, is to produce ethanol
from non-food sources such as prairie grasses and woody plants. Such
"cellulosic" ethanol may offer much greater reductions in greenhouse gas
emissions. 

Indeed, the US Department of Energy released a report on Friday endorsing
cellulosic ethanol as a way to replace 30% of US petroleum fuels by 2030. 

"To make big inroads, clearly we will need cellulosic ethanol," says Daniel
Kammen, who directs the Renewable and Appropriate Energy Laboratory at the
University of California at Berkeley, US. "That is where the greenhouse gas
savings are. That is where we need to push, innovate and invest."

Journal reference: Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (DOI:
10.1073/pnas.0604600103)

Julie-Anne Richards
Coordinator
Climate Action Network Australia

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