Biofuels are produced from biological material — plants and plant products, typically. These plants have to come from somewhere, and in most of the world, that’s a monoculture farming operation. Operations on the scale required to provide a 1 for 1 swap on energy sources from oil to ethanol and biodiesel would be absolutely enormous. Assuming that were done, the way we do farming requires a lot of fertilizer. And where does the nitrogen in most fertilizer products come from? Petrochemicals — Oil. So while the process is cleaner in the emissions sense, it is still ultimately a petrochemical product. You cannot simply make a counter-argument like “use another source” or “do it organically” without first having a sense of the scale this would require.

Further, with the increase in demand these fuels would place on farm markets, does that mean that there would develop an economic calculus that determines the choice between feeding people and cars in times of depressed global crop production?

The real choice is not about energy use, but about lifestyle itself. Those of us in the west, Europe and especially North America need to drop cars. Move into town, live densely and close together, use bicycles and slow down the pace of our lives. It seems to work for the places in the world that have adopted it.

This isn’t an technical issue, ultimately, it’s a choice we’re going to make about the way our lives will be lied now and in the future. Because your choices now can affect generations, you really are making a decision for other people. You need to be very clear about what kind of world you want to hand your children based on careful consideration of actual facts, not wishes and poorly understood technofixes.

Good luck, and Goodnight.

Comment by big papa — January 26, 2006 @ 12:54 pm

It’s like anything – just one day at a time :)

Comment by realist67 — January 26, 2006 @ 12:01 pm

Sorry for the delay, I’ve been trying to teach a troll that the reflection in the mirror is his… after all, they teach chimps to do it… much easier with an ape than a troll.

Gee, I guess I just started making small incremental changes. Not sure about books or websites to suggest.

But turning off the television, especially during commericals makes a huge difference.

I guess just think about where you spend you money, and how you could cut back, or find it cheaper. You’re right – most of it is common sense.

Good luck!

Linked on that page are the article’s wonderful graphics. Under the heading “$30-$70” in the side bar, they show that the USA has about 1/100th (roughly–I am estimating off their highly stylized chart) the arable land to produce enough soybeans to make enough biodiesel to replace the amount of oil we used last year.

Ethanol is a different story, but still drastic: According to their sources, we only produce corn with a tiny fraction of the arable land in this country, but if we instead grew corn on 1/4 or so of the arable land available to us, we could make enough ethanol to replace the oil amount of oil we used last year.

Of course, then there is the question of fertilizing the crops–current inorganic fertilizers are made in chemical plants powered by coal or what have you from a large number of oil products. And the pesticides we use are all hydrocarbon derived using massive amounts of energy, in most cases from coal. And the tractors to plant and reap the crops, plus the trucks to transport the grain or soy… We’ve got a LONG way to go.

I could’ve disproved or not “The Origin of Species” in this amount of time…

Comment by unbelievable

I envy you your ability to live the spartan life…

I live close to my job, use public transportation when available and walk to places within a 2 mile radius. I grow a garden in the summer. I stopped watching commercials and limit my television to 3 to 5 hours per week. When I go to the store, I go with a list and only go where these items lie (incredible how much I was spending on nothing of value that just fattens the wallets of Corporate America). Not only am I decreasing my dependence on the BIG Corporate Industries, but I now have considerably less stress in my life, and, as a result am regularly mistaken for being considerably younger than my real age. It’s not just about ’sticking it to the man’, but about living in harmony and balance with the earth – as we should be.

Sounds like a lot of common sense. I too, would like to change my life: Can you state some books or websites that have pointers about this?

Comment by roundup — January 25, 2006 @ 5:04 pm

Well I can point to some patents for Motionless Generators and Scalar field devices. One such device was patented years ago and installed in the ICBM missiles. NOTE; This is not Free energy but a very high C.O.P.
Many of these Inventors, such as the Wankle C.O.P. Motor have been bought out or silenced by big oil.

The Soviets claim that very deep oil reserves actually replenish themselves thru the Earths lower crusts.
From USGS
http://pubs.usgs.gov/publications/text/tectonics.html
Fossil fuels
Oil and natural gas are the products of the deep burial and decomposition of accumulated organic material in geologic basins that flank mountain ranges formed by plate-tectonic processes. Heat and pressure at depth transform the decomposed organic material into tiny pockets of gas and liquid petroleum, which then migrate through the pore spaces and larger openings in the surrounding rocks and collect in reservoirs, generally within 5 km of the Earth’s surface.

America IS the Second Largest Producer of OIL. Look at the San Andreas Fault Line. I know for a Fact they have been drilling in the Middle of Los Angeles for Oil last year, right under your noses.

Now Show us some FACTS mr trust me Jackass Dem.

Oh well, you can still live in fairy tale land and pretend Bush is spying on you.

Comment by Innocent Lite — January 25, 2006 @ 5:11 pm

Hes just another Borker. They will say anything to get confirmed. Heres Roberts First ‘Loss’ and Yet another to Bushco;
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20060117/ap_on_go_su_co/scotus_assisted_suicide
WASHINGTON – The Supreme Court on Tuesday blocked the Bush administration’s attempt to punish doctors who help terminally ill patients die, protecting Oregon’s one-of-a-kind assisted-suicide law.
It was the first loss for Chief Justice John Roberts, who joined the court’s most conservative members —
Antonin Scalia and
Clarence Thomas — in a long but restrained dissent.
The administration improperly tried to use a federal drug law to pursue Oregon doctors who prescribe lethal doses of prescription medicines, the court said in a rebuke to former Attorney General
John Ashcroft.
The 6-3 ruling could encourage other states to consider copying Oregon’s law, used to end the lives of more than 200 seriously ill people in that state. The decision, one of the biggest expected from the court this year, also could set the stage for Congress to attempt to outlaw assisted suicide.

Anything that interferes with that and helps the poor to boot – “fuhgetaboutit-

plutocratic government is not interested in “the greater good”, only investment returns…

There’ll be NO bio-fuel development as long as there’s a republiscum in the White House and majority controlling the House and Senate…

Comment by roundup #9

roundeye,

What kind of voodoo science do you have to back it up?