 |
|
Add to My Group
|
April 8, 2008 at 06:13:16
Bio-Fuels and Sequestering Are Not Solutions by Jerry West Page 1 of 1 page(s) |
|
 
|
Preventing carbon emissions from entering the atmosphere is certainly a good thing, but technical fixes like carbon sequestering alone do not address the critical issue that we face with the environment, and alone are little more than an expensive public relations stunt.
Another environmental scam is the current craze focused on so called bio-fuel. Faced with a dwindling petroleum supply, vast tracts of land are now being dedicated to growing crops like corn and other sugar-rich plants to be converted into ethanol. Royal Dutch Shell is even claiming that they have a process to convert plant sugars directly into gasoline.
So, ethanol may burn cleaner than fossil fuels, and it may be a renewable resource if produced within reasonable limits, but again, by itself it does not address the issue that needs dealing with if any attempt at saving our environment is to succeed. Even worse, the switch to bio-fuel has an ominous downside,;hungry people become collateral damage in its production.
Bio-fuels like ethanol use up crops and crop land that could be providing food, and that is a problem. Food reserves in the world are dropping while the number of people looking for something to eat is increasing. The shift of crop land from food production to fuel production not only reduces food supply, it raises the cost of food. Last year alone, according to the UN Food and Agriculture Organization, dairy prices have risen about 80 percent, and grain prices about 40 percent.
The problem with programs like carbon sequestering and bio-fuel production is that they are treatments for symptoms, not treatments for the disease that caused the symptoms. When we go looking for alternative energy sources, and cleaner energy, without understanding why we need them, we will someday find out that even with clean, alternative energy we still have the problem.
Cleaner and more renewable forms of energy are a good thing, as far as they go, but the question must be asked, - why do we need so much energy to start with? The real problem is that we are already using too much energy and making too many demands on an eco-system that can not support us indefinitely at our current rate of consumption.
We have used our energy to overfish our oceans, over-cut our forests, over-dam our rivers and commit other excesses, as well as filling the atmosphere with carbon gasses at such a high rate for the past 200 years that our climate is changing and compounding our ability to cope with the crisis that we have created.
Our excesses have given us briefly the ability to overpopulate, which has put us on a treadmill of needing more consumption to support additional people, who will then increase consumption and population even more and so on. The problem is that the resources of the planet are finite, as is its ability to sustainably renew itself in the state which supports humans. That brief period of excess will sooner or later be ending.
The question for us is how do we solve the core problem that lies at the heart of all of our environmental woes. Merely pumping carbon into the ground while expanding the production of energy that will enable us to tax the system even more is not a solution. Creating a replacement source of fuel for fossil fuel so that we can continue to consume great amounts of energy and expand society is not a solution.
We can only solve the problem of over-consumption by reducing consumption. More important than sequestering carbon gases, and more important than producing cleaner fuel, is to relieve the whole system by producing less fuel and less energy.
Producing less, even though it is the only sane thing to do, of course runs into some heavy opposition in a world controlled by people who want more. Nobody wants to be told that they should expect less, and politicians wax effusively about growing economies and get elected for promising more. If our species is to survive, however, at least in a recognizable form, less must become the goal, not more, until the planet's system has the ability once again to produce more than we can demand of it.
http://www.island.net/~record/
The views expressed in this article are the sole responsibility of the author
and do not necessarily reflect those of this website or its editors.
 Contact Author |
Contact Editor |
 View Authors' Articles |
|
|
|
|
| 13 comments |
|
There's a problem
You can't just cut production while the population maintains it's current levels or is growing. Depopulation has to come first before you can cut production of anything that is needed for survival. Population and production grew up together and they have to be decreased together or else you will be pulling the rug out from under billions of people, mostly poor, who would die because they would no longer be able to feed themselves. by Watching (0 articles, 1 quicklinks, 3 diaries, 313 comments [1 recommended, 0 rejected]) on Tuesday, Apr 8, 2008 at 7:36:49 AM  (0+)
|
|
depends on what kind of sequestering you do
I refer everyone to David Blume's excellent book, "Alcohol Can Be a Gas! Fueling an Ethanol Revolution for the 21st Century". It is here you can learn how effective polycultural farming, combined with diverse crops, many of them not food, can make an enormous contribution to saving our planet and reversing global warming. It is a handbook for taking control of your own energy future, not one big oil or big agribusiness has in store for us. There are sample chapters, as well as reviews. Barry Commoner said it best when asked about inputting too much energy to get the energy ethanol provides. "It is always possible to do a good thing stupidly." by Michael Mustelier (0 articles, 0 quicklinks, 0 diaries, 4 comments) on Tuesday, Apr 8, 2008 at 10:39:24 AM (0+)
|
|
Reply
Watching: We definitely can not increase production to accomodate population increases. Better to start cutting production and redistributing resources to even out the effects of negative growth. Increasing production got us into this mess, it will take both decreasing production and a commitment to population reduction to get us out. Michael: The biggest problem isn't how dirty or inefficient our fuel is, but how much we consume. Cleaner fuels and carbon sequestering are good things, but they are not the solution. We need to reduce overall consumption of resources, not merely consume the same amount or more in a cleaner and more efficient manner. Taking control of our energy future is not a bad idea, but along with that must come a decreased use of energy in all forms by humans, including food. It would be a mistake to think that by increasing efficiency we could maintain or increase the current population. by Jerry West (30 articles, 0 quicklinks, 1 diaries, 17 comments) on Tuesday, Apr 8, 2008 at 4:21:03 PM (0+)
|
|
Reply: Wait a minute
So if you have a village of 100 people that is producing enough food and energy to support 110 people, you advocate them cutting their production so they can only support 50 and letting the remaining 50 die en masse rather than having them decrease their production gradually so the necessary population decrease can happen as a result of the normal death rate combined with a controlled decline in births? I wouldn't want you as mayor of my town. by Watching (0 articles, 1 quicklinks, 3 diaries, 313 comments [1 recommended, 0 rejected]) on Wednesday, Apr 9, 2008 at 3:55:16 PM (0+)
|
|
Reply: Reply to Watching
Quote: So if you have a village of 100 people that is producing enough food and energy to support 110 people, you advocate them cutting their production so they can only support 50.... ---- The problem is not about a village or any one area, it is a global problem. Total consumption on the planet exceeds the ability of the planet to sustainably reproduce. Total world-wide production has to be reduced to a level that is sustainable, consumption must follow that. If the world could sustainably produce more than it needs, then there wouldn't be a problem. As far as your comment about radically cutting production to the point of mass starvation, that might be someone's fantasy, perhaps, but not mine. Production can no longer be increased, we need to go into a negative growth mode with both production of food and material and population until we reach a point where where the global average level of consumption is enough to sustain everyone. It isn't right now, but it could be if we all lived at a third world standard of living, about an 80% reduction in consumption for Americans, 75% for Canadians. Most of that reduced cosumption would free up material for people already way below the world average. The higher that we want that average level to be, the fewer people there must be. by Jerry West (30 articles, 0 quicklinks, 1 diaries, 17 comments) on Tuesday, Apr 15, 2008 at 7:12:03 AM (0+)
|
|
The answer is in new, suppressed forms of energy.
Bio fuels are a temporary solution, such as from Algae which is the most efficient method and which does not "steal" land from producing food (it can be grown in man-made salt lakes on the desert). Using corn for methanol is silly and immoral imo; it takes more energy to create it than is gotten out, and it raises food prices at precisely the wrong time. The real answer here will be new clean energy technologies that most peole have never heard of yet.... Such as HHO Brown's Gas (Hydrogen and Oxygen disassociated from water) created cheaply using the new, proven, and suppressed techniques as discovered by Klien, Brown, and Stanley Meyer. But this technology has been heavilly suppressed for over 20 years.... So it will take a huge grass roots movement to "free" it from the control of the oil and coal cartels.... And the government who considers them "secret" and a matter of national security. Other technologies such as permanent magnet motors will also surface from the suppression, which will create electricity much more cheaply without any pollution at all. If these technologies had been studied for the last 20 years instead of suppressed, we would now be using petrolium only for lubricants and plastics..... Not for fuel. by Steve Windisch (jibbguy) (17 articles, 0 quicklinks, 4 diaries, 361 comments [55 recommended, 0 rejected]) on Tuesday, Apr 8, 2008 at 5:51:05 PM (0+)
|
|
The "powers" that be have
kept alternative fuels hidden from public view, as profits would not be controlled by established businesses. At the same time time marketing encouraged consumption to the levels facing humanity today. Capitalist markets demand a expanding base, but this negates Earth's finite resources, or commodities unrecoverable at present consumption rates. To be aware of personal consumption and minimize use is the answer, but how many are willing to forgo multi-thousand square foot homes with more devices than many third world cities, SUV's operated 99% of the time on paved roads, and food which travels thousands of miles from harvest to grocer, and finally a residence for devouring? by Stanimal (2 articles, 228 quicklinks, 38 diaries, 1259 comments [235 recommended, 2 rejected]) on Wednesday, Apr 9, 2008 at 4:41:43 AM (0+)
|
|
Reply: What alternative fuels
are you referring to exactly? There is no alternative fuel that can take the place of fossil fuels at this time. There is no reason to keep anything hidden from view because there is nothing to hide. We are seeing the effects of bio fuel development already as more and more of the world's poor face starvation due to increases in food prices because land is being used for fuel instead of fuel. we are seeing supplies of fresh water drying up as more and more gets diverted for growing of crops for fuel production. So tell me smart guy, what alternative fuel exists that will completely break our dependence on fossil fuels without having disastrous consequences in other areas?? by Watching (0 articles, 1 quicklinks, 3 diaries, 313 comments [1 recommended, 0 rejected]) on Wednesday, Apr 9, 2008 at 3:41:53 PM (0+)
|
|
Reply: oops
That line in there should read "used for fuel instead of food." I need to do better at proofreading. :P by Watching (0 articles, 1 quicklinks, 3 diaries, 313 comments [1 recommended, 0 rejected]) on Wednesday, Apr 9, 2008 at 3:44:32 PM (0+)
|
|
Reply: HHO for one...
HHO, "Browns Gas", is an excellent alternative fuel.... Cheap to create (it comes from water and small amounts of electricity), safer than stored compressed Hydrogen because it is created at low pressures on demand, and HHO actually has several times more energy than gasoline by weight. It comes from water: Any water including salt. HHO can be used as a "Booster" for existing carbon-based fuels (raising mileage by as much as 75%), or it can be used by itself. The technology to do boosters is here right now. New engine designs will be needed to use it most efficiently as a stand-alone fuel; it has a unique property of imploding when in its "pure 66.67% H-to-O ratio that quadruples it's energy value. However, several people have successfully run their car on nothing but HHO from water. The suppression comes from the scientific community refusing to test or study it... And the fact that they are still publishing the old methods of creating Hydrogen in the university textbooks... Which require hundreds of times more energy to do than the new methods discovered by Stanley Meyer, Yull Brown, and others. A car's alternator can push more than enough current to make HHO in sufficient quantities to run a car. If you are not familiar with it (...not surprising, since it has been vigorously suppressed), please Google the subject for yourself, or start here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mXZakmw0jEI by Steve Windisch (jibbguy) (17 articles, 0 quicklinks, 4 diaries, 361 comments [55 recommended, 0 rejected]) on Wednesday, Apr 9, 2008 at 6:10:21 PM (0+)
|
|
Reply: Hemp
They knew in the 30's that Hemp can produce fuel. (It can even produce plastic.) My first guess was that The powers 2b then, were sold out to big oil, but I hear it was the Lumber industry THEY were sold out too. Here is a link to Hugh Downs talking while alive. (This isn't the stuff you smoke...wouldn't that be a waist? lol) There is also a Nuclear Plant in Japan with a new cooling system using a moltent form of some kind of metal. And in the steam it produces hydrogen, which we can make elctricity from. Since it is clear to me that D.C. has been sold out to big oil in the 70's as they are to big coal today, how do we develop all this new tech stuff, with out all the profits going to the top, instead of down to the people? by Michael Dewey (5 articles, 1 quicklinks, 4 diaries, 245 comments [12 recommended, 0 rejected]) on Thursday, Apr 10, 2008 at 9:24:28 AM (0+)
|
|
"Energy from combustion" ration cards.
If rising CO2 levels are a problem, the obvious solution is to limit each individual's consumption of CO2 producing energy. Money should not entitle any one person to pollute vastly more than another. It's like allowing rich people to pay higher insurance premiums to drive with higher blood alcohol levels. If we want to reduce CO2 emissions, we must quickly make every person responsible for their own carbon footprint. That includes Al Gore and John Travolta. by John Haigh (1 articles, 0 quicklinks, 1 diaries, 118 comments) on Wednesday, Apr 9, 2008 at 1:46:28 PM (0+)
|
|
Hello Watching, like Mr. Dewy said,
Hemp could be used to drive the world economy, not only as a fuel, but as a lubricant also. Anything made from plastic-paper-wood, can be made using hemp. Tis a shame that a plant that can solve many of the worlds problems is kept away. The powers that be want to keep it illegal, to control the profits it generates. There have been many inventions suppressed by the auto-oil consortium that could have raised MPG significantly in the past. Much of public is like a child that will speak what it has been told to say, not "Question Authority"! by Stanimal (2 articles, 228 quicklinks, 38 diaries, 1259 comments [235 recommended, 2 rejected]) on Friday, Apr 11, 2008 at 4:44:35 PM (0+)
|
Want to post your own comment on this Article? 
|
||||
|
||||||||||||||
Must Read (0) 
Well Said (0) 
News (0) 
Touching (0) 
Funny (0) 
Supported (0) 
Interesting (0) 
Inspiring (0) 
Valuable (0)
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Tell a Friend:
|
Copyright © 2002-2009, OpEdNews |
