As negotiators from approximately 200 countries convene in Copenhagen for the United Nations climate change conference, there's one issue on which the world's wealthier and poorer nations should be able to agree:
Immediate action is needed to increase the production of biofuels of all kinds, particularly for use in the transportation sector that accounts for a large and growing share of greenhouse gas emissions.
After all, the major source of greenhouse gas emissions is fossil fuel combustion - which mostly means running cars, trucks and other vehicles with petroleum products, such as gasoline. Transportation accounts for 25 percent of the world's greenhouse gas emissions, and this share will increase in 25 years when 3 billion cars throughout our planet will also drive daily oil consumption from the current 86 million barrels to a projected 120 million barrels.
Fortunately, one solution is already available. With the support and coordination of governments and international bodies, existing and emerging biofuels can continue to replace the use of gasoline and reduce the emission of greenhouse gases. Delegates to Copenhagen may not know it, but the limousines in which they are riding are running on ethanol made from straw.
This year, the world is expected to produce 80 billion liters (around 21 billion gallons) of ethanol, replacing the need for 1.9 billion barrels a day of crude oil. In 2008, the 9 billion gallons of domestic ethanol produced and consumed in the US resulted in a reduction in greenhouse gas emissions comparable to removing 2.1 million cars from the road.
Imagine the impact of increased production and consumption of ethanol on a global scale. It is estimated that the global production of biofuels will reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 123 million tons in 2009 alone. Such an impressive and growing environmental benefit stands in stark contrast to the environmental footprint of the petroleum industry which continues to worsen.
Researchers from the University of Nebraska have reported that, compared to gasoline, today's ethanol reduces direct greenhouse gas emissions between 48 percent to 59 percent. This figure is for the current generation of ethanol which is made mostly from grains, such as corn.
The environmental benefits may be even greater from the next generation of ethanol, made from cellulosic sources such as wastes from wood and plants. According to the U.S. Department of Energy's Argonne National Laboratory, ethanol produced from these cellulosic feedstocks has the potential to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by more than 85 percent, compared to gasoline.
Meanwhile, as conventional oil is depleted and exploration shifts to unconventional sources such as tar sands, shale and the deep sea, finding and using petroleum will require more energy and release more greenhouse gases.
All of this is occurring against a backdrop of increased agricultural productivity. Vast tracts of arable land remain unused. As the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations has reported, there are, at present, 1.5 billion hectares of land used for farming. That is only 11 percent of the world's surface area, and almost twice as much arable land - 2.8 billion acres - remains unused. With new farming technologies, this land can be responsibly and sustainably managed to provide a growing population both food and renewable fuel.
That is why it is so encouraging that the developing world has huge supplies of the "biomass" (wood and plant wastes) that will be the feedstocks for the next generation of biofuels. As one recent study concluded, biomass could fuel 65 percent of the world's energy consumption by 2050. Sub-Saharan Africa, the Caribbean and Latin America account for about half of this global potential.
These facts stand in contrast to those who argue biofuels are destroying the land and responsible for deforestation. Yet, forest land in the US has been increasing at the same time that ethanol production has grown. Moreover, global deforestation has slowed as global biofuel production has accelerated.
The development of biofuels could fuel the economies of developing countries, reducing the desperation that produces deforestation by illegal logging, cattle ranching, and subsistence farming.
Energy security, economic growth, and environmental responsibility: These are three reasons why the Copenhagen climate change conference should create a new consensus, among developed and developing nations, to encourage the production and use of biofuels.
The RFA is working with the Global Renewable Fuels Association, representing over 60 percent of the world's renewable fuels production from 30 different countries, to make the case for biofuels before international bodies.
Follow Bob Dinneen on Twitter: www.twitter.com/ethanolbob
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ethanol has a positive benefit in greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions reduction. On a per gallon basis, corn ethanol reduces GHG emissions by 18% to 29%, while cellulosic ethanol has an even greater benefit with an 85% reduction in GHG emissions. See the rest at :
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This takes into account all energy inputs and the worst case scenario (ethanol plant that uses energy from coal fired electric plants) is a reduction of greenhouse gases by 18%!
Claiming that GHG emmisions are 50% higher for ethanol over gasoline is just one example of your willingnes
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Inbicon has already sold its first year of production to Statoil, which plans to blend the ethanol into the Danish fuel supply early next year. In addition, some of the ethanol is being reserved to fuel E-85 vehicles during next month’s COP-15 meeting in Copenhagen
Source: http://cle
Good to see progress on biofuels that are not made from food but Dinneen is CEO of the RFA, which claims to defend all biofuels but that is just Trojan Horse to hide corn ethanol in. The last thing the corn ethanol lobby wants is a competitor that can make ethanol cheaper than they can.
That 9 billion gallons of ethanol all came from corn and 2.1 million cars is roughly one percent of our registered cars. Corn ethanol did not reduce global emissions at all. About 70 percent of corn ethanol comes from fossil fuels. The thirty thousand square miles of corn fields diverted to gas tanks displaced carbon sink land outside the US, and the fact that the high amounts of fertilizer created large amounts of nitrous oxide. Corn ethanol produced about 50% more GHG than gasoline.
Two paragraphs later you state that ethanol can replace 1.9 BILLION barrels of crude oil per day.
If you check the math, the amount of ethanol being produced can offset roughly 1.9 million barrels of crude oil per day. Ethanol cannot replace all the fuel we use, but the fraction it can replace has been increasing
In the interim the best and fastest way to reduce gasoline consumptio
It takes a little over 20 HP to maintain 60 MPH on the highway. Yet every year the commercial
The model T ford of 1908 got 21 mpg, the average fuel economy of an American car on the road today is 20.3 mpg (EPA). In Europe, the average fuel economy is over 40 mpg.
America, home of the Humvee and Corvette, both shining examples of status over reason.
are you aware that Henry Ford created the Model T to run on ethanol? until Prohibitio
As for you water use, your logic could also apply to a Big Mac. The amount of corn irrigated (~12%) has been largely unchanged for years. And corn for feed use (i.e. feeding beef cattle for McDonalds) remains the largest use of American corn. The vast majority of all corn used for ethanol production ( 96%) is rain fed, meaning it requires no irrigation
I just see conservati
But it must be waste, not crops grown for fuel.