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Big agriculture mislead the public about the benefits of biofuels

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Re: Big agriculture mislead the public about the benefits of biofuels

#151

Post by tim333 »

AngryData wrote: post #73
ptman wrote: post #39

80% of UK’s waste oil would only power 0.6% of its flights Using synthetic e-fuel for all USA domestic flights would use 85% of USA’s electricity generated. Powering UK flights on plant-based biofuels would use >50% of its agricultural land 2⃣ UK waste oil is already spoken for, used in soap, cosmetics etc. But it’s far short of what would be needed anyway. Instead we will import ‘waste’ from places like Malaysia, wh…

This why im still a huge advocate for building nuclear power. In order to synthesize this kind of stuff from air instead of wasting all our farmland on it to have carbon neutral liquid or gas fuels available, we need insane amounts of energy. For some things batteries and other tech are the better option to switch to, but petroleum is still king for many applications and farming it with plants is extremely land ineff…

What if solar in the desert is cheaper and easier?

One of the main issues with switching to biofuel is it costs way more than regular. Mandating an expensive way to make it won't fix that.

Re: Big agriculture mislead the public about the benefits of biofuels

#152

Post by circlefavshape »

RivieraKid wrote: post #144
griffzhowl wrote: post #121

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think the idea is that the wetland or forest or whatever is a carbon sink in the sense that they have a net negative effect on carbon in the atmosphere each year. Growing corn and then burning it would at best be net zero if no further atmospheric carbon were produced by the production processes, fertilizers etc., which it is. So the differences between the two scenarios is net negative versus net positive atmosphe…

A forest or wetland is a carbon sink only in the growth phase. In a long-term equilibrium, it's carbon-neutral, like biofuels.

I don't think that's true - my understanding is a forest produces soil continuously, and that's a carbon sink

Re: Big agriculture mislead the public about the benefits of biofuels

#153

Post by circlefavshape »

mapt wrote: post #135
tzs wrote: post #40

> Why would growing corn for ethanol and burning it in an engine be any climate-friendlier than growing that same corn for food and burning an equivalent amount of gasoline in an engine? The carbon absorbed in the field wouldn’t change; neither would the carbon emitted from the car. If the only difference was that producing ethanol emitted much more carbon than producing gasoline, where were ethanol’s benefits? Where…

Yes, that is indeed what was sold to us 30+ years ago. This background context is in the article; The rest of the article is about how that was a lie. By about 20 years ago we understood that this was nonsense, that farm equipment and transportation infrastructure for corn cultivation chugs diesel, that somewhere between half, all, or twice (depending on study) the fossil fuels saved by corn ethanol would be burned t…

if it's half, then corn ethanol is totally worthwhile, right?

Re: Big agriculture mislead the public about the benefits of biofuels

#154

Post by karolinepauls »

RivieraKid wrote: post #144
griffzhowl wrote: post #121

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think the idea is that the wetland or forest or whatever is a carbon sink in the sense that they have a net negative effect on carbon in the atmosphere each year. Growing corn and then burning it would at best be net zero if no further atmospheric carbon were produced by the production processes, fertilizers etc., which it is. So the differences between the two scenarios is net negative versus net positive atmosphe…

A forest or wetland is a carbon sink only in the growth phase. In a long-term equilibrium, it's carbon-neutral, like biofuels.

The world is more complicated than a 17th century lab experiment in combustion.

Forests sequester carbon through forest fires producing charcoal. Humans could actually cut down old trees, dry them, and convert them to charcoal later used for soil enrichment.

Wetlands capture carbon by incorporating wood from dead trees in anoxic conditions.

> When plant productivity exceeds decomposition, net soil carbon accumulation occurs. This process eventually leads to the formation of deep peat deposits, which can accumulate for thousands of years.

https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s44246-024-00135-y (first search result for wetland carbon sink)

Re: Big agriculture mislead the public about the benefits of biofuels

#155

Post by tim333 »

Scoundreller wrote: post #32
0xbadcafebee wrote: post #23

Lobbyists are responsible for all of the harm that Americans at large come to. Eco damage, car crashes, toxic chemicals in food, the drug war, wars in the Middle East, lack of public housing, the world's most expensive health care, union-busting, even heart disease. If you can think of it and it hurts lots of Americans, lobbyists were behind it.

We need some anti-mosquito lobbyists. That’s an environment disaster I can get behind. Just hasn’t happened yet because the benefit is too spread out to make it happen.

Here you go. Oxitec https://news.sky.com/story/750-million-genetically-modified-...

lobbying https://www.opensecrets.org/federal-lobbying/clients/summary...

Re: Big agriculture mislead the public about the benefits of biofuels

#156

Post by pfdietz »

circlefavshape wrote: post #152
RivieraKid wrote: post #144

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A forest or wetland is a carbon sink only in the growth phase. In a long-term equilibrium, it's carbon-neutral, like biofuels.

I don't think that's true - my understanding is a forest produces soil continuously, and that's a carbon sink

Soil too eventually reaches an equilibrium where carbon injection and carbon oxidation are in balance.

If what you thought was true, imagine a forest sitting there for millions of years. Where would this permanently sequestered carbon be going? Soils do not become unboundedly thick.

Re: Big agriculture mislead the public about the benefits of biofuels

#157

Post by motorest »

bravesoul2 wrote: post #116
motorest wrote: post #91

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> It's explained in the article. People aren't going to starve to fill their gas tank so you need to grow more corn to offset that used for biofuel. To do that can require destroying other carbon sinks (wetlands are the example given, sometimes dried and then burned) to turn them into fields. The key point is that biofuel replaces fossil fuel. Meaning, instead of having a system that inputs carbon into the environmen…

Please reread tbe comment you replied to and address its points. It has already countered the "but it's replacing fossil fuels!" point.

> Please reread tbe comment you replied to and address its points. It has already countered the "but it's replacing fossil fuels!" point.

It doesn't counter it. At best, it plays on a fallacy that burying the lead only leaves the red herring as argument.

But corn-based biofuel is a red herring. Try to understand it.

Your blend of argument is the same type of strategy used to denigrate electric cars, where complaining that the fact that electricity can be generated from coal is this major gotcha. It isn't. It's one of many ways to generate it. There are others, and the end result is always better for the environment.

Re: Big agriculture mislead the public about the benefits of biofuels

#158

Post by pfdietz »

jkhdigital wrote: post #131
jbstack wrote: post #115

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"People aren't going to starve to fill their gas tank so you need to grow more corn to offset that used for biofuel. To do that can require destroying other carbon sinks (wetlands are the example given, sometimes dried and then burned) to turn them into fields" This doesn't make any sense to me. With petrol, you are transferring carbon from a store to the atmosphere every time you use it for energy. With a wetland, y…

Except that industrial-scale agriculture in general requires quite a bit of exogenous petrochemical inputs—not just the fuel to power the machines that do the work, but also the fertilizer.

The energy for fertilizer is mostly in the nitrogen fertilizer. The energy input here is to make hydrogen for the Haber-Bosch process. This hydrogen can come from renewable sources ("green hydrogen"), and this would be an excellent way to counter long term variability in renewable output.

That the hydrogen currently comes from natural gas is no argument it must come from natural gas, any more than cars currently using petroleum derived fuels would imply they must use petroleum derived fuels.

Re: Big agriculture mislead the public about the benefits of biofuels

#159

Post by lazytitanic »

karolinepauls wrote: post #154
RivieraKid wrote: post #144

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A forest or wetland is a carbon sink only in the growth phase. In a long-term equilibrium, it's carbon-neutral, like biofuels.

The world is more complicated than a 17th century lab experiment in combustion. Forests sequester carbon through forest fires producing charcoal. Humans could actually cut down old trees, dry them, and convert them to charcoal later used for soil enrichment. Wetlands capture carbon by incorporating wood from dead trees in anoxic conditions. > When plant productivity exceeds decomposition, net soil carbon accumulation…

> Forests sequester carbon through forest fires producing charcoal

Forgive me if I misunderstand, but the carbon in the charcoal resulting from forest fires isn't sequestered any more than the same carbon in the forest when in its un-burned state. The only difference is that, once you have a forest fire, a lot of the carbon is also just released into the atmosphere as CO2 in smoke.

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