Biofuel Slapped Backwards, More Carbon Emmisions overall
Major blow today when a pair of scientific studies shows bio-fuel increases carbon emissions. Any usable farm land used to produce crops for bio-fuel means that the food that was grown there needs to be grown somewhere else. The somewhere else is where the carbon emissions increase. It is usually less desirable land to grow crops so more land is needed to grow the same amount. So when the U.S. converts 1 acre of food production to fuel production, another couple of acres somewhere else needs to be converted. Most often this leads to converting rainforests, peatlands, savannas, or grasslands and the carbon produced outweighs the carbon savings from bio-fuels.
There was some good news, any source not require clearing of native vegetation, such as, agricultural waste, weedy grasses, and woody biomass grown on lands unsuitable for conventional crops, do reduce carbon emissions.
Moral of the story, don’t use corn or soybeans(conventional farm crops or land) for bio-fuel, you will destroy the environment faster then you will save it.
- Fargione, J. el al (2008). Land Clearing and the Biofuel Carbon Debt. Science, Feb 8, 2008.
- Searchinger, T. el al (2008). Use of U.S. Croplands For Biofuels Increases Greenhouse Gasses Through Emissions From Land Use Change. Science, Feb 8, 2008.