Re: Are Biofuels the Answer?

Hey C.S.,

Your points are valid, if they were correct.  True, they don't use "sweet corn" for the production of EtOH, but the field corn is neither sub-standard nor unfit (unpalatable, but wholesome).  It does demand  water, fertilizer, and pesticides in large quantities.  As far as non-food crops go, no farmer will depend on fallow growth for his livelihood.  So again,  more irrigated fields, more fertilizer & pesticides.  This practice also does not fallow the land, it could be considered crop rotation though.

Lastly, just this year we've seen significant price increases in milk that that are *directly* attributable to the rise in the price of corn, caused by diversion from feed to fuel.  Remember this is just the tip of the iceberg, it takes time for farm practices to propagate through the system.

It's also a detrimental positive feedback effect.  When petroleum is cheap, there is no incentive to divert food to fuel.  So food is abundant & cheap.  As food is diverted to energy at the higher energy prices, food becomes less plentiful and more expensive.  Sure we're not on th path to starvation (yet), but much of the 3rd world is...  And what will happen is that "guilt" fill force us to try to feed the world.  They will take out food and aid, and while we might save lives, they will grow to to hate us, even more than now.

The real danger is wealth envy.  A starving man will gratefully take any assistance offered.  A man who was starving and now has a little food in his belly, might become foolishly brave... I'll leave the implications to you.

We need a new source of energy!  We need to make obsolete the old-fashioned model of scarcity.  We can do it by striving for the elusive "Electricity too cheap to meter" that they promised 50 years ago.  We'll never reach that goal (who would want to?) but we can work towards it.  Imagine that energy costs were slashed by 90% from *everything*...  We can get there, and there are only two technologies we need to fully develop to accomplish it;  Solar and nuclear(not "noo-cue-lar").  I'm championing solar.