Interesting
It's always interesting to find out "the other side of the story". Sometimes uncomfortable, but always interesting. In today's example:I sort of thought biofuels had promise. Lower carbon footprint, renewable resource, what’s not to love?
Well apparently if you’re a poor Mexican… a lot. To the point where they mention in this article that it could start causing malnourishment in people who depend on corn tortillas for their daily sustenance.
If you raise cattle, chicken, or pork and have an already razor thin margin of profit, well you aren’t thrilled either.
It’ll be interesting to see what the longer term results are going to be.
posted by MyHusbandRules @ 1:36 PM
3 Comments:
WAY TO GO HIPPIES! I love how the hippie solution is to drive cars that burn something else, not, oh, I don't know, not drive.
Also check out ewg.org - it appears the production of corn for ethanol requires a environmentally objectionable amount of fertilizer. Clearly, the impact of producing ethanol hasn't been reviewed appropriately (ie by someone other than Bush's cronies)...
Bush's 'biofuel boosterism' boondoggle?
In the State of the Union address, in addition to tougher mileage standards, President Bush called for increased reliance on renewable fuels, namely ethanol. The corn-based fuel additive, which has gained notoriety as of late, is far from a panacea for the environment or oil independence. Bloomberg’s Jack Kaskey writes of the high fertilizer diet corn requires (30 times that of soy) and the likelihood that this year will see the greatest increase in farmland used to grow corn since 1949 – an increase that doesn't bode well for the Gulf of Mexico.
I knew corn is a super fertilizer intensive crop - actually got that out of "Omnivore's Dilemma" (which will turn you into a hunter gatherer in no time...), but didn't apply that to this situation.
Funny though, I figured Caly-forny was the area REALLY pushing this, since most alternative fuel work is driven by their requirements. I didn't know Bush was a player in this area. But I really hadn't done my homework on bio fuels since it's not a realistic option anyway in this part of the country.
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