There are quite a few cars on the west coast that have biodiesel-related bumper stickers professing the righteousness of driving a biofuel compatible car or truck. They claim “Biodiesel – No War Required” or a similar idea about the clean and environmentally friendly aspects of biodiesel. But oil is already there and the infrastructure to pump and transport it is well invested. Converting crops into fuel instead of food and feedstock does not seem to be an efficient process, but investments and subsidies continue to encourage growth. And rightly so, in part, because diversification of energy sources is important to keep an economy afloat when oil begins to run out. The economic implications of converting a nation’s food sources into fuel resources for export are apparent to many people. The cost of living for many third world country citizens is highly dependent on affordable food. If the profit from selling food as commodity energy outweighs that of selling food as nourishment, then profit motive will starve the people. The most vulnerable of a population has always been the poorest, and they may have a bleak future ahead as peak oil brings economic upheaval and desperation.
And then there are the possible detrimental environmental effects of increasing biofuel use. A BBC News article reads,
Oxfam says so-called green policies in developed countries are contributing to the world’s soaring food prices, which hit the poor hardest.
The group also says biofuels will do nothing to combat climate change.
Its report urges the EU to scrap a target of making 10% of all transport run on renewable resources by 2020.
Oxfam estimates the EU’s target could multiply carbon emissions 70-fold by 2020 by changing the use of land.
Read BBC News article
The amount of energy required to plant, cultivate, and harvest a crop and then convert it into biofuel is not always a sensible and efficient process. The subsidies that are offered to encourage the use of corn as biofuel in in the US, for example, offset the actual cost of producing the end product. Other crops such as sugar are easier to convert into fuel. Market forces will see us through these troubled times.
