Brazil's growing biofuels output does not threaten rainforest - expert
At the Biopact, we try to take a cautious position in the debate about the environmental and social impacts of biofuels (here for a closer look at criteria to measure these impacts). Large-scale production of such fuels presents important challenges which shouldn't be denied. But on the other hand, it would be wrong to perpetuate the unnuanced and often incorrect argument that 'biofuels destroy rainforests'.
When credible and independent scientists study the matter in-depth and conclude for example that Brazilian ethanol as it is currently produced is fundamentally 'sustainable' (earlier post), then we do not gloss over these findings. Instead we present them, and with reason: the potential social, environmental and economic benefits of efficiently produced biofuels may far outweigh the risks they present. The dangerous opportunity cost of not using efficient biofuels on a massive scale, is accelerated climate change, which may result in far bigger damages to the planet's (rain)forests and ecosystems. Global warming is set to lead to a mass extinction of species, not just in Brazil, but across the world (earlier post). What's more, it will cause the destabilisation of entire societies - with migrations, poverty, political conflict and economic decline as possible outcomes - factors that are not beneficial to good environmental governance either. In short, a full life-cycle analysis and environmental balance of biofuels must be made, taking into account the potential disasters arising from not using those fuels.
Roberto Rodrigues, Brazilian coordinator of the Inter-American Ethanol Commission, and former agriculture minister who currently heads the agronomy center of the Getulio Vargas Foundation, a green and social think-tank (previous post), fully engages in this important debate. According to Rodrigues, Brazil's planned biofuels expansion does not pose an immediate threat to the country's rainforests and biodiversity hotspots.
Speaking to a seminar on the environmental impact of biofuels, Rodrigues said Brazil has some 220 million hectares of livestock land, which includes 90 million ha of degraded pasture which could be used for crops. 20 million ha of this area is suitable for sugar cane. Rodrigues added that sugar cane currently only occupied 6 million ha of the 62 million ha of Brazil's cultivated farmland. Roughly half the cane area is used to produce ethanol and the rest for sugar:
biomass :: bioenergy :: biofuels :: energy :: sustainability :: ethanol :: biodiesel :: deforestation :: biodiversity :: life-cycle analysis :: Brazil ::
Environmental groups are rightly concerned that a huge expansion in Brazilian sugar cane planting to produce ethanol would result in forests being cut down and savannah cleared. They are worried that rivers and water supplies will be contaminated by massive additional use of fertilizers, herbicides and pesticides. They also say it will increase air pollution due to the practice of burning cane fields before manual harvesting so as to clear undergrowth and pests.
But the practise of burning cane residues is being discouraged, not in the least because it makes for a viable biomass feedstock. More and more sugar mills and ethanol plants are using this biomass to produce power and feed renewable, green electricity to the grid (earlier post).
On the food versus fuel issue, Rodrigues added: "It's absolutely false to say that Brazilian food production will fall with an increase in ethanol output." As for the Amazon, he said the climate in the region was generally unsuitable for growing sugar cane.
But Rodrigues admitted that Brazil needed a strategic ethanol policy to cover issues such as zoning of agricultural farmland to ensure that sugar cane is planted in suitable areas. Currently, earth imaging is used to a great extent to study and monitor agronomic aspects of biofuel plantations, but no stringent zoning laws exist. The technology is there to make such policies and laws work in practise.
Cane burning, water supplies, ethanol credits, production mix, logistics, labor and social issues also needed to be examined, he said, noting that eight government ministries were involved with ethanol but only the agriculture ministry had drafted a national plan.
Brazil is the world's cheapest producer of ethanol and is competitive when oil is above $37 a barrel, he said. Oil is trading around US$64 a barrel. Brazil is the world's biggest producer and exporter of cane-based ethanol with output of 17.6 billion liters in 2006/07 (May/April). In Brazil, agroenergy covers the production of ethanol from sugar cane and from wood and plant cellulose. It also includes biodiesel from oilseeds.
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When credible and independent scientists study the matter in-depth and conclude for example that Brazilian ethanol as it is currently produced is fundamentally 'sustainable' (earlier post), then we do not gloss over these findings. Instead we present them, and with reason: the potential social, environmental and economic benefits of efficiently produced biofuels may far outweigh the risks they present. The dangerous opportunity cost of not using efficient biofuels on a massive scale, is accelerated climate change, which may result in far bigger damages to the planet's (rain)forests and ecosystems. Global warming is set to lead to a mass extinction of species, not just in Brazil, but across the world (earlier post). What's more, it will cause the destabilisation of entire societies - with migrations, poverty, political conflict and economic decline as possible outcomes - factors that are not beneficial to good environmental governance either. In short, a full life-cycle analysis and environmental balance of biofuels must be made, taking into account the potential disasters arising from not using those fuels.
Roberto Rodrigues, Brazilian coordinator of the Inter-American Ethanol Commission, and former agriculture minister who currently heads the agronomy center of the Getulio Vargas Foundation, a green and social think-tank (previous post), fully engages in this important debate. According to Rodrigues, Brazil's planned biofuels expansion does not pose an immediate threat to the country's rainforests and biodiversity hotspots.
Speaking to a seminar on the environmental impact of biofuels, Rodrigues said Brazil has some 220 million hectares of livestock land, which includes 90 million ha of degraded pasture which could be used for crops. 20 million ha of this area is suitable for sugar cane. Rodrigues added that sugar cane currently only occupied 6 million ha of the 62 million ha of Brazil's cultivated farmland. Roughly half the cane area is used to produce ethanol and the rest for sugar:
biomass :: bioenergy :: biofuels :: energy :: sustainability :: ethanol :: biodiesel :: deforestation :: biodiversity :: life-cycle analysis :: Brazil ::
Environmental groups are rightly concerned that a huge expansion in Brazilian sugar cane planting to produce ethanol would result in forests being cut down and savannah cleared. They are worried that rivers and water supplies will be contaminated by massive additional use of fertilizers, herbicides and pesticides. They also say it will increase air pollution due to the practice of burning cane fields before manual harvesting so as to clear undergrowth and pests.
But the practise of burning cane residues is being discouraged, not in the least because it makes for a viable biomass feedstock. More and more sugar mills and ethanol plants are using this biomass to produce power and feed renewable, green electricity to the grid (earlier post).
On the food versus fuel issue, Rodrigues added: "It's absolutely false to say that Brazilian food production will fall with an increase in ethanol output." As for the Amazon, he said the climate in the region was generally unsuitable for growing sugar cane.
But Rodrigues admitted that Brazil needed a strategic ethanol policy to cover issues such as zoning of agricultural farmland to ensure that sugar cane is planted in suitable areas. Currently, earth imaging is used to a great extent to study and monitor agronomic aspects of biofuel plantations, but no stringent zoning laws exist. The technology is there to make such policies and laws work in practise.
Cane burning, water supplies, ethanol credits, production mix, logistics, labor and social issues also needed to be examined, he said, noting that eight government ministries were involved with ethanol but only the agriculture ministry had drafted a national plan.
Brazil is the world's cheapest producer of ethanol and is competitive when oil is above $37 a barrel, he said. Oil is trading around US$64 a barrel. Brazil is the world's biggest producer and exporter of cane-based ethanol with output of 17.6 billion liters in 2006/07 (May/April). In Brazil, agroenergy covers the production of ethanol from sugar cane and from wood and plant cellulose. It also includes biodiesel from oilseeds.
Article continues
Wednesday, March 28, 2007
Unique study analyses consumption and carrying capacity of ecosystems
A unique study - titled 'Human Appropriation of Net Primary Productivity (HANPP)' - led by Marc Imhoff and Lahouari Bounoua of the NASA Goddard Space Flight Center (GSFC) has attempted to answer this question by spatially allocating the amount of carbon required to derive food and fiber products consumed by humans. Columbia University's Center for International Earth Science Information Network (CIESIN) puts a combination of the results - published between 2004 and 2006 - under the spotlight.
Carrying capacity
Using United Nations data on food and fiber consumption, the scientists allocated it on a per capita basis to SEDAC's Gridded Population of the World dataset. The scientists compared this to a remotely-sensed map of global net primary productivity (NPP) — the net amount of solar energy converted to plant organic matter through photosynthesis — in order to identify parts of the world where local NPP is oversubscribed. The map (click to enlarge) shows how, in some urban areas, the excess of consumption over local NPP production is more than 1,000% (areas in dark red). In others, the ecosystem's maximum sustainable carrying capacity is far from reached.
Human appropriation of net primary productivity (HANPP), through the consumption of food, paper, wood, fuel and fiber, alters the composition of the atmosphere, levels of biodiversity, energy flows within food webs and the provision of important ecosystem services. Importantly for us, it also determines the sustainability of bioenergy production, and the carrying capacity of ecosystems to yield biomass and biofuels for exports:
biomass :: bioenergy :: biofuels :: energy :: ecosystem :: net primary productivity :: carrying capacity :: biofuels :: biomass :: sustainability ::
A tabular database associated with the spatial data also describes human requirements for NPP by country and major product: vegetable calories, meat, eggs, milk, fiber, paper, and wood. Globally, meat consumption accounts for 47% of NPP requirements for human food and 17% of overall NPP requirements. But these percentages vary significantly by country. For instance, meat consumption in the United States accounts for 68% of NPP requirements for human food and 23% of overall NPP requirements as opposed to Bangladesh (the country consuming the least amount of meat) where the percentages are 8% and 3%, respectively.
The spatial data products plus the tabular data are available from the HANPP Web site, which is part of the SEDAC Environmental Sustainability mission area.
Bioenergy potential of regions
Researchers from the International Energy Agency's Bioenergy Task 40 used virtually similar methods to calculate the sustainable biofuel and export potential in different regions of the planet (earlier post). The results clearly match those of the NPP-study.
Two regions stand out with their vast capacity to produce biofuels without exceeding the carrying capacity of their ecosystems, which are also needed to provide food, fiber and fuel to (growing) local populations: Latin America and sub-Saharan Africa. Zones with limited potential are the Indian subcontinent, China and the Far East, Europe, Eastern North-America and the Middle East. Not surprisingly, some of these regions already are net bioenergy importers (Europe, China and especially Japan which has been linking up with Brazil for biofuel supplies), and will become so increasingly in the future.
The original work on these data was published in Nature and Journal of Geophysical Research.
More information:
Columbia University's SEDAC: Human Appropriation of Net Primary Productivity (HANPP) website.
Imhoff, Marc L., Lahouari Bounoua, Taylor Ricketts, Colby Loucks, Robert Harriss, and William T. Lawrence. 2004. Global patterns in human consumption of net primary production. Nature, 429, 24 June 2004: 870-873.
Imhoff, Marc L., and Lahouari Bounoua. 2006. Exploring global patterns of net primary production carbon supply and demand using satellite observations and statistical data. Journal of Geophysical Research, 111, D22S12, doi:10.1029/2006JD007377.
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posted by Biopact team at 6:20 PM 0 comments links to this post