I shake my head when I read about using grain as fuel. Or see a new SUV using 'Flexfuel' , an ethanol based gasoline. Ethanol is far from a 'green' product.
A comprehensive study by Michigan State University concludes, "Using productive farmland to grow crops for food instead of fuel is more energy efficient."
"It's 36 percent more efficient to grow grain for food than for fuel," said Ilya Gelfand, an MSU postdoctoral researcher and lead author of the study. "The ideal is to grow corn for food, then leave half the leftover stalks and leaves on the field for soil conservation and produce cellulosic ethanol with the other half."
The U.S. Energy Independence and Security Act of 2007 calls for biofuels to comprise 22 percent of the nation's transportation fuels by 2022.
One area of potential is the biofuel made from biomass from both "climate mitigation and economic perspectives. But the promise could come up short if we don't pay attention to details such as the land on which they are grown." The report stresses that good farmland should grow food, and more marginal farmland be used for biomass production.
Another article is also skeptical of using grain as fuel. "From an agricultural vantage point, the world's appetite for crop-based fuels is insatiable. The grain required to fill an SUV's 25-gallon tank with ethanol just once will feed one person for a whole year. If the entire U.S. grain harvest were to be converted to ethanol, it would satisfy at most 18 percent of U.S. automotive fuel needs."
Ultimately "The choice is between a future of rising world food prices, spreading hunger, and growing political instability and one of more stable food prices, sharply reduced dependence on oil, and much lower carbon emissions."
