Biofuel Basics

Over the last decade, biofuels have become a source of both hope and derision. Their promise is undeniable: Domestic, clean-burning transportation fuel sources with the potential to eliminate our dependence on foreign oil.

Following in the footsteps of countries such as Brazil, which have successfully tapped domestic sugar cane crops to create a reliable ethanol supply, the United States subsidizes corn and soybean farming in hopes of similar success. But the effort has created some troubling side effects.

First, the increased demand for corn and soybeans is straining crop supplies, driving up their cost and thereby threatening not only the economic viability of ethanol, but also our food supply. What’s more, when analyzed with all environmental factors considered (transportation, conversion, land use), some studies show that corn ethanol may ultimately increase carbon emissions by as much as 50 percent over fossil fuel.*

While alternate biofuel sources, like cellulosic ethanol (made from wood chips, grasses or agricultural and lumber waste) are promising, some require more energy to produce than they provide, and have higher production costs. Meanwhile, biology-based approaches using micro-organisms and enzymes are years away.

The question, then, becomes: Is there an efficient, abundant feedstock alternative for ethanol?
The answer is yes.

*Source: Sciencexpress, 7 February 2008.