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While that may be a sad story, the author is confusing corporate irresponsibility with the creation of renewable fuel sources. Contrary to what the author of the article claims, biofuels (and biodiesel in particular) DOES NOT create more so-called "greenhouse gas" than diesel fuels derived from crude oil.
Personally, it is a little tiresome to hear environazis continually deride every possible solution to the impending fuel crisis. All I ever hear from their camp is that "this won't work" or "that won't work" with very little attention given to the fact that devoid of any fossil fuels or fossil fuel substitutes, human overpopulation will not be a problem as the majority of the population of the world will starve to death.
The fact remains that while biodiesel will never directly replace gasoline to the same extent we consume it today, it will play a part along with solar energy, electricity and beasts of burden in creating power sources used to fuel public transit, shipping and agriculture. To think the world will simply roll over and die when we suck the last drop of oil out of the ground is a fool's notion at best.
This is pretty much a farce to tie this to bio-fuels or anything green.
These are dispossessed, now landless peasants due to a Corporate Land Grab. Could just as easy be American Natives, Hawaiians under Dole Pineapple, Central America under United Fruit, Mexican Zapatisa Natives under NAFTA Corporate Land Grabs, and folks all over the world under Shell and Chevron.
These folks could have grown (or not) the same crops - bio-fuel or not without the Corporate Land Grab. This is just privatizing the profits. Sounds like US.
What the locals should do is burn the crops, and run the Corporations out, backed with AK's and whatever else it takes.
At least there was another side during the Soviet era.
It was not possible for the villagers to get their land back, Mwenisongole said. "It is now owned by the government. The government was meant to compensate the land owners." In Tanzania, large land deals are done through the district government, which acquires the land and then leases it to companies. District officials have told villagers that Sun Biofuels did not pay all the money due, but refused to see the Observer.
Seems these companies are now failing.
Last edited by thecoalman; 06-23-2012 at 11:02 PM..
While that may be a sad story, the author is confusing corporate irresponsibility with the creation of renewable fuel sources. Contrary to what the author of the article claims, biofuels (and biodiesel in particular) DOES NOT create more so-called "greenhouse gas" than diesel fuels derived from crude oil.
This is government irresponsibility, this market is being driven by mandates making it profitable AND necessary. The EPA is fining oil refiners in this country for not using a fuel that doesn't exist, does that make sense?
I haven't researched it but I would assume the reason it's not on the market is because it requires so much energy to make it the cost is astronomical, paying the fine is probably cheaper.
While that may be a sad story, the author is confusing corporate irresponsibility with the creation of renewable fuel sources. Contrary to what the author of the article claims, biofuels (and biodiesel in particular) DOES NOT create more so-called "greenhouse gas" than diesel fuels derived from crude oil.
Personally, it is a little tiresome to hear environazis continually deride every possible solution to the impending fuel crisis. All I ever hear from their camp is that "this won't work" or "that won't work" with very little attention given to the fact that devoid of any fossil fuels or fossil fuel substitutes, human overpopulation will not be a problem as the majority of the population of the world will starve to death.
The fact remains that while biodiesel will never directly replace gasoline to the same extent we consume it today, it will play a part along with solar energy, electricity and beasts of burden in creating power sources used to fuel public transit, shipping and agriculture. To think the world will simply roll over and die when we suck the last drop of oil out of the ground is a fool's notion at best.
I assume you know that "Peak Oil" is the real problem, since oil depletes in a bell-shaped curve. The global oil production peak is already behind us, as of 2006 per the International Energy Agency. It peaked for the very same reason that we can never physically get it all out of the ground. And shale is a joke solution; the bulk of U.S. shale is kerogen, which has terrible EROEI.
My main gripe with biodiesel is that it seems to be an excuse to drive full-sized diesel trucks that really don't get very good MPG. Renewable can still be wasteful. I can't fathom the lack of compact diesel trucks in America, especially with "clean diesel" standards nowadays. Many people are waiting for Toyota and such to bring diesel models to the U.S.
The first and only generation of US made small sized diesel cars in the early 80's all had enormous problems. There was the VW rabbits that ran better but they could usually be seen a mile away with the tell tale black smoke and back of the car covered in soot. Those first impressions killed any diesel development for the consumer and the EPA took care of any possibility of development with regualtions.
I think that AUDI will lead the conversion of private automobiles to hybrid diesel drives. Their endurance racing based R&D has dominated the sport for the last few years and they sell a lot of diesel cars in Europe. I owned a GM diesel car and pickup truck back in the '80's. They served me well and, until the engines broke due to weak cylinder head bolts at about 100k miles, were cheap to operate. By the time the engines expired the bodies were too rusty to be worth fixing so they were scrapped.
The major savings in transportation fuel would be to electrify the freight railroads and eliminate long distance trucking. Another fuel savings would be by building Very High Speed Rail and eliminating the government subsidy on airline travel. That has worked very effectively in Europe.
OP - That is just another example of big business screwing over poor and politically weak people. So what else is new? They were doing this in Egypt and Mesopotamia 5,000 years ago.
Coalmman - I agree that corrupted government certainly assissts business in the fine art of screwing lots of people over for fun and profit. FWIW - I consider the Gasohol Program to be nothing but a giant boondoggle corporate welfare program for the mid west. The "fuel" produced creates more problems than it solves.
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