Biofueling the food shortage

After writing about my concerns about Biofuels here back in February, the issue is now beginning to get some serious coverage (you may have seen the feature on BBC Newsnight on Monday).

Biofuels are causing catastrophic environmental damage: because they're one of the main reasons tropical rainforests are being cleared (in order for farmers to produce crops used to make biofuels) - thereby worsening climate change; and because hundreds of thousands of acres of arable farmland that was once used to produce staple crops like corn, rice and wheat have now also been turned over to the biofuels industry.

This in turn is causing food shortages around the world; in turn pushing up food prices and in turn again making it harder and harder for the very poorest to afford these staple crops. Far from being the environmental godsend, biofuels are actually worsening international environmental and humanitarian problems.

Let's be clear: biofuels are not clean and they are not that green. The energy needed to process this fuel negates its benefits from the outset. They are not economical - or they wouldn't receive the vast and unsustainable subsidies governments pass on to ethanol producers. And any environmental good they (questionably) bring through reduced reliance on carbon-based fuels is eradicated by the loss of rainforests (which greatly reduces the planet's capacity for converting carbon dioxide into oxygen) they have been directly responsible for.

However, it is a fair question to ask - as Jeremy Paxman did on Newsnight - what's the alternative? We do, after all, need to find a sustainable fuel source to drive our vehicles. I think the answer is twofold.

First, we need to use electric, gas and hydrogen powered vehicles far more: they're not sexy, they're not especially fast, but there's no reason that for business use and urban travel they cannot be used. The Prius (featured in the photo above) is not a particularly beautiful car - it's popularity has simply been sourced from its claim to be a "green" car.

And second, we need to stop paying lip-service to the need for better public transport and rail freight. We can get so much of our transit off the roads and onto rail - reducing congestion for those who have no choice but to drive, improving the cost-effectiveness of public transport services, giving people a clean, safe, reliable and efficient service.

Although there's a limit to how convenient public transport can be - because it will never be more convenient than our own private, comfy, car - there's also a reason why London is the only major capital city where public transport use is rising: and that's because our Mayor, Ken Livingstone, has spent the last eight years investing in public transport.

There's one further, deeply ironic consequence of those environmentalists still championing biofuels despite the damage they're doing. This is that they are pushing the need for genetically modified crops - which can be grown in less favourable environments, in larger numbers, yielding larger harvests - higher up the political agenda.

Biofuels

I wrote last week about rising food prices and their impact on poorer households. In that post I criticised biofuels as creating more problems than they solve.

I'll talk a bit more about why biofuels aren't a green solution in a minute, but also last week - entirely coincidentally - the House of Commons Environment Select Committee came out in favour of axing EU biofuels targets; if for slightly different reasons.

Their concern is not only that the target can't be met, but also about land use - because utilising land for biofuel production is one of the main causes of deforestation (which I discussed here during the Bali Climate Change Summit last year); especially in rain-forest countries like Brazil.

The Environment Committee is also looking at how green bio-fuels really are. Whenever someone supporting nuclear power makes the point that nuclear emits no carbon dioxide the anti-nuclear lobby rushes counters that a substantial amount of carbon is emitted in the construction of nuclear power plants.

Fair point. But the same is true of biofuel - and unlike nuclear, it's an ongoing cost: because the energy output is in the actual production of the fuel as well as the construction of the processing plants. Almost as much fuel is used to create biofuel than is created.

How is that sustainable? And the only reason it is vaguely affordable is the vast, market-warping subsidies bunged to the bio-fuel industry. Without them, biofuel would be uneconomic, fields that have been dedicated to producing crops for fuel would be returned to use for food production and cereals and bread would begin falling in price again.

We need to remember the distinction between power and fuel, because power can run computers, light streets, boil kettles and cook meals, but it can't drive cars or operate central heating. For that we need liquid or gas fuels. One day, we may have nuclear-cell driven cars; we already have natural gas and hydrogen-fueled vehicles as well as those powered by batteries charged with green electricity, but bio-fuels aren't the solution - apologies to anyone who's just bought a Prius or other hybrid powered car!

Here's how the BBC reported the MPs' report calling for a scrapping of EU biofuels targets.

We need nuclear power AND green energy

The Government's announcement last week that it has decided to commission a new generation of nuclear power plants is one that I welcome.

To meet Britain's energy needs we do of course need to invest in renewable energy: I also welcome the plans for more offshore windfarms and (if the ecological issues can be overcome) the proposals for a tidal barrage across the river Severn.

Anyone who claims that you're either for the environment or pro-nuclear is being dishonest. Those who believe that the UK's entire energy contribution can be met from solar panels and wind turbines are mistaken, as prominent environmentalist George Monbiot who investigated this issue extensively has acknowledged.

Some have urged us to wait for carbon sequestration technology to be realised - yes, that will make a contribution when it arrives, but we're not there yet and we need to meet an energy gap that is just around the corner - 2015 is when our demand is forecast to outstrip supply. It's why the decision on nuclear is overdue: even on the most optimistic timescales the first new nuclear plant won't start working until 2019.

Some oppose nuclear on safety grounds; that despite far more coal miners or gas technicians being injured or killed in recent years. It has been over 20 years since Chernobyl: and that was a neglected, unsafe power station. British nuclear plants were built and maintained to far higher standards and technology has made new generation nuclear energy even safer still.

Others argue that the waste produced outweighs the benefits of zero-carbon emissions. I disagree, but even if sympathetic to that case, we can actually reprocess nuclear waste and get further energy from it. It's an expensive option, but no more so than most of the renewable alternatives.

We need a "basket" of energies to keep our country running: more renewables; combined heat and power plants which also help with our refuse problem and alongside these sources better home insulation, energy saving technology and more awareness of how much energy we each consume.

Halting deforestation

My post earlier this week on the UN Bali Conference on the next steps to tackle climate change proved popular, so I thought I'd talk about another subject that has been hotly debated at the Conference this week: deforestation.

Deforestation is the other side of the coin of increased carbon emissions - because at the same time as carbon emissions are increasing, the proportion of trees that can absorb the greenhouse gases is declining - in some cases, alarmingly. This again goes to my preference for initiatives that encourage, incentivise and innovate to tackle climate change: simply by reversing deforestation we can make a significant, and relatively affordable contribution to the fight.

On Thursday, Channel 4 News noted that Indonesia - with 10% of the world's rainforests - produces 25,000 cubic metres of wood pulp every single day at the loss of a staggering 2 million hectares of forest every year. Not that long ago an area of the Brazilian Rainforests the size of Wales was year-after-year being hacked down - a problem that has declined significantly under President Lula da Silva but remains a problem in part because of the world-wide demand for Soya.

The mooted solution to this is for wealthy countries to effectively pay these developing nations (and economies) to not cut down their forests. Indonesia's government is keen on this idea, perhaps unsurprisingly: it gets paid handsomely for doing not very much! The sticking points are many, however - not least how can donor nations be guaranteed that the forests won't be felled after the cash has been handed over: after all, 80% of the logging in that country is illegal.

I also personally feel slightly uneasy about rich countries effectively "buying up" swathes of the developing world - it has echoes of colonialism about it even if it is consensual.

My solution would be to create an International Trust, mirroring our own National Trust, which is of course the biggest landowner we have - and one of our most trusted institutions to boot.
The cash-for-land arrangement would still go ahead - albeit that rather than the government getting 100% of the money a share would go to the Trust for security and forestry management; but instead of the sovereign government being responsible for honoring and enforcing the preservation of forests they would have to covenant the land over to the Trust; so that there is a guarantee to the donor nations that our agreement will be honoured over the long term; not subject to the whim of changing governments, elected or otherwise.

If you're interested in reading more about the RED - Reducing Emissions from Deforestation programme, you can do so at the UN Environmental Programme website here. And a reminder that the UN Bali Conference site is http://unfccc.int/. The Conference runs until 14 December.

Bali must find practical ways to tackle climate change

One of the emerging divides in the debate about Climate Change is between those who believe that the problem should principally be addressed by draconian changes in the way we live, and those who believe incentives are far more likely to achieve the goals both sides seek.

Both sides are on display for all to see at this week's Bali Conference, which is the first step on a United Nations path to update the Kyoto Protocol.

I'm much more interested in practical ideas to tackle climate change than Domesday predictions from the fringe who only set back their own cause by overselling their case. So, for example, the news that the European Union is working on plans to provide billions of watts of solar power by building a string of solar "fields" in a ring across north Africa is exactly the sort of focus we should be providing.

Before anyone raises the spectre of EU Imperialism exploiting Africa, the plan is for two thirds of the electricity generated to be used in that continent with the added bonus that the process desalinates sea water. In other words, as well as power, Africa will also get clean drinking water. The solar fields will be in uninhabitable desert areas. And Europe will get something like 30 billion watts of power - for context Britain's entire electricity generating capacity today is 12 billion watts.

If all this sounds too good to be true, then the catch is that at the moment this clean, sustainable energy is hugely expensive - twice the cost of coal-power. It's no good for the Green movement to dismiss cost: most people are already stretched too thinly to be able to afford a doubling of their power bills, which will hit the poorest the most.

Nor should they have to - this isn't an insurmountable problem. Again, technology is the answer: more efficient means of storing and transporting the power and more powerful solar cells will bring the cost down and I'd far rather the government invest in and subsidise clean fuel than oil producers in order to level the playing field.

You can follow the Bali Conference via the UN's official website at www.unfcccbali.org.