Summary
Mr. Watson and Sir David King have significant understanding of climate change issues and significant understanding of biofuels. So for them to urge the British government to hold off on increasing the biofuels ratio from 2.5% to 5.75% in two years they would have had a caveat. That caveat is likely to follow along these lines. 1) Where the feedstock for the ethanol is made from a commonly used food like corn, sugar and cassava which I refer as “foodstocks”. 2) Where the ethanol producers gain a preferred market share access to those “foodstocks” as they did in the USA. When the feedstock for the ethanol production is made from other sources then both Mr. Watson and Sir David King would impeach their credibility in the field to oppose the increase.
Analysis
It bothers me when authors of articles found in such newspapers as the Globe and Mail renowned for accuracy fail to address the real issues or even understand them. It bothers me when they either deliberately leave out pertinent information or are too lazy to dig into the real issues. You may take your pick with this author.
The two real issues in the production of ethanol are the feedstocks and the subsidies. As you read this opinion keep them at the forefront of your mind. A bit of knowledge on history would have helped the author of this Globe and Mail article as well.
The facts are in the USA post 9/11, there was a rush to create ethanol due to security reasons. The USA found itself in a struggle with certain factions of the Muslim world. There were and still are concerns that the oil the USA imports from the Muslim world could be cut off. Therefore a drive to less dependence on foreign oil spawned the biofuels industry in the USA with the help of government subsidies and farmer incentives. Even today biofuels is linked inseparably to homeland security.
That desperate rush spawned some poor decision making. One of those decisions was to create ethanol from corn. The reason for this decision was quite frankly the farmers of long ago did the same to operate their early 1900 vehicles. So because they knew it could be done they didn’t immediately look beyond corn, but the government did commission studies into the feedstock. It was those studies that determined that one corn and sugar as feedstocks for ethanol were less than the best choice. Corn was less than the best choice because of two reasons the first being that the ratio of energy in to energy out which is 1:1.34. Therefore combine that with the fact that ethanol has less BTU’s per gallon and the need for using fuel to harvest corn the resultant greenhouse gas reduction is negative rather than positive. But GHG reductions were not the US Government’s primary objective. The primary objective was to reduce foreign oil dependency especially dependency from Muslim controlled countries. So corn was promoted further by the US government because of two reasons the first being it is a domestic feedstock and the second was that the government could subsidize and control the farmers to grow the crop for ethanol purposes. The need for these subsidises was because ethanol producers could not compete with food and other users of these “foodstocks” in the ability to withstand sharp price increases.
Starched based ethanol exploded in the USA and with that explosion the problems became apparent. Starch based ethanol from corn and sugar and various other “foodstocks” is not sustainable. Thus ethanol has found itself in the position it is in today, the US government realizing it cannot sustain the subsidises, it has fallen out of favour with those seeking GHG reductions, it has fallen out of favour with activists concerned with global food supplies and also with the investment community.
So does that mean biofuels are dead in the water, no! There are several different feedstocks for ethanol production that are commercial now and even more developing feedstocks that have promise for the future. One such feedstock, Miscanthus grass is not used for food, has a ratio of energy in to energy out of 1:7 and is proven to reduce GHG’s. Mr. Watson and Sir David King are both aware of this and other feedstocks such as sweet grass and know that they are the next generation of ethanol production feedstocks. Even the US government has begun promoting sweet grass as an ethanol feedstock grown domestically.
Mr. Watson’s concerns are not to prevent the increase of biofuel blends; they are to prevent the mistakes of other countries like the USA and Brazil. They are to promote good decision making rather than poor choices. His caveats basically states that if the biofuels come from starch based feedstocks like corn and sugar than the increase should be aborted, but if they come from feedstocks other than “foodstocks” the increases should remain.
