Fuel v food dangerous battle
US poultry producers have put the potential food-fuel conflict well. They say a 20-gallon vehicle fuel tank filled with E10, a 90% petrol and 10% ethanol blend, requires enough maize to feed a 25-pound turkey or seven five-pound broilers.
Universal use of an 85% ethanol and 15% petrol fuel blend in the US is not inconceivable — even though it would consume almost all of the world’s grain supply.
Biofuels from grain, oil seeds and sugar are drawing away food supplies, even as the population of the world expands by 70 million a year.
And forecasts that crude oil will cost $105 a barrel by the end of 2008 will drive on biofuel production.
It could come down to food versus fuel here too. Our national bioenergy conference recently heard that, by 2030, it will be possible to meet the EU-27 energy demand of up to 20% of all energy from biomass and biogenic waste, without harming the environment or competition with production of food or feed.
As part of energy and climate change measures being prepared in the EU, Ireland will be required by 2020 to get 16% of energy from renewable sources, use biofuels for 10% of transport, and reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 20%.
Agriculture will be an important source of bioenergy feedstocks to help achieve these targets, with the help of steadily increasing grant aid. For example, Teagasc experts say 70,000 hectares of willow and miscanthus will be required by 2015, to meet electricity and heat targets in Ireland.
Those hoping for the most environmentally friendly scenario say renewables could provide up to 75% of world energy needs in the long term.
They include, for example, drivers in Sweden, where ethanol cars have increased from 5,000 in 2004 to nearly 70,000 in 2007.
However, those who make these predictions may have little understanding of agriculture.
They include politicians and world leaders who seem happy to bargain away intensive farming in the EU in world trade talks, in return for lowering of non-food trade barriers.
They seem happy to leave food production entirely dependent on global supply and demand swings — even when oil depletion and famine threaten. They presumably think food production can be turned on and off like a tap to suit the markets.
Current record high food prices show how stupid that thinking is —and potentially disastrous.
So much can go wrong when governments try to manipulate agriculture. For example, China’s worst snow in 50 years recently brought fears of a return of that country’s widespread starvation in the 1960s.
China now determines many global trends; if it continues to develop and produce more cars, demand for oil will continue to soar, putting further indirect pressure on agricultural biofuel capacity.
That capacity is limited by water availability more than any other single factor. Fuel crops like maize require a lot of water, and biofuel expansion may push global water resources to the limit. There are many things that can go wrong, and it is the world’s poor who will feel the effects first. Already, they have to pay 35% more for their cereal imports, a heavy burden on developing countries, according to the United Nation’s Food and Agriculture Organisation, who point out that significant increases in production of more than one season’s global cereal crop are needed to stabilise markets and bring prices down significantly. There’s less chance of that happening if biofuel cropping expands.
Back in the US, many believe the government’s use of tariffs and farm subsidies to boost ethanol production is a huge mistake, driving up the cost of food while having no effect on the cost of fuel.
Ethanol is about 25% less fuel economical than petrol. Meanwhile, Brazil burns more forest to grow more soya beans, to replace acres taken up by maize in the US.
The deforestation effect negates any environmental benefit from ethanol.
Farmers may be laughing all the way to the bank, but the stakes are huge if the global plan don’t work out.
