Will biofuels take away from our food resources? I read in another post that ethonol comes from corn. Since there are people out there starving in the world, wouldn’t it be irresponsible to feed extra food to our gas tanks? Is this true or have I been mislead?
like i never saw a country really interested in what is happening with fourth world countries. so why talk about people who don’t have food?
if the ones in control don’t do anything, what can we do for them?
and about that, yes it is not good to throw away food to generate fuel.
Gianni
[quote author=“centaur”]Will biofuels take away from our food resources? I read in another post that ethonol comes from corn. Since there are people out there starving in the world, wouldn’t it be irresponsible to feed extra food to our gas tanks? Is this true or have I been mislead?
I think that is a terrible thing to do. I mean there are other ways to produce biofuels like Adam said hydrogen generated from solar panels is another option which is better and doesn’t take the food from people. :cry:
I would be very selfish to fill our gas tanks when people are starving out there…
With the amount of food being wasted at present, as irresponsible it might be, I don’t think it would make all that much difference even if we were to consider bio fuel derivatives of food.
I’m personally against many bio fuels based on the principle that they are simply shifting the impact - like in this case where food must be sacrificed in order to produce ethanol. At least with solutions concerning solar power, for instance, the energy is, to all intents and purposes as far as we are concerned, renewable.
That being said, what other bio fuel alternatives are there?
There is biodiesel (made out of vegetable oils or animal fats), hydrogen, this ethanol, methanol(also called wood alcohol),natural gas, propane(produces fewer vehicle emissions) and electricity of course.
I think biodiesel was the only one of those I wasn’t already aware of, though what I didn’t realise is that they come under biofuels - I suppose thinking about it logically, those are produced via biological processes though so it shouldn’t really come as too much of a surprise.
I have been wondering how long will it be before we have a different kind of fuel source because after a discussion at work, we came to the conclusion that we’re at war mostly because of oil.
A change of fuel could make a big difference in a lot of things.
And I’m also wondering why there hasn’t been more electric cars? I’m sure there is a logical reason aside from it not being very affordable and that there wouldn’t be many places to charge it but that could change if the government and auto industries really did more research on it…
I need to do some myself because maybe I’m missing something important.
While bio-fuels are a great idea…they just aren’t feasible, at least in the case of ethanol. I think it takes an energy input equivalent to 4 gallons of ethanol to produce 1 gallon of ethanol. Like someone has said, a net loss of energy and very wasteful.
Also, using ethanol wouldn’t help curb our oil dependence. Guess what is used to sometimes fertilize fields? Petroleum and oil derivatives!
I really cannot see there being any long term success with bio-fuels when they are using petroleum products in the processing.
All they are is a political ploy to shift the attention away from the real problem and make it appear that governments and petrol companies are trying to do the right thing.
While bio-fuels are a great idea…they just aren’t feasible, at least in the case of ethanol. I think it takes an energy input equivalent to 4 gallons of ethanol to produce 1 gallon of ethanol. Like someone has said, a net loss of energy and very wasteful.
Also, using ethanol wouldn’t help curb our oil dependence. Guess what is used to sometimes fertilize fields? Petroleum and oil derivatives!
FourBear, I think you meant to say 4 gallons of gasoline = 1 gallon of ethanol.
The fact is, Corn based Ethanol take more energy and produces more pollution then just burning fossil fuels.
And I repeat-that is because they are just a political tool to get the masses to think that they are doing the right thing, whilst still feeding the CEOs fat wallets of these uber gas companies.
Nope, I really did mean to say it takes the equivalent energy input of 4 gallons of ethanol to produce 1. Sorry if I made it sound like you use 4 gallons of ethanol to make 1…the key words there are “energy equivalent.” My apologies!
I have a special interest in this since they are proposing to build an ethanol plant in my town. I’m strongly against it. Let’s focus on feeding everyone first, I say.
I definitely would not want to live in a world where we have a corn shortage!!! So maybe it could work if there were special farms just for this cause?
The problem with that would remain the fact that the land used could be used for growing food. Given the growing population of the planet, I think that food would or should be the priority.
The problem with using corn or any other food as I see it is, farmers are going out of business, they are selling off their farms. Who is going to grow all of this corn if the farmers are selling their farms?
There are hungry people all over the world not just third world countries. There are people in American that need help with food needs.
If you have the choice of feeding your family or feeding your car which would you choice?
