bio Diesel

[Pete Masterson]

At 5:59 AM +0000 4/25/06, Al wrote:
><snip>
>Plus biodiesel is derived from plants so it is a renewable resourse
>unlike the petro we by from our friends in the middle east now over
>$75 a barrel. <snip>
>
>Al Johnson
>96 BMC
>Mandeville, Louisiana


Al,

I really don't want to start a flame war on this topic... but there
are two types of "bio" diesel.

1. That which recycles used cooking oils obtained from restaurants,
etc. To me, this makes a great bit of sense and it might even be
economically feasible to create more formal collection and recycling
systems to obtain the waste and reprocess it into usable fuel. This
is "win-win" in that a nasty waste product is removed from the waste
stream and turned into something useful.

2. Bio diesel obtained directly from vegetable oil is mostly
processed soy beans. This is potentially an ecological disaster
(along with ethanol from processed corn). Agricultural production
requires substantial amounts of fuel, chemical fertilizers, and
pesticides (or genetically modified plants) to grow efficiently. What
_really_ amazes me is that folks don't think about where all these
soy beans are coming from. WIth due respect to our US farm industry,
they are _not_ the only source of soy beans. A decade or two back,
soy beans were bred that can be grown in tropical climates. When we
visited Peru a couple of years ago, we were shocked to discover that
areas in the headwaters of the Amazon basin are being cleared to grow
... soy beans. Checking statistics, the number one export from Brazil
is.... soy beans. Hopefully, it doesn't take a rocket scientist to
realize that the Amazon rain forest and tropical forests around the
globe are being sacrificed for ... soy beans. Frankly, it's a very
poor ecological trade off.

Better we drill for petroleum in ANWAR, the California and Florida
coasts, and/or figure out how to efficiently process coal, tar sands,
and oil shale into liquid fuels. Bio diesel is no panacea.

--
Pete Masterson -- pete@...
looking for a 91-96 WL .... with RIVITS.