“Friends of the Earth” Now Against Biofuels!

It’s not common to find environmental activists switching sides and admitting it openly, but Friends of the Earth have:

[The] drive to substitute fossil fuels with biofuels is driven in large part by an assumption that bio-based energy is sustainable for the planet. However, biofuels can create significant environmental harm. Large-scale agricultural production of corn and other crops used for biofuels often involves massive fertilizer inputs, use of large quantities of water, and soil erosion. Also, rather than helping prevent global warming, biofuels can actually cause global warming as a result of deforestation and the destruction of other natural ecosystems. 

The real challenge now is to find a way to end a Federal Agriculture Subsidy program.  As far as I can determine, none have ever been ended.  Every subsidy program has people who benefit from it.  Those people take a percentage of the money they get (from taxpayers via the IRS) and hire lobbyists to ensure that programs don’t get cut, let alone ended.

Friends of the Earth go on to ask…

…our activists to spread the word and educate their friends, family and neighbors about how biofuels are a false solution to our climate and energy woes.  Follow us on Twitter and Facebook, tell your representatives not to buy the biofuels lie, read factsheets and watch movies here!

They go on to suggest that conservation and “greening” the grid are better choices.  Well, sure, but you can’t conserve your way to energy independence.  For a well-thought out plan to wean us off petroleum products, read the position papers of the Set American Free Coalition.

In his excellent book, Energy Victory: Winning the War on Terror by Breaking Free of Oil, Dr. Robert Zubrin explains why we need biofuels to fill the gap in liquid automotive fuels until we can build a sufficiently powerful nuclear energy pipeline for the next generation of cars.

The problem with the current emphasis on corn-based ethanol is not the issues discussed by Friends of the Earth, but that Congress chose corn for political reasons rather than allowing the free market to decide how best to develop a sufficient supply of ethanol.  Since Congress chose the technological ‘winner’, inventors and investors will not put competing options into the marketplace to determine what is really wanted.  THAT is the real problem with the corn ethanol ‘solution’.