[Sustain] Berkeley Says Bye To Biodiesel

[Eric Brooks]

http://www.contracostatimes.com/berkeleyvoice/ci_12536568?nclick_check=1


  Berkeley says bye to biodiesel

By Doug Oakley
Berkeley Voice
Posted: 06/06/2009 04:24:15 PM PDT

Berkeley has ended its six-year attempt to save the world by burning 
biodiesel in its trucks and machinery amid concerns it actually 
increases greenhouse gases worldwide and exacerbates hunger.

The city stopped receiving shipments of biodiesel derived from soy bean 
crops last month.

The City Council will consider formalizing its policy on the matter in 
September.

"Four years ago we looked at this and thought it was a really good idea 
to do biofuels when there were no crop-based biofuels, but the situation 
has changed beneath us," said Robert Clear a member of the city's 
Community Environmental Advisory Commission which recommended the city 
change its policy on biofuels.

In 2003, the city started using 100 percent biodiesel in its more than 
100 cars and trucks that run on diesel fuel. But that biodiesel was 
derived from recycled frying grease. Over the years, the supply changed 
to a crop-based biofuel.

New thinking on that product and its implications for global warming 
have changed for the worse.

Although biodiesel pollutes less than regular diesel when it comes out 
of a tail pipe, the farming involved to produce crop-based biofuels 
actually increases pollution worldwide, city officials say.

Clear said American farmers who are now converting their crops to grow 
soy beans to meet the biodiesel demand are decreasing the amount of land 
used to grow food for people and cattle.

That in turn has caused an increase in demand for land to grow food in 
South America and South East Asia where farmers are burning down virgin 
forests. The burning of the forests releases carbon into the atmosphere 
and there is a decrease in the amount of carbon the plants suck out of 
the atmosphere: two big negatives for global warming.

Add that to the fact that American farmers are growing less food because 
they are using their land for biodiesel production and you have a crimp 
on worldwide food supplies that contributes to global hunger problems.

Both of those issues are something Berkeley policy makers don't want on 
their save-the-world agenda even though local pollution is reduced when 
their trucks are burning biodiesel.

"It no longer looks like a thing to encourage," Clear said. "It's really 
too bad, because we'd love to see some magic bullets."

One option is going back to using biodiesel from recycled fryer grease, 
but there just isn't enough of it to go around and it's hard on the 
engines, said Deputy Public Works Director Andrew Clough.

In 2005 the city had two diesel truck engines explode when the city got 
a bad batch of biodiesel made from recycled fryer grease.

"Right now it doesn't sound like there is a good option," Clough said. 
"What seemed like a really good idea maybe isn't such a good idea as we 
thought because of all the considerations."

Reach Doug Oakley at doakley at bayareanewsgroup.com 
<mailto:doakley at bayareanewsgroup.com>

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-- 
"I am not a liberator. Liberators do not exist. The people liberate themselves." -- Che Guevara

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