February 2008 - Sustainability

Re: [Sustain] CO2 Cap & Trade?
by Eric Brooks 21 Jul '08

21 Jul '08

Well, the idea is that you put a top limit or 'cap' on how much each county/state/corporations can emit. Concurrently with that, you create a market for trading reductions in CO2 emissions such that corporations get 'credits' (which are worth real money) and sometimes (but not always) corporations receive financial penalties or taxes for exceeding limits. The idea is that you make reducing CO2 emissions desirable by making it valuable. Then, you set up a market in which the CO2 credits get turned into electronic trading notes (a lot like stocks). So, one company, say, a carpet maker, figures out ways to greatly reduce it emissions, and its trading exchange issues that company a given amount of credits for free. Then, another company, say, a cement manufacturer, knowing that it is going to exceed its limits, buys the credits created by the carpet company so that, on paper, the cement company has bought enough credits to -not- exceed its limits; and so, it can therefore avoid emissions penalties (if there are any) or the cost of installing pollution controls (if their state requires any). Depending on the current or future cost of pollution control requirements, and taxes and penalties on fuel use or CO2 production, some companies may see the credits as even more valuable and pay more for them than their set value, and this makes the credits rise in value on the trading 'floor'. Now, as we all know, from any quick glance at the stock market, and especially at markets trading currency values, speculators over the last many decades have developed incredibly clever and complex ways of making money from trading even though they aren't creating any value or production whatsoever. Add this to the fact that corporations have high incentives to use tricks to pretend on paper that they are reducing their emissions when they are not, that corporations will continue to get laws passed to reduce pollution controls and penalties and even to change the way CO2 trading systems work, and it is easy to see that such cap and trade systems are doomed to failure. Indeed, the cap and trade system adopted a few years ago in Europe is already failing dismally. See http://www.heartland.org/Article.cfm?artId=21202 cheers Eric Anne Garrison wrote: I can't even figure out how this cap and trade business is supposed to work. Somebody told me that carbon offsetting meant something fairly simple like paying to plant a tree in exchange for some sort of excess energy use, but I can't even tell how this is supposed to work. If I'm around and anyone can enlighten me at the next meeting, I'd appreciate it. I know it's crap, and don't much feel like sorting it out, but feel like I should.

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[Sustain] Reminder: Joint Transpo/Sustainability Meeting Thursday
by Eric Brooks 28 Feb '08

28 Feb '08

Hi all, Just a reminder of our meeting tonight. I've added the Mayor's solar incentives programs to the proposed agenda. Joint Meeting Transportation & Sustainability Working Groups When: Thursday, 2/28/08, 6:30PM-9:00PM Where: SFGP Office, 1028A Howard St Proposed Discussion Items - New Version Of McGoldrick Elected MTA Board Charter Amendment - Peak Oil Taskforce Update - Maxwell/Peskin SFPUC Charter Amendment - Mayoral Shake Up Of Building Inspection Commission - Update On SFPUC - CCA Update - Mayor's Solar Program - Combustion Turbine Update - Forming an active working group members alert list for the Sustainability WG -- "I am not a liberator. Liberators do not exist. The people liberate themselves." – Che Guevara

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[Sustain] Sustainability WG meetiing tonight- 'SFGP Sustainability WG 01/24/08 notes
by Don Eichelberger 28 Feb '08

28 Feb '08

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[Sustain] LA Times: CPUC, Brown, Newsom, PG&E - Deep Corruption Behind The Curtain
by Eric Brooks 26 Feb '08

26 Feb '08

PUC member's donation request raises questions The panel OK'd bonus system changes that benefit utilities that gave $50,000 for its green-energy summit. By Jordan Rau and Evan Halper, Los Angeles Times Staff Writers February 20, 2008 http://www.latimes.com/news/printedition/california/la-me-puc20feb20,0,1431… SACRAMENTO -- Public Utilities Commissioner Timothy A. Simon solicited donations from companies he regulates to help pay for a nonprofit conference on green energy hosted last month by one of his political patrons, documents and interviews show. Two weeks after the conference, the three most generous corporate donors to the Willie L. Brown Jr. Institute on Politics and Public Service -- each of which gave at least $50,000 -- won PUC agreement to change a new energy-efficiency program as the companies had requested. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ *FOR THE RECORD:* Utilities: An article in Section A on Wednesday about fundraising efforts by Public Utilities Commissioner Timothy A. Simon stated that the commission regulates the Sacramento Municipal Utility District. The commission does not regulate municipal utilities. --- ------------------------------------------------------------------------ The program was changed to award bonuses to utility companies even if they fall substantially short of power-saving goals. In some circumstances, the change will be worth $176 million to the companies. Simon's appointment to the commission is largely due to Willie Brown, the former Assembly speaker and San Francisco mayor. Brown recommended him to Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger and is said to be rallying support for his confirmation, which the state Senate Rules Committee is scheduled to consider today. No law bars regulators from raising money from those they oversee. But consumer advocates said Simon's solicitations exemplified the close relationships between utilities and the five PUC commissioners, who set utility rates, adjudicate complaints and have broad power to instruct the utilities how to behave. "It's a questionable practice for any commissioner to raise money directly from utility companies," said Mark Toney, executive director of TURN, a utility watchdog group in San Francisco. "I would think a commissioner would want to recuse himself from any decision that impacted them." About the same time Simon was raising money from the utilities, Pacific Gas & Electric Co., Southern California Edison and San Diego Gas & Electric Co. were petitioning the PUC to increase bonuses in an energy-efficiency program the commission had established a few months earlier. Simon, 52, who voted with the other commissioners Jan. 31 to adopt the change, did not respond to requests for an interview. His office released a statement Tuesday that said he spearheaded the conference because "the utility companies reached out" to him for help in preparing a new generation of utility workers. "In contacting the utilities about this opportunity, no promises were made, either expressly or implied, that participation in the summit would result in utility matters pending before the CPUC receiving favorable treatment," the statement said. "Commissioner Simon's actions in organizing the summit were consistent with laws and CPUC rules," the statement said. "Neither he nor the CPUC received any private gain or advantage, nor did the participating companies obtain any private gain or advantage." Simon's association with Brown dates to Brown's mayoral administration, in which Simon was a volunteer. In 2006, Brown recommended Simon to Schwarzenegger's chief of staff, Susan Kennedy, to fill a PUC vacancy. The governor hired Simon that year as his appointments secretary, a senior position in his administration, and nominated him to the PUC in February 2007. Commissioners are paid $128,109 a year and serve six-year terms. Brown told The Times last year that Simon "went to Sacramento to be a PUC commissioner" and that it was "highly appropriate that his wish to be PUC commissioner is fulfilled." Brown did not respond to a request for comment for this article. The Jan. 14 conference brought together investors, labor leaders, policymakers and industry officials with the goal of finding ways to expand green energy in California and create business opportunities and jobs, particularly for people from poor areas. Along with the PUC, the conference was organized by Brown's institute and other groups. In an e-mail sent to prospective donors, Simon described the event as "a summit like no other" and encouraged donors to contact him directly at his office or call the conference organizer, a PUC employee. "I look forward to hearing from you soon," Simon wrote. Pacific Gas & Electric, Southern California Edison and San Diego Gas & Electric agreed to be "platinum sponsors," those donating $50,000 or more, according to conference materials. Christy Heiser, a spokeswoman for Sempra Energy, which owns San Diego Gas & Electric, said Brown and Simon jointly signed a letter to the company asking it to take a "lead role" in sponsoring the conference. Southern California Edison said it was recruited by other utilities. Spokesman Gil Alexander said the executives who decided to participate "have no knowledge of either individual or any CPUC commissioner soliciting SCE's involvement." Pacific Gas & Electric did not respond to a request for comment. Other utilities regulated by the PUC also gave money, conference materials show. AT&T, Comcast Corp. and the Sacramento Municipal Utility District each donated between $10,000 and $24,999. Simon and Brown gave welcoming remarks at the conference, and San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom gave the opening address. The commission's energy-efficiency program rewards utilities for investing in efficient equipment and taking steps to help customers conserve fuel. Originally, the panel allowed utilities that met 85% or more of their goals to collect bonuses. In the amended rules, the commission lowered the threshold so those meeting more than 65% of their goals would qualify for financial rewards of as much as $176 million, according to PUC spokeswoman Terrie Prosper. Before the change, companies achieving 65% to 85% of the goals would receive no bonuses. Those that do not exceed 65% of the goals will face penalties, as they did in the original plan, starting at $144 million. jordan.rau(a)latimes.com <mailto:jordan.rau@latimes.com> evan.halper(a)latimes.com <mailto:evan.halper@latimes.com> Times staff writer Elizabeth Douglass in Los Angeles contributed to this report.

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[Sustain] Joint Transpo/Sustainability Meeting Thursday
by Eric Brooks 25 Feb '08

25 Feb '08

Joint Meeting Transportation & Sustainability Working Groups When: Thursday, 2/28/08, 6:30PM-9:00PM Where: SFGP Office, 1028A Howard St Proposed Discussion Items - New Version Of McGoldrick Elected MTA Board Charter Amendment - Peak Oil Taskforce Update - Maxwell/Peskin SFPUC Charter Amendment - Mayoral Shake Up Of Building Inspection Commission - Update On SFPUC - CCA Update - Combustion Turbine Update - Forming an active working group members alert list for the Sustainability WG -- "I am not a liberator. Liberators do not exist. The people liberate themselves." – Che Guevara

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[Sustain] Urgent Alert: Public Comment This Mon & Tue On Brown Apple Moth Aerial Spraying
by Eric Brooks 21 Feb '08

21 Feb '08

from - http://sanfrancisco.tribe.net/listing/b61d5789-6629-4912-a35c-2567d7806251 Speak out against aerial spraying - CDFA coming to town this week! Last week the California Department of Food and Agriculture (CDFA) made an official announcement that they intend to continue aerial spraying of pesticides over Monterey and Santa Cruz counties in June, and begin spraying over the Bay Area in August. Once implemented the spraying will occur every 30-90 days, for 9 months of every year, for at least 3-5 years to come. The proposed areas to be sprayed by air total 444,060 acres, 693.8 miles (see map www.hopefortruth.com/lbam_2008.jpg) <http://www.hopefortruth.com/lbam_2008.jpg%29.> And that doesn't include the vast acreage of ground treatments that allow them to enter private properties to attach chemical twist ties and traps in your organic gardens, and paint insecticide on trees and utility poles, all in easy reach of climbing children, pets, and other beneficial creatures. Hundreds of people have already been made ill by the spraying last Fall in Monterey and Santa Cruz (list of symptoms www.indybay.org/newsitems/...70272.php) <http://www.indybay.org/newsitems/2008/01/05/18470272.php%29.> The CDFA is battling the little light brown apple moth (LBAM), not because it has the potential of eating us out of house and home, nor are they concerned about us not having enough to eat. Their eradication program has nothing whatsoever to do with public health and safety, but everything to do with trade. They worry about losing profits because of potential embargoes on California produce. They are not concerned about organic farmers, however, and organic standards are in the process of being diluted further. The CDFA will be holding "scoping" meetings to hear public comments regarding their Environmental Impact Review (EIR) process. Please be aware that the spraying is not dependent on completion of such a review, because they have declared a "State of Emergency", which gives them the right to overrule other regulations, such as local pesticide ordinances, private property laws, and health, safety, and environmental protection. You can demonstrate your concerns at the following meetings, which the CDFA is expected to attend. More meetings, organized by the CDFA, various city and county officials, and grassroots activists, in various communities are being added all the time. Please keep updated by checking out the calendar at www.lbamspray.com/calendar.htm <http://www.lbamspray.com/calendar.htm> If you haven't done so already, please scroll down to the links on the bottom of this mail to sign the petition opposed to aerial spraying, and vote in the polls. CDFA "scoping" meetings: Monterey Wednesday, February 20, 2008, 6:00 -- 8:00 p.m. Monterey Peninsula College Lecture Forum 103 980 Fremont Street Monterey, CA 93940 Santa Cruz Thursday, February 21, 2008, 6:00 -- 8:00 p.m. University Inn & Conference Center Sierra & Dawn Room 611 Ocean Street Santa Cruz, CA 95060 San Francisco Monday, February 25, 2008, 6:00 -- 8:00 p.m. San Francisco County Fair Building Auditorium Golden Gate Park 9th Avenue & Lincoln Way San Francisco, CA 94122 Oakland Tuesday, February 26, 2008, 6:30 -- 8:30 p.m. Ellis M Harris State Building Auditorium 1515 Clay St. Oakland, CA 94612 Oral and written comments will be accepted. The deadline for written comments is March 20, 2008. They may be sent to: Jim Rains, Staff Environmental Scientist CA Department of Food and Agriculture Plant Health and Pest Prevention Services 1220 N Street, Room A-316 Sacramento, CA 95814 LBAM on the agenda at City Council meetings: Oakland Tuesday, February 26, 2008, 7pm Oakland City Hall, 1 Frank Ogawa Plaza (14th St. Between Clay and Broadway) Hearing Room 1 Oakland City Council Public Safety Committee considers a resolution against aerial spraying proposed by Councilmembers Brunner and Reid (draft resolution: clerkwebsvr1.oaklandnet.com/atta....pdf) <http://clerkwebsvr1.oaklandnet.com/attachments/18426.pdf%29> Berkeley Tuesday, February 26, 2008, 7pm 2134 Martin Luther King Jr. Way, Berkeley CDFA presentation scheduled at Berkeley City Council meeting To prepare for talking with the CDFA, and to hear from grassroots opposition to the pesticide program: San Leandro East Bay Pesticide Alert/Don't Spray California presents: Who's afraid of the Light Brown Apple Moth? Sunday, February 24, 2008, 1:30-3:30pm Zocalo Coffeehouse 645 Bancroft Ave @ Dutton, San Leandro *(scent-free please) www.eastbaypesticidealert.org/ <http://www.eastbaypesticidealert.org/> Have you signed the petition against the spraying? www.stopthespray.org/ <http://www.stopthespray.org/> Voted in the poll in the Marin Independent Journal? www.marinij.com/marin/ci_8257611 <http://www.marinij.com/marin/ci_8257611> And the one on About.com? sanfrancisco.about.com/b/2008...rea.htm <http://sanfrancisco.about.com/b/2008/02/16/aerial-spraying-over-san-francis…> -- "I am not a liberator. Liberators do not exist. The people liberate themselves." -- Che Guevara

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[Sustain] Fwd: Victory in Oregon! - Governor Kulongoski ups ante against LNG sites
by Eric Brooks 15 Feb '08

15 Feb '08

rcox(a)pacificenvironment.org wrote: As many of you know, I spend most of my time campaigning to keep Liquid Natural Gas (LNG) out of California, and as some of you may know, I spent last week in Oregon helping to organize a rally at the state capital and have some meetings with decision-makers on this. Well, it appears as if our efforts have paid off in a huge way, as the Governor of Oregon is finally doing the things we’ve been asking him to do. This has huge implications for the Bay Area’s energy future, as any LNG terminal located in Oregon would largely serve the Northern California energy market. This is an amazing victory for all of us (though we still have some work to do to ensure LNG stays out of Oregon. But this is a giant step). The story below is from the front page of today’s Oregonian. http://www.oregonlive.com/printer/printer.ssf?/base/business/12030495269790… <http://www.oregonlive.com/printer/printer.ssf?/base/business/12030495269790…> *Governor ups ante against LNG sites * *Energy - A letter tells federal regulators to back off and calls into question the quality of their reviews * Friday, February 15, 2008 TED SICKINGER *The Oregonian* Gov. Ted Kulongoski insisted Thursday that federal regulators halt all reviews of proposals to build liquefied-natural-gas terminals in Oregon until they study all alternatives for supplying natural gas to the region. In a letter sent Thursday to Federal Energy Regulatory Commission Chairman Joseph Kelliher, Kulongoski said he had asked the state attorney general to examine Oregon's legal authority to refuse state permits for the projects until FERC complies with his request. Kulongoski also told Kelliher he had asked Oregon's congressional delegation to enact legislation that would wrest back state control for licensing LNG facilities. State authority was preempted by the federal government as part of the Energy Policy Act of 2005. The governor's new posture, outlined Thursday in an interview with The Oregonian, marks a bold departure from his wait-and-see, open-minded approach that has accompanied debate and review of the gas-importing terminals for years. From the outset, the LNG proposals have stirred controversy. Some in rural communities welcome the jobs and taxes they would generate. Other residents scorn the potential damage to the Columbia estuary and decry the likely use of eminent domain to seize farmland, vineyards and forest for hundreds of miles of pipeline. Kulongoski told Kelliher he wasn't "unalterably opposed" to LNG being part of Oregon's energy mix. But he said FERC's "approach to the licensing of plants and pipelines has created a crisis of confidence with Oregonians." Opponents of the projects cheered Kulongoski's moves. They have been appalled by FERC's style of regulating the terminals -- an extension, they say, of a laissez-faire approach of the Bush administration. "This is just the type of leadership we want to see the governor take on this issue," said Brent Foster, executive director of Columbia Riverkeeper. "It's encouraging that he's recognizing that these LNG projects deserve a very close look, and it's important that the rush to approve these projects not leave us with a mistake." The governor's new stance puts Oregon in league with states across the country that have raised objections to FERC's permitting approach and its preemption of state licensing authority. "Ultimately, we may end up in court over this," Kulongoski said in the Thursday interview. "We're not exactly clawless. . . . The state doesn't have all the tools, but we are a critical piece. You're going to have to meet the state concerns." Energy companies have proposed building three LNG terminals in the state: one in Coos Bay and two on the Columbia River. The terminals would accept imports of supercooled natural gas from abroad, reheat the liquid into a gas, and ship the gas to West Coast markets through one of four proposed pipelines. Two other companies have proposed building pipelines to ship domestic natural gas from the Wyoming Rockies to southern Oregon. Project proponents say Oregon needs to diversify its natural-gas supply to offset potential price spikes as regional demand rises and, as they contend will happen, Canadian imports or domestic supplies go into decline. The Northwest Gas Association projects that natural gas demand will grow 2 percent annually during the next five years, driven primarily by higher need for electricity generation and growing residential use. "The Northwest's need for additional natural gas is well documented," said William "Si" Garrett, chief executive of NorthernStar Natural Gas Inc., in an e-mail statement. NorthernStar wants to build the Bradwood Landing terminal 20 miles upriver from Astoria on the Columbia River. Bradwood is expecting a decision from FERC -- its first on any of the Oregon proposals -- in the spring or early summer. The company says nine studies in the past two years have shown a need to boost the region's gas supply. Industrial gas users and the gas industry's regional trade group said Thursday that the federal government does not need to analyze the region's gas needs and how best to meet them. No company would build a facility that wasn't needed and fully subscribed, they contend. "I'm not sure the government is as well-equipped as the market to determine which facility is most efficient and cost-effective at meeting the region's needs," said Dan Kirschner, executive director of the Northwest Gas Association. Kulongoski, however, said the regional need for gas, and which facility would best meet that need, are "threshold questions." Each of the proposed LNG and Rockies pipelines could import far more gas than Oregon uses. Opponents long have contended that project backers want to use Oregon as a back door to California, which already has spurned several efforts to locate LNG terminals there. Oregon state agencies, meanwhile, have complained that FERC's environmental review of Bradwood was inadequate and that it had abdicated its responsibility to thoroughly evaluate alternatives. Some of Kulongoski's Democratic colleagues, including Secretary of State Bill Bradbury and Oregon House Speaker Jeff Merkley, have opposed the terminals. Bradbury, in particular, is wary of seeing the state tie its energy future to an imported fossil fuel with higher greenhouse emissions than domestic natural gas. In his letter, Kulongoski asked that FERC's review of alternatives include a full analysis of carbon emissions along LNG's path from source to market, including liquefication overseas, trans-ocean shipping and re-gasification here. The analysis, he said, should be compared with the harms of extracting more gas domestically. "No review of any of the three individual LNG projects should proceed further until this carbon study is completed by FERC," Kulongoski wrote. Ted Sickinger: 503-221-8505 tedsickinger@ news.oregonian.com ©2008 The Oregonian

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[Sustain] Fwd: NY Times: Biofuels Deemed a Greenhouse Threat
by Eric Brooks 11 Feb '08

11 Feb '08

Hi all, This article is even better than the last one. Important Note: Near the end of the article where one of the scientists actually speaks positively about sugar cane for fuel, he is totally failing to account for the realities that most cane farming involves regular -burning- of the fields, and that increased cane fuel production would still cause other land to be cleared increasing global warming and food insecurity. Likewise his statement about 'waste' from crops being used for fuel production is short sighted. Such waste needs to be returned to the -soil- to retain and increase its nutrient value and promote better carbon storage in more secure soil. Here's the article - New York Times Biofuels Deemed a Greenhouse Threat By ELISABETH ROSENTHAL Published: February 8, 2008 Almost all biofuels used today cause more greenhouse gas emissions than conventional fuels if the full emissions costs of producing these “green” fuels are taken into account, two studies being published Thursday have concluded. The benefits of biofuels have come under increasing attack in recent months, as scientists took a closer look at the global environmental cost of their production. These latest studies, published in the prestigious journal Science, are likely to add to the controversy. These studies for the first time take a detailed, comprehensive look at the emissions effects of the huge amount of natural land that is being converted to cropland globally to support biofuels development. The destruction of natural ecosystems — whether rain forest in the tropics or grasslands in South America — not only releases greenhouse gases into the atmosphere when they are burned and plowed, but also deprives the planet of natural sponges to absorb carbon emissions. Cropland also absorbs far less carbon than the rain forests or even scrubland that it replaces. Together the two studies offer sweeping conclusions: It does not matter if it is rain forest or scrubland that is cleared, the greenhouse gas contribution is significant. More important, they discovered that, taken globally, the production of almost all biofuels resulted, directly or indirectly, intentionally or not, in new lands being cleared, either for food or fuel. “When you take this into account, most of the biofuel that people are using or planning to use would probably increase greenhouse gasses substantially,” said Timothy Searchinger, lead author of one of the studies and a researcher in environment and economics at Princeton University. “Previously there’s been an accounting error: land use change has been left out of prior analysis.” These plant-based fuels were originally billed as better than fossil fuels because the carbon released when they were burned was balanced by the carbon absorbed when the plants grew. But even that equation proved overly simplistic because the process of turning plants into fuels causes its own emissions — for refining and transport, for example. The clearance of grassland releases 93 times the amount of greenhouse gas that would be saved by the fuel made annually on that land, said Joseph Fargione, lead author of the second paper, and a scientist at the Nature Conservancy. “So for the next 93 years you’re making climate change worse, just at the time when we need to be bringing down carbon emissions.” The Intergovernment Panel on Climate Change has said that the world has to reverse the increase of greenhouse gas emissions by 2020 to avert disastrous environment consequences. In the wake of the new studies, a group of 10 of the United States’s most eminent ecologists and environmental biologists today sent a letter to President Bush and the speaker of the House, Nancy Pelosi, urging a reform of biofuels policies. “We write to call your attention to recent research indicating that many anticipated biofuels will actually exacerbate global warming,” the letter said. The European Union and a number of European countries have recently tried to address the land use issue with proposals stipulating that imported biofuels cannot come from land that was previously rain forest. But even with such restrictions in place, Dr. Searchinger’s study shows, the purchase of biofuels in Europe and the United States leads indirectly to the destruction of natural habitats far afield. For instance, if vegetable oil prices go up globally, as they have because of increased demand for biofuel crops, more new land is inevitably cleared as farmers in developing countries try to get in on the profits. So crops from old plantations go to Europe for biofuels, while new fields are cleared to feed people at home. Likewise, Dr. Fargione said that the dedication of so much cropland in the United States to growing corn for bioethanol had caused indirect land use changes far away. Previously, Midwestern farmers had alternated corn with soy in their fields, one year to the next. Now many grow only corn, meaning that soy has to be grown elsewhere. Increasingly, that elsewhere, Dr. Fargione said, is Brazil, on land that was previously forest or savanna. “Brazilian farmers are planting more of the world’s soybeans — and they’re deforesting the Amazon to do it,” he said. International environmental groups, including the United Nations, responded cautiously to the studies, saying that biofuels could still be useful. “We don’t want a total public backlash that would prevent us from getting the potential benefits,” said Nicholas Nuttall, spokesman for the United Nations Environment Program, who said the United Nations had recently created a new panel to study the evidence. “There was an unfortunate effort to dress up biofuels as the silver bullet of climate change,” he said. “We fully believe that if biofuels are to be part of the solution rather than part of the problem, there urgently needs to be better sustainability criterion.” The European Union has set a target that countries use 5.75 percent biofuel for transport by the end of 2008. Proposals in the United States energy package would require that 15 percent of all transport fuels be made from biofuel by 2022. To reach these goals, biofuels production is heavily subsidized at many levels on both continents, supporting a burgeoning global industry. Syngenta, the Swiss agricultural giant, announced Thursday that its annual profits had risen 75 percent in the last year, in part because of rising demand for biofuels. Industry groups, like the Renewable Fuels Association, immediately attacked the new studies as “simplistic,” failing “to put the issue into context.” “While it is important to analyze the climate change consequences of differing energy strategies, we must all remember where we are today, how world demand for liquid fuels is growing, and what the realistic alternatives are to meet those growing demands,” said Bob Dineen, the group’s director, in a statement following the Science reports’ release. “Biofuels like ethanol are the only tool readily available that can begin to address the challenges of energy security and environmental protection,” he said. The European Biodiesel Board says that biodiesel reduces greenhouse gasses by 50 to 95 percent compared to conventional fuel, and has other advantages as well, like providing new income for farmers and energy security for Europe in the face of rising global oil prices and shrinking supply. But the papers published Thursday suggested that, if land use is taken into account, biofuels may not provide all the benefits once anticipated. Dr. Searchinger said the only possible exception he could see for now was sugar cane grown in Brazil, which take relatively little energy to grow and is readily refined into fuel. He added that governments should quickly turn their attention to developing biofuels that did not require cropping, such as those from agricultural waste products. “This land use problem is not just a secondary effect — it was often just a footnote in prior papers,”. “It is major. The comparison with fossil fuels is going to be adverse for virtually all biofuels on cropland.

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[Sustain] Scientific American Article/Studies Drive Stake Into Heart Of Biofuels Illusion
by Eric Brooks 11 Feb '08

11 Feb '08

Hi all, This is the best condemnation of biofuels I have seen yet. Scientific American Article Cites Studies Which Drive A Stake Into Heart Of The Biofuels Illusion http://www.sciam.com/article.cfm?id=biofuels-bad-for-people-and-climate&pri… Scientific American News <http://www.sciam.com/section.cfm?id=news> - February 7, 2008 Biofuels Are Bad for Feeding People and Combating Climate Change By displacing agriculture for food---and causing more land clearing---biofuels are bad for hungry people and the environment By David Biello Converting corn to ethanol <http://www.sciam.com/article.cfm?id=is-ethanol-for-the-long-h> in Iowa not only leads to clearing more of the Amazonian rainforest <http://www.sciam.com/article.cfm?id=fragmentation-quickly-des>, researchers report in a pair of new studies in /Science,/ but also would do little to slow global warming---and often make it worse. "Prior analyses made an accounting error," says one study's lead author, Tim Searchinger, an agricultural expert at Princeton University. "There is a huge imbalance between the carbon lost by plowing up a hectare [2.47 acres] of forest or grassland from the benefit you get from biofuels." Growing plants store carbon <http://www.sciam.com/article.cfm?id=scientists-spend-10-years> in their roots, shoots and leaves. As a result, the world's plants and the soil in which they grow contain nearly three times as much carbon as the entire atmosphere. "I know when I look at a tree that half the dry weight of it is carbon," says ecologist David Tilman of the University of Minnesota, coauthor of the other study which examined the "carbon debt" embedded in any biofuel. "That's going to end up as carbon dioxide in the atmosphere when you cut it down." By turning crops such as corn, sugarcane and palm oil into biofuels---whether ethanol, biodiesel, or something else <http://www.sciam.com/article.cfm?id=turning-whole-plants-into-fuel-in-four-…>---proponents hope to reap the benefits of the carbon soaked up as the plants grow to offset the carbon dioxide (CO_2 ) emitted when the resulting fuel is burned. But whether biofuels emit more or less CO_2 than gasoline depends on what the land they were grown on was previously used for, both studies show. Tilman and his colleagues examined the overall CO_2 released when land use changes occur. Converting the grasslands of the U.S. to grow corn results in excess greenhouse gas emissions of 134 metric tons of CO_2 per hectare---a debt that would take 93 years to repay by replacing gasoline with corn-based ethanol. And converting jungles to palm plantations or tropical rainforest to soy fields would take centuries to pay back their carbon debts. "Any biofuel that causes land clearing is likely to increase global warming," says ecologist Joseph Fargione of The Nature Conservancy, lead author of the second study. "It takes decades to centuries to repay the carbon debt that is created from clearing land." Diverting food crops into fuel production leads to ever more land clearing <http://www.sciam.com/article.cfm?id=combating-climate-change-farming-forest…> as well. Ethanol demand in the U.S., for example, has caused some farmers to plant more corn and less soy. This has driven up soy prices causing farmers in Brazil to clear more Amazon rainforest land to plant valuable soy, Searchinger's study notes. Because a soy field contains far less carbon than a rainforest, the greenhouse gas benefit of the original ethanol is wiped out. "Corn-based ethanol, instead of producing a 20 percent savings [in greenhouse gas emissions], nearly doubles greenhouse emissions over 30 years and increases greenhouse gases for 167 years," the researchers write. "We can't get to a result with corn ethanol where we can generate greenhouse gas benefits," Searchinger adds. Turning food into fuel also has the unintended consequence of driving up food prices, reducing the access of the neediest populations to grains and meat. "It's equivalent to saying we will try to reduce greenhouse gases by reducing food consumption," Searchinger says. "Unfortunately, a lot of that comes from the world's poorest people." "We are converting their food into our fuel," Tilman notes. " The typical driver of an SUV spends as much on fuel in a month as the poorer third of the world spend on food." The studies do find some benefit from biofuels but only when planted on agricultural land too dry or degraded <http://www.sciam.com/article.cfm?id=grass-makes-better-ethanol-than-corn> for food production or significant tree or plant growth and only when derived from native plants, such as a mix of prairie grasses <http://www.sciam.com/article.cfm?id=amber-waves-of-gas-gasoli> in the U.S. Midwest. Or such fuels can be made from waste: corn stalks, leftover wood from timber production or even city garbage. But that will not slake a significant portion of the growing thirst for transportation fuels <http://www.sciam.com/article.cfm?id=climate-change-happening-effects-severe…>. "If we convert every corn kernel grown today in the U.S. to ethanol we offset just 12 percent of our gasoline use," notes ecologist Jason Hill of the University of Minnesota. "The real benefit to these advanced biofuels may not be in displacement of fossil fuels but in the building up of carbon stores in the soil." Of course, there is another reason for biofuels: energy independence. "Biofuels like ethanol are the only tool readily available that can begin to address the challenge of energy security," Bob Dinneen, president of industry group the Renewable Fuels Association said in a statement. "The alternative is to continue to exploit increasingly costlier fossil fuels for which the environmental price tag will be great." But the environmental price tag of biofuels now joins the ranks of other, cheaper domestic fuel sources---such as coal-to-liquid fuel <http://www.sciam.com/article.cfm?id=pumping-coal>---as major sources of globe-warming pollution <http://www.sciam.com/article.cfm?id=worse-than-gasoline> as well as unintended social consequences. As a result, 10 prominent scientists have written a letter to President Bush and other government leaders urging them to "shape policies to assure that government incentives for biofuels do not increase global warming." "We shouldn't abandon biofuels," Searchinger says. But "you don't solve global warming by going in the wrong direction."

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[Sustain] Speech: David Holmgren On Permaculture & Peak Oil
by Eric Brooks 09 Feb '08

09 Feb '08

Hi all, I just found a very important speech by David Holmgren (the co-founder of permaculture) which has a lot of very crucial perspective in it on the ways that human thinking on how to manage a sustainable future must evolve beyond where it is now, and also must re-vision current concepts of sustainability. Cal Broomhead if you are reading this, I think it is especially important that you pass on to the Department of Env. and SFPUC a really vital point that Holmgren makes toward the end of the speech that as we restrict water use to counter coming droughts, we crucially create strong -exemptions- on those restrictions to allow for local food production in home, rooftop, and neighborhood gardens which actually -save- water supply in the big picture. I preface guiding you all to the audio link by saying that I actually strongly disagree with some aspects of what Holmgren lays out. His described idea of a long gentle decline from peak energy use is made from his perspective of working hands on in local oriented permaculture and doesn't account for very large and irresistible forces in techno-capitalism which will simply not allow this slow energy decline to an energy nirvana take place. So when he lays out that part of his vision I think we should take it with a grain of salt and realise that our actual future will be something more of a yin-yang marriage between the growing shift to technological fixes like solar and wind power and the very low energy agrarian devolution which he envisions. Also, I have always strongly disagreed with Holmgren's emphasis on using animals in a big way for food and food production. Though it is indeed possible to create a beautifully sustainable local living system which harmoniously includes the human eating of lots of animals, such tactics will be extremely hard to scale to a growing global human population that is -far- too large. Even more important, what so many permaculturists like Holmgren totally fail to grasp, is that it is the mentality that it is ok for humans to enslave, strike, and kill animals and even plants and living systems to our -use-, instead of properly envisioning ourselves as ethical partners in a dance with the rest of our ecosystem, that has repeatedly gotten modern humans stuck in horrendous progress traps over at the last 100,000 years of our history. When we make the decision to dominate (for example in the moment when we decide that it is ok to take a fish and strike its head on a rock to make it dead) we are fundamentally changing our own mentality. With proper mythical reverence for, and thanks to, the animal, that mentality is at first sustainable, but gradually such internalised moments of violent dominance evolve into unsustainable behavior and group practices because they stealthfully accumulate a mental and physical dominance paradigm over the biosphere, eventually crowding the mythical reverence out. As we build permacultural living systems within which to live, it will be important that we let -predators- do the job of culling animals that achieve unbalanced high populations in those systems; not humans which are far too drastically clever at over-exploiting tools and mentalities of dominance and destruction such that those tools and thought processes inevitably spiral over and over again into sustainability failure. Anyway, with all those caveats laid down, Holmgren's core perspectives are crucial to re-envisioning ourselves and our civilisation. You can hear his speech at: http://www.radio4all.net/index.php?op=program-info&program_id=26484&nav=& For a basic explanation of permaculture go to: http://www.idepfoundation.org/idep_permaculture.html peace Eric

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