Debunking Biofuels: Part 2

In a previous blog post, I had described the downside of corn-derived ethanol for biofuels. One of the biggest problems with using agriculture for biofuel production is the land use issue. We need land for food; with biofuels, we need land for energy as well.

What about a crop just for biofuels, then? High in energy and not involved in food production, such a source for energy might be more efficient-biodiesel, another type of biofuel, utilizes such a plant.

Unfortunately, that plant has also directly been destroying the rainforest.

Oil palm is a rather conflicted crop-in South East Asia, far away from its sustainable production in native Africa¹, it is controlled by the demand from multinational soap companies and governments eagerly marketing it for the growing biofuel demand. Malaysia is the largest oil palm producer today, and its entire landscape is transforming².

I witnessed this tragic transition in the landscape first-hand last summer in Malaysian Borneo. You see, oil palm is grown as a monoculture-similar to corn, it's planted in rather sterile rows. Many of Malaysia's once-verdant hills covered with shady, beautifully variegated rainforest have given way to unending undulations of dusty oil palm rows where much of the once-rich tropical soil has dried into a fine orange powder.

Although palm oil growers argue that they are only growing palm in previously damaged forest (also called secondary forest), this is no way to treat damaged areas. The act of planting monoculture is equivalent to giving up on land that still functions well as carbon sinks³. On the other hand, a better alternative to oil palm is the selective harvesting of trees, fostering a sustainable carbon sink that is profitable for green logging industries⁴.

Regrettably, because Malaysia is the largest oil palm grower in the world, it's looking to maximize demand to keep palm oil prices up⁵ rather than putting substantial investment in other industries-which leads to the nation supplying a growing biofuel market. And though the government claims that it limits oil palm growth to already damaged land, they can't stop all the poor farmers who scramble onto nearby forest to grow it for increased income, nor can they control the practice of burning down old oil palms to make way for new crop-a practice that negates any positive value derived from using biodiesel.

The growing global interest in biofuels and economic incentives strengthens developing nations' dependence on energy crops. Converging trends and demands only cause nations like Malaysia to pile on more and more ways to squeeze as much biofuel and/or palm oil as possible from land that would otherwise (ironically) be absorbing the massive amounts of carbon emissions from other nations.

We should keep in mind that rainforests make up almost half of the total carbon dioxide sink available on land⁶. They continually vacuum up the world's greenhouse gases and efficiently turn them it into the huge concentration of life found in the tropics. Losing these forests would be like losing one of your kidneys while your other one is being hacked away-and there's no dialysis to save us once our carbon sinks diminish beyond rescue.