[Stoves] News 9 September 2016: Biofuels "worse than petrol" for the environment, new study finds

[Crispin Pemberton-Pigott]

Dear Nikhil

The article stimulated a large number of comments at wattsupwiththat.com ‎when it first came out. The best analyses come from the attempts to do an energy accounting of any biofuel system. The surprising result is that biofuels contain a lot of energy that comes from fossil fuels.

As Cecil says, we are eating oil.

And speaking of biofuels, we tested the first of the dung burning stoves in Bishkek this afternoon, the first of two. The power control was stunning, apparently, as reviewed by the workshop staff. The most impressed was the guy who uses dung exclusively at home on the range. He found the air controller was also a volume control. Fine power control is requisite for making 'plof' which has a high power phase for 20 minutes then a very low power for the duration.

The stove will cost about $30. ‎It is simple in the extreme. It is lined with recycled boiler lining bricks.

Regards
Crispin



Biofuels 'worse than petrol' for the environment, new study finds
<http://www.telegraph.co.uk/science/2016/08/25/biofuels-worse-than-petrol-for-the-environment-new-study-finds/>,
Henry Bodkin, Telegraph (UK)

It's two weeks old, I just saw it. Called "a landmark new study"; methinks
University of Michigan is at least 15 years behind the pioneering study by
Kirk Smith, et al. (Joshi and Kishore, among them if I remember correctly.)
in AREE 2000.

In fact, these blokes don't seem to have paid any attention to Smith's work
even now.

Smith looked at all air emissions (save black carbon) and wrote, "If one
were to put carbon in the atmosphere anyway, carbon dioxide is the least
harmful form from climate or health points of view. The policy implications
of this finding are profound." (I am writing from memory.)

James Hansen (with Sato) had said something quite similar that very year in
PNAS.

DeCicco seems to be stuck in the CO2 mania, ignoring the non-CO2 damage on
health and environment.

BUT he "ignored the prevailing models and analysed real data on crop
production, biofuel production, fossil fuel production and vehicle
emissions."

IGNORE MODELS AND ANALYZE REAL DATA??? WHAT AN IDEA!!

Will WHO and EPA/ISO fundamentalist fools take notice? (Pardon my
impudence. I am looking for a blood boiling test protocol, whatever the
model.)

There is much more to biomass - fuel or not - and the environment. But the
"biomass renewable energy" cult won't know it.

Why, the IPCC inventory guidelines shove biomass fuel emissions to LULUCF
section and the CDM/"Gold Standard" maniacs of "improved stoves" obsess
over "renewable biomass fraction" based on some silly CO2 factors. "Save
the earth, kill her children," seems to be their motto.

I for one don't give a damn about computed environmental effects of biomass
via CO2. But biomass production and use are closely linked to the lives of
the poor - some rich enough to own a bit of land and have access to water
(there's rain, after all), some have to forage and suffer hunger on a daily
basis. The real worth of renewable biomass is in human brains;
mal/under-nutrition, mal/under-fertilization create psychosocial illnesses
whose burden of disease is arguably far greater than that from CO2, EPA and
Obama notwithstanding.

Nikhil

Full paper, Open Access Carbon balance effects of U.S. biofuel production
and use <http://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10584-016-1764-4>, John
M. DeCicco, et al.  25 August 2016 doi:10.1007/s10584-016-1764-4
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