Electric Cobra

ELECTRIC GRAND PRIX CORP.

364 Lanning Road, Honeoye Falls, NY 14472-9741

Tel./Fax.  585-624-8182

OPEN LETTERS

Butane-Propane News

John Needham, Editor, Butane-Propane News, Inc.

Dear Mr. Needham:

 I wish to comment about the article, “Converting Land to Produce Biofuels Creates Carbon Debt” by Ann Rey, Editorial Director of BPN.  I am an engineer and have been involved in promoting alternate fueled vehicles, alternate fuels and supporting infrastructure development for over 20 years.

 I believe that Ms. Ray has done a rather thorough job presenting information relative to the opposing views of both sides of the issues concerning current development of bio-fuels and the associated environmental impact.  She references information contained in two reports published in the February issue of Science “that conclude that most biofuels are worse for the environment than the fuels they seek to replace when looking at the full emissions cycle of producing the biofuels.”

 The point that I want to make is: Watch where the carbon atoms go.  It is quite correct that rainforests absorb a huge amount of carbon in the form of carbon-dioxide (a greenhouse gas) from the air.  The carbon atoms that are removed are captivated in plant tissue that eventually will die and return to the environment in the form of carbon-dioxide or peat.  The more significant issue with respect to conversion of rainforests to crop production is the quality of the soil is generally very poor and very thin.  Using this land for growing crops will cause soil depletion due to intensive cultivation and erosion.  The only “permanent” repository for the carbon atoms removed from the atmosphere by photosynthesis is by subjecting cellulose to the geological process that ultimately results in coal and crude oil.  This obviously is not a practical solution.

 Timothy Searchinger, the lead author of the Princeton University study is said to have stated that just looking at tailpipe emissions is overly simplistic because the process of making bio-fuel from plant material causes its own emissions.  This is true.  Overly simplistic analysis is usually misleading and can lead to misunderstanding.  This reminds me of an article “Protected Land Goes Back to Work as Crop Prices Soar” by Kent Garber in the in the April 28 – May 5, 2008 issue of US News and World Report.  Mr. Garber states that in 2007 plants growing wild in the federal Conservation Reserve Program trapped 50 million metric tons of carbon dioxide from the atmosphere.  He did not mention that the carbon atoms are not locked away forever.  The vast majority of the carbon trapped in plant materials will ultimately rot or burn and return to the atmosphere in the form of carbon dioxide and methane, another greenhouse gas. 

 Joseph Fargione, lead author of the second paper and scientist at the Nature Conservancy is referenced by Ms. Fay who has written, “It takes about 17 years for the positive effects of using sugarcane ethanol from those (Brazilian) fields instead of petroleum-based fuels to overcome the CO2 debt.”  What is not stated is that it will take hundreds of thousands of years to use geological processes to permanently captivate the carbon from petroleum-based fuel.  The process of using plants to captivate carbon from the atmosphere and making fuel from these plants is an excellent example of recycling of carbon atoms and occurs almost instantaneously in geological time frame.

 What is the bottom line?  Currently, due to the ever increasing demand for energy, there is a pressing need for both the expansion in the use of all forms of renewable energy plus continued use of fossil fuel.  There has not been much in the press recently but it is known that there are huge reserves of petroleum in North America in the form of oil shale and tar sand.  It is expensive to extract the petroleum from these sources but it can be and is being done.

 It is well known that we should be ashamed of using the sea as a dumping ground for our garbage and the practice in the United States (and some other countries) has been stopped.  We have to now work very hard to stop using the atmosphere as a dumping ground for our gaseous garbage.  I repeat:  There currently as room for the development of all forms of alternate fuel technology.  Simple economics will dictate which non-polluting fuel will become prominent in the future.  It is time that we stop expending effort to dissuade consideration of any form of alternate fuel but rather work cooperatively to develop any and every opportunity for clean alternate fuels.  Economics will determine which of the many will be the most successful in the future.

Sincerely yours,

Paul Heaney, President

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