Ecological Dimensions of Biofuels Conference

The Ecological Society of America is sponsoring a conference on the Ecological Dimensions of Biofuels in Washington DC on March 10. Registration for the conference closes February 21. The conference website frames the issue:
Production of fuels from plants and agricultural and forestry wastes can reduce both society’s dependence on fossil fuels and net [...]

Rethinking biofuels?

The BBC reports that the Environmental Audit Committee has called on the EU to abandon its biofuel targets “because they are damaging to the environment”.
It has become fairly clear that current ideas about biofuel production have major problems. Using crop plants like corn creates a competition between food production and fuel production. Modern [...]

Biofuels

A recent post by Joe Brewer at Celsas is called The Coming Biofuels Disaster.  In it, he points out that a recent push towards biofuels is likely to make matters worse.
There are two reasons to push for biofuels (or three, if you’re a cynic).  One is carbon - since biofuels are made from recent photosynthesis, [...]

Fuel and economics

Trust me, I don’t know what I’m talking about.
Biofuels are a really hot topic these days, especially since the Bush administration has set a goal of 35 billion gallons of “renewable an alternative fuel” by 2017. On the surface of it, renewable fuels seem like a perfect solution to the joint problems of fuel [...]