The environment and peakoil

[Tanada]

Evidence has mounted that over half the CO2 emitted through burning fossil fuels remains in the atmosphere for a millennium or longer, look up the terms Long Tail by Dr. David Archer to learn more about it. Yes decreasing the release rate will help, a little. Unfortunately it will take a few decades for the system to catch up to the CO2 we have already emitted. Even if we came to a dead stop today we would keep warming for 40 or 50 years until the system reaches equilibrium, and the longer we keep burning the longer it will be until we stop warming.

[Keith_McClary]

Most biofuels are not 'green', researchers show
This is an update on a 2007 study on the "ecobalance of numerous biofuels, including their production chains" with "more extensive data set and up-to-date methods".

Diesel from Tar Sands is "greener" than (Swiss) petrol in the GW and Land Use columns and much "greener" than corn ethanol in most (the colours represent wide ranges, one would need to look at the full report to make an exact comparison).

Disclaimer: As an Alberta resident I own 0.00005 % of the tar.

(I couldn't find a thread where this was discussed - perhaps our Mergerators can)

[dohboi]

I'm actually surprised that almost all of the biofuels were found to have significantly less effect on gw than gasoline or diesel do.

But not many come up smelling like roses. East African jatropa hedge was a new one on me, and shows fewer downsides than most. US soy also comes out better than I had thought it would.

I had heard that methane from wood chips, manure and sewage were some of the better sources, and this confirms that--I do wonder what might not be included in the calculation--does the power needed to chip the wood not get figured in since lot's of wood is getting chipped anyway.

Unfortunately, all available woodchips in my area are desperately needed (imvho) for use in developing beds for urban farming. Food (again, imvho) should always take precedence over fuel.