Biofuels threaten ecology, biodiversity, food supply, warnings for international trade and prices-EPA draft

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1/28/11, "Draft EPA report: Biofuels threaten habitat, water quality," The Hill, Ben Geman

"A draft Environmental Protection Agency report concludes that expanded production of renewable fuels like ethanol and biodiesel carries an array of

• ecological risks in the U.S. and other nations, and calls for improved policies to

mitigate these harms.

The report is required under a 2007 energy law that vastly increased the national biofuels mandate but also called for new analysis of the ecological effects of expanded development.

The draft finds, for instance, that growing biofuels crops can affect water quality through erosion and fertilizer runoff, among other factors.

The report comes as ethanol is already under attack from some environmentalists, and lawmakers seeking to strip tax subsidies. But renewable fuels are valued as a way to displace oil reliance and boost rural economies, and retain powerful political support on Capitol Hill.

Elsewhere, the report addresses effects on wildlife and habitat. “Increased cultivation of feedstocks for biofuel could significantly affect biodiversity through habitat alteration when uncultivated land is put into production,” it states, also noting risks of plant and animal exposure to pesticides,

• nutrient runoff into waters and other effects.

“Feedstocks” refers to the source of the fuels, such as corn, soybeans, grasses and wood materials.

Corn is the dominant source for U.S. ethanol today. But the 2007 law, which mandates an expansion of U.S. biofuel use to reach 36 billion gallons annually in 2022, caps corn ethanol at 15 billion gallons, while the balance must come from “advanced” biofuels made from sources like agricultural residues and perennial grasses.

EPA posted the draft report online Friday, but the document cautions that it’s for review purposes

• and “does not constitute Agency policy.”

The agency plans to produce a final report for Congress after peer review (the 2007 law mandates triennial reports on the environmental impacts of increased biofuels production and use).

The report reiterates EPA’s conclusion that meeting the biofuels mandate in the 2007 law will lead to a net reduction in carbon dioxide emissions compared to petroleum-based fuels.
It also explores the international effects of expanded biofuels development, noting that increased U.S. production and use

• will affect trade patterns and prices.

The report states: “This will result in land use change and effects on air quality, water quality, and biodiversity. Direct and indirect land use changes will likely occur across the globe as the U.S. and other biofuel feedstock-producing countries

• alter their agricultural sectors

to allow for greater biofuel production. Many locations where biofuel production is growing,

• such as Indonesia, Malaysia, and Brazil, are also areas of high biodiversity value.

Depending where biofuel feedstock production occurs, and to what extent the level of production increases with time, impacts to biodiversity could be significant.”

The report notes that most aspects of the biofuels supply chain are already “regulated, subject to limitations, or mitigated through various approaches.”

But it nonetheless calls for further steps to address harms, such as improved federal agency efforts to develop and implement “best management” and conservation practices, and

• international scientific cooperation

to identify and implement sustainable techniques."
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Commenter to article on Lucianne.com

"Reply 10 - Posted by: NorCal Foothill Rich, 1/28/2011 1:47:03 PM (No. 7308558)

"That's the government for you: mandate something without doing the research beforehand, then make the taxpayers foot the bill for their outrageous incompetence.

Here in CA, the certified fraud, idiots in the California Air Resources Board (CARB) mandated that a 'new' diesel fuel be required for vehicles here in the 1980s. This 'fuel' ruined or damaged thousands of engines, costing the state millions of dollars in reimbursement costs to the owners of these vehicles. Did anybody get fired or suggest that CARB be shut down.....hell no! The same draconian bunch of idiots then decided to 'tinker' with the gasoline and make it 'cleaner and more efficient' and mandated that a compound named MTBE be used in gasoline. It was claimed that this new gas would burn 5% cleaner, but the trouble is, it caused gas mileage to go down 10-15%! But the kicker is that MTBE started leaking into aquifers and began poisoning water wells statewide! This cost the state untold millions more but the real tragedy is that this agency still continues along, making one stupid mandate after another.

If it was up to me, these people would all be in jail for their transgressions against the People! The Federal EPA should be shut down as a matter of public interest."

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