Counting Carbs

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Counting Carbs

November 19, 2007

Reporting by Brita Belli

_http://www.emagazine.com/view/?3977_ (http://www.emagazine.com/view/?3977)

 

“A market for low-carbon fuels can produce a rare convergence of business,

agricultural and environmental interests that, if pursued wisely, could

represent a ‘win-win-win’ opportunity,†promises the report Biofuels: An

Important

Part of a Low-Carbon Diet, released this month by the Union of Concerned

Scientists. But the report says to achieve that goal, we need to “count

carbsâ€

accurately, measuring global warming emissions over a transportation fuel’s

entire lifetime.

That means the accounting must include how various plants used for biofuels

capture carbon dioxide (CO2). It also needs to incorporate the effect of

farming practices—the energy consumed, and pollution emitted by farm

equipment,

fertilizers and tilling practices. Following UCS’s “carb counting†method

(taking extraction and related practices into account), liquid coal is shown to

increase emissions over gasoline by more than 80 percent. In contrast,

cellulosic ethanol—made from woody plants instead of the corn used in

conventional

ethanol—may be able to reduce emissions more than 85 percent.

“Our current system provides no incentive for fuel providers to accurately

measure or minimize their carbon emissions,†the report says. “In contrast,

a

system that requires providers to account for their emissions would spur

increased research into life cycle analysis and provide a public process for

evaluating the benefits and limitations of different analytical methods.â€

Source: _Union of Concerned Scientists Biofuels Report_

(http://www.ucsusa.org/clean_vehicles/vehicles_health/biofuels-low-carbon-diet.h\

tml)

_http://www.ucsusa.org/clean_vehicles/vehicles_health/biofuels-low-carbon-diet

..html_

(http://www.ucsusa.org/clean_vehicles/vehicles_health/biofuels-low-carbon-diet.h\

tml)