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   used2ski | Aug 18, 2007 | Reply

   I haven’t seen the Science article, but it seems like an overly simple and irresponsible conclusion to assume and assert that simply “switching from fossil fuels to biofuels will add more carbon to the atmosphere, destroy primary forests, and destroy economies.” True, it is possible for all of those things to happen if we clear cut massive quantities of rainforest, but there are other, more responsible ways of achieving cleaner biofuels. What I see as having the most promise is algal biodiesel for meeting this goal. With much higher yields per acre that terrestrial crops, algae farms would require far less land than traditional crops and can be built in marginal lands where little else grows. Further, great promise has been shown in cultivating algae for biodiesel use by bubbling the exhaust gases of power plants through the algae’s growth medium. Not only does this help cultivate the algae it cleans the power plant’s exhaust. In short, there are many great biofuel technologies that can, and likely will, solve our energy problems, let’s not make large sweeping statements about a large and diverse biofuels field based on the requirements of one or two particular niches and their bad practices.

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