New West: voice of the Rocky Mountains

Guest Column: GOING HOG WILD ON CORN?
On Ethanol: Conservation Should Precede Biofuels Mania

By Tom DeLuca, Guest Writer, 2-28-07


Montanans by nature are not the type to rush into an untested
activity or fad. However, when it comes to energy, the whole
country is in a frenzied search for alternative fuel sources. While
this nation absolutely requires alternatives to fossil fuels, we
first need to learn to conserve fuel; and second, thoroughly
evaluate the sustainability of any proposed alternatives.

In the recent State-of-the-Union address, President George W. Bush
advocatedreducing US gasoline consumption by 20 percent in 10
years: "Twenty in Ten". This is a goal that could easily be
attained through increased fuel economy standards. However, the
Bush Administration instead chose to focus on biofuel development to
displace 15 percent (or 35 billion gallons) of our unchecked
petroleum consumption. Unfortunately, the nation currently produces
only a fraction of this much biofuel and environmental concerns are
not being considered. Since Montana is poised to play a major role
in biofuel development, we must take a good look before we leap.

To date the only significant biofuel infrastructure in the US is
corn grain ethanol. In 2006 we produced over five billion gallons
of ethanol (less than 3 percent of transportation fuel demand) from
corn produced on 9 million acres of prime farm land. That is a lot
of corn, but not much fuel.

Even if every single acre of corn in the US were put into ethanol
production it would only satisfy 14 percent of our projected fuel
consumption.

There are a lot of other reasons to resist the lure of grain ethanol
as a biofuel, here are just a few: (1) It takes one gallon of
fossil fuel to produce 1.3 gallons of grain ethanol (not much gain);
(2) Corn grain ethanol production promotes soil erosion (20 pounds
of soil lost per gallon of ethanol); (3) The amount of corn required
to fill one 25 gallon tank of gas could feed an person for a year;
(4) Corn is an important export to developing countries, diversion
to ethanol production may strain our capacity to supply these
countries; (5) Ethanol cannot be transported by pipeline; (6)
Ethanol plants demand large volumes of water and generate waste
water.

The other major biofuel slated for development is cellulosic ethanol
which is produced from logging residues and biomass crops.
Cellulosic ethanol has a positive energy balance (about 5:1 units of
ethanol per unit of fossil fuel), stores carbon, and can be produced
from crops that actually protect soils. Unfortunately, cellulosic
ethanol is not yet commercially available, thus the nation must go
from zero to 25 billion gallons cellulosic ethanol in ten years.

Cellulosic ethanol requires a lot of biomass and thus a lot of land.
It would take approximately 306 million tons of cellulosic biomass
to produce 25 billion gallons of ethanol.

If Montana supplied just 10 percent of this biomass from logging
residues or grasses, then 3 - 6 million acres of land in the state
would be employed in annual biofuel production. Interesting idea.
However, only about 400,000 acres of timbered lands are currently
harvested each year in the whole Rocky Mountain West. Furthermore,
biomass can only be hauled about 50 miles economically, thus grass
crops in Scobey or logging residues in Yaak may be an unrealistic
endeavor.

The environmental impacts of cellulosic ethanol producing plants are
unknown. Some potential impacts include: (1) Ethanol plants require
about four gallons of water per gallon of ethanol produced (a lot of
water in a dry state); (2) The use of crop or logging residues
denies soils of carbon and nutrients; (3) Ethanol plants require a
constant flow of biomass (will fuel demand drive timber harvest?).

Biofuels certainly hold an important a place in our country's fuel
mix. Yet in a nation that insists on driving large vehicles that
average less than 21 miles per gallon, the production of grain
ethanol at the expense of soil resources and in the face of
increasing global populations is, at best, irresponsible.

Cellulosic ethanol has a bright future, but source volumes and
impacts must be scrutinized. As a society, it is our responsibility
to learn to conserve fuel before we are entitled to the consumption
of soil degrading fuels produced from food of fiber resources.

EDITOR'S NOTE: As an ecologist for The Wilderness Society, Mr.
DeLuca specializes in issues of forest ecology, land resources, and
environmental sustainability.