Biofuels Have A Major Problem
This once-hailed climate technology has a deadly dark side.
In our fight to save the planet from a self-made climate apocalypse, biofuels seem like a no-brainer idea. By gathering combustible fuels from plants rather than ancient oil deposits, we can create a more circular carbon economy and reduce humanity’s net carbon footprint. This means there is no need for everyone to switch to fancy EVs, build new charging infrastructure, or even construct vast solar farms and new nuclear power plants vital to supplying low-carbon energy. Instead, all we need to do is simply switch the fuel source and keep everything else pretty much how it is. This could be a quick, simple, and cheap way to have a massive positive impact on the climate. But the war in Ukraine has highlighted how deadly and destructive this technology could be. So, are biofuels humanity’s climate savior or a mortal threat?
Before we dive into these dangers, we first need to know what biofuels are. In the broad sense, “biofuels” is an umbrella term for fuels such as gasoline, kerosene, diesel, and ethanol derived from biomass (plant-based material used for fuel). We currently either use algae or food crops as this biomass, though, more specifically, food crops such as wheat, maize, corn, rapeseed, canola, and soy are by far the most common sources. Once collected, this plant matter biomass is heated in an oxygen-free environment to temperatures of up to 700°C and then cooled and condensed in a process called pyrolysis. This changes the plant-based material into a crude oil analog that can then be refined into a myriad of fuels. Alternatively, the biomass can be brewed to produce ethanol.
This refining process must produce no carbon for biofuels in order to be truly carbon neutral, which can be tricky for the energy-intense pyrolysis procedure. Hence, the brewing method is by far the most common. But most of our cars, trucks, boats, trains, and planes can’t run on pure ethanol, even after modification, as their engines are optimized for gasoline. However, they can easily run using a gasoline and ethanol blend, such as E5 and E10 fuels (which have 5%, 10%, and 85% ethanol content, respectively).
Recently, the UK and several EU countries have made E10 fuel the standard across their countries. While this won’t make the millions of combustion engine cars operating within their borders carbon neutral, it will significantly reduce their overall footprint. For example, the UK is expected to reduce its carbon footprint by 750,000 tonnes thanks to a recent switch to E10 fuel, which is equivalent to taking approximately 350,000 cars off the road.
This massive carbon reduction can buy us time to develop and roll out better technologies. For example, we still don’t have cheap EVs with a long enough range to enable everyone to own one, and we are likely a good ten, maybe even twenty, years away from facilitating that. However, E10 fuels can reduce the impact of our current cars in the meantime, extending the time that combustion vehicles can be used without jeopardizing our climate goals (as presented in the Paris agreement to keep climate change below 2°C).
So biofuels could be the key to giving us the breathing room we need to get a genuinely carbon-neutral global transportation system developed, refined, and rolled out. Great! What’s the catch?
Well, they can cause food crises and enable Putin to blackmail the world into doing his bidding. Let me explain.
Ukraine used to be one of the world’s largest crop exporters. They were predicted to export around 63.7 million tonnes of grain in the 2021–22 season, but due to the Russian invasion, their trade has fallen well below that. This has caused a global food crisis as the demand for these grains has now massively outstripped supplies, causing prices to skyrocket. This is affecting even the most developed nations, as poorer families in these countries are struggling to afford to feed themselves.
Putin is using this to his advantage. He knows that the longer this war goes on, the more pressure is put on the West to buckle, drop sanctions, and buy grain from the now Russian-controlled farms of Ukraine. In effect, he is blackmailing the West to give in and rescind support for Ukraine or face a food crisis that will cripple the country’s poorest families and kneecap their economy.
So, in a world where people are literally starving, can we really use food crops as fuel with a clean conscience? Many think not.
In fact, a climate activist group called RePlanet is pressuring the UK and EU governments to put a moratorium (temporary ban) on E10 fuel; lift the band on GM crops (to boost EU crop yields), and cut meat production in half (to reduce the use of grain-intensive feed). If these actions are undertaken, the food crisis will stop, and the EU will be able to produce enough food to sustain itself. This will, in turn, help these countries’ economies recover quickly from COVID-19, as well as allow them to accrue enough funds to pay for climate technologies such as EVs, solar farms, and nuclear plants.
It seems that in the long run, E10 fuel might actually hinder our fight against climate change and play into the hands of the deplorable Putin. That sounds pretty deadly and dangerous to me.
I will leave it to you to make up your mind about RePlanet’s action plan. But one thing is certain; biofuels have significant flaws that make them as much of a threat as they are a climate-saving technology. They aren’t a get-out-of-jail-free card or a silver bullet that can stop climate change in its tracks. We must treat them with caution and care, as their misuse could spell disaster for our global geopolitical, humanitarian, and climate situations.
