Comments for Advanced Biofuels and Climate Change Information Center

Comment on The 15 Percent Solution by Richard Boston

Richard Boston — Mon, 05 May 2008 13:50:41 +0000

Opening the Alaskan Wilderness to more oil drilling is not the answer when capacity is constrained by the lack of refineries. Sitting down with our OPEC friends is a more direct answer to the world’s current energy problems.

It is more than a coincidence that refinery capacity has not been increased significantly for many years, along with regular constraints by OPEC to keep fuel prices artificially high. These conspiring forces are very well explained in the very humorous but factual book by Greg Palast entitled “Armed Madness”. This is a “must read” but it get you excited no matter what side of the political aisle that you live. It is strong enough treatise with enough facts to make you change aisles.

Comment on The 15 Percent Solution by pwintersatbiodotorg

pwintersatbiodotorg — Sun, 27 Apr 2008 22:41:58 +0000

Austin American-Statesman reporter Jason Embry has an interesting take on the announcements by Perry and Hutchison at http://www.statesman.com/blogs/content/shared-blogs/washington/washington/entries/2008/04/26/is_perry_tryin.html.

Comment on Uncontrollable Forces by The 15 Percent Solution « Advanced Biofuels and Climate Change Information Center

Sun, 27 Apr 2008 20:18:21 +0000

[...] Uncontrollable Forces [...]

Comment on TIME Magazine’s Journalism Scam by Alex Cameron

Alex Cameron — Thu, 17 Apr 2008 05:30:25 +0000

It is my hope that people will start pulling their heads out of the sand and recognize that mainstream media is owned by corporations with agendas. What is really important to Americans, i.e. truth and fair and balanced, unbiased reporting, is not presented to the audiences of FOX corporation, etc.
For example, Rupert Murdoch, who happens to own FOX and is a staunch supporter of G.W. and the war in Iraq, would not allow his radio stations to play the song,”give peace a chance’, by John Lennon. Now hows that for corporate control?

Comment on TIME Magazine’s Journalism Scam by George Miller

George Miller — Mon, 14 Apr 2008 17:49:21 +0000

For a nice contrast, see the April 14 cover story in Newsweek. It recaps the presidential candidates’ positions on the environment, and recognizes the importance that environmental issues now have among voters.

Time magazine gave itself a big black eye.

Comment on TIME Magazine’s Journalism Scam by pwintersatbiodotorg

pwintersatbiodotorg — Thu, 10 Apr 2008 19:08:46 +0000

Also check out the 25 x ‘25 Coalition’s response to the TIME Magazine article, http://www.25×25.org/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=402&Itemid=57

Comment on Is the Debate on Land Use Over? by Jack Huttner

Jack Huttner — Mon, 31 Mar 2008 13:41:52 +0000

At the Biofuels Conference in Brussels on 3/12/08, Andre Faaij of the Copernicus Institute of the University at Utrecht made the following observation. “25 million hectares are in biofuels production; 5,000 million are in food production.” If this statistic is correct, then it provides an interesting context for the land use impact controversy, i.e., it is a distant concern. That is not to mean it is trivial, just that it assumes one future scenario. We should approach the debate with the knowledge that we do have time and do have the means to manage the unfolding future to achieve a sustainable outcome. As long as we are open and honest in our dialog.

Comment on Indirect Land Use Thoughts by nicoleatbio

nicoleatbio — Fri, 21 Mar 2008 00:06:24 +0000

Hi Aaron,

Thanks for dropping in and writing. There is most definitely room for criticism on our blog.

I did want to address just one of the issues in your post — BIO’s relationship with Bruce Dale. Although we did invite Bruce to post, we aren’t paying him for his efforts.

Bruce is a professor in the department of chemical engineering and materials science at Michigan State University. He is also the Editor-in-Chief of Biofpr (no relationship with BIO).

Again, we do appreciate your comments, stop in any time.

Best,

Nicole Ruediger
Editor, Bio.org

Comment on Indirect Land Use Thoughts by aaron leopold

aaron leopold — Thu, 20 Mar 2008 10:23:29 +0000

Bruce,

Even if I would not know anything about your organisation/lobby, it is extraordinarily obvious from your writing that you receive your paycheck from some sort of biased group. Please think about land use changes as they are being discussed in other forums as well- ie. rain forest destruction, small holder eviction, varied food crops to monoculture fuel crops, etc.

Your recalcitrance to predictive regulation (ie the precautionary principle which is in effect in most other developed nations and many developing countries as well, but not the USA) is many ways inadequately argued; indeed, you use irresponsible, nearly offensive reasoning for much of it. Although your job is to do otherwise, in future posts, please consider adding a more human face to your rationalization and consider that this technology is booming today due to a promise, which is now in question, that it will help and not hurt our planet. If precautionary regulation is not appropriate here, when could it be in your opinion?

I hope there is room for criticism here on your page.

-Aaron Leopold

Comment on Do Biofuels Always Bring Rainforest Destruction? by mus302

mus302 — Fri, 14 Mar 2008 20:55:24 +0000

The one thing that I never see emphasized is the fact that burning fossil fuels creates a carbon debt that will never be paid off. And as oil production shifts more towards non-conventional sources such as oil sands the debt will get racked up even quicker.

So basically this whole argument boils down to whether we should trade off long term gains for short term benefits.