While scrolling through news accounts of the recent boom in the agrochemicals industry -- yes, that's how I spend my days -- I came across an interesting take on biofuels and phosphate, a key element of soil fertility.
The article, from Investors Business Daily, takes a standard rah-rah position on what it deems a "heyday in the heartland." The journal wants to make sure its readers know there's plenty of cash to be made investing in the companies catering to the great boom in industrial agriculture.
With corn and soy prices both at or near record highs, the article tries to handicap which crop farmers will plant more of in the coming growing season. Impossible to tell, it concludes. Nevertheless:
Fertilizer producers benefit either way. Corn demands more fertilizer than soy or wheat. But price competition among the grains, stoked largely by federal supports for ethanol production, has bled generously into fertilizer markets.
That's boilerplate. Anyone who's checked out the stock chart of Mosaic -- the fertilizer giant, two-thirds owned by agribiz behemoth Cargill, recently profiled here -- knows that the fertilizer industry has been essentially printing money.
But the Investors Business Daily article really started to pique my interest when it turned to phosphorus -- the "P" of NPK (nitrogen, phosphorus, potassium), the main macronutrients required for plant growth.
Of course, industrial agriculture makes a fetish of NPK. Like a '70s-era faddist who thinks you can maintain health while eating whatever junk food you want, so long as you take a vitamin pill containing "100 percent RDA" of every vitamin, industrial agriculture enthusiasts insist that by isolating NPK and dumping it into soil, you've solved the problem of soil fertility.
NPK mentality neglects micronutrients and forgets that healthy soil relies on teeming populations of microorganisms, whose function we don't fully understand. Lashing the soil with industrial fertilizer doesn't renew life in the soil; it squeezes life out. Someday, I predict, NPK dogma will crumble and seem as absurd as relying on a bowl of Total for nourishment.
For now, though, we live in an NPK world -- and biofuel production relies absolutely on mined and synthesized macronutrients.
OK, back to the Investors Business Daily article and phosphorus. Toward the bottom, we find this:
Phosphates shot to $300 and then to $400 a ton last year, and are now on track to break $800 ... Out of 50 billion tons of potential phosphate rock reserves worldwide, the USGS estimates the U.S. holds only 3.4 billion tons. Morocco owns 21 billion, China has 13 billion. All are keen to closely manage the resource.
Wow, so our big "renewable," domestic energy source relies heavily on a mined substance, of which we own a tiny reserve. The biggest store lies in an Islamic nation, representing a religious group our government has antagonized. The second-biggest store is lodged within the borders of a budding geopolitical rival. Hmm.
Then we get this:
Global consumption of phosphate rock is projected to grow 2.3% a year. But that rate of growth could increase due to demand for biomass used in biofuel production.
Farmers are harvesting larger shares of the plant rubble left after harvest -- a natural source of potassium and phosphate when turned back into the soil. The loss of that natural fertilizer means more P & K demand.
What the article is saying is this: If we transition to cellulosic ethanol -- which utilizes whole plants, not just the seeds, as in conventional ethanol -- we'll need even more phosphorus. And demand for this finite resource, located mainly in geopolitically troublesome places, will grower at an even faster clip than the current 2.3 percent compounded annual rate.
I should note here that phosphate mining, as I laid out in the above-linked post on Mosaic, is environmentally ruinous. It leaves behind radioactive waste.
Note further that cellulosic ethanol -- perpetually five years away from commercial viability -- counts in some quarters as biofuel's great green hope.
To me, all of this exposes the folly of relying on industrial agriculture to create a "clean" fuel source for transportation. To avoid the political and ecological troubles of mining, we need to nudge agriculture back toward the nutrient loop -- recycling animal and vegetable waste back into the soil and building true and sustainable soil fertility. I believe we can "feed the world" that way; we surely can't feed the world (or its cars) for long using an agriculture style that relies on finite mined products.
As for biofuels, I don't see how they fit in to a return to sustainable agriculture. Sustainably fertilized land can feed our bellies, but not our cars, too. We surely can't squeeze enough excess grain out of sustainably managed land to make a dent in the fuel demands of a country with a 210 million-plus auto fleet.
Rather than promote biofuels, environmentalists should be pushing for alternatives to the internal-combustion engine -- and for a return to sustainable agriculture.
Here's a talking point. The Global Subsidies Initiative reckons that the U.S. government supports biofuels to the tune of about $13 billion per year between now and 2012. Amtrak gets about $1.2 billion per year. Let's defund biofuels and invest the proceeds in a functional national rail system. No?
Do diesel-based farmers dream of electric tractors?
Will Africa’s farmland become a ‘resource curse’?
Comments
View as Flat
LGT Posted 9:48 am
13 Feb 2008
So what's the problem?
Inordinate prevalence of psychopathology caused by exponential growth economy: money fetishism, industrialism, militarism, atomic lifestyles, consumerism, throwaway culture, dysfunctional societies ...
from "Dynamics of Collapse"
http://edro.wordpress.com/collapsing-cities/
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Bart Anderson Posted 10:49 am
13 Feb 2008
Here's a letter I wrote for our local chapter of Master Gardeners about it:
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Dear Master Gardeners,
Some MGs might find interesting an article that I've just co-written on "Peak Phosphorus" and what it means for agriculture.
energybulletin.net/33164.html
Also at The Oil Drum (which has 102 comments)
www.theoildrum.com/node/2882
Background reading (may be easier to start with):
energybulletin.net/28720.html
As we know from our MG training, phosphorus is one of the three macro-nutrients required by plants. Farmers (both organic and non-organic) use the phosphorus from rock phosphates as fertilizer to replenish the amount used up by crops.
The main points of the article are widely accepted: Phosphates suitable for mining are limited.
Modern agriculture needs large amounts of phosphorus to raise enough food for the world population.
World demand for phosphorus has grown dramatically during the past decades and shows no sign of declining.
There is no substitute for phosphorus.
Phosphate production will probably follow a bell-shaped curve, with the most accessible deposits mined first.
We currently waste a heck of a lot of phosphorus. What is new and controversial in the article is the assertion that we have passed the point of "Peak phosphorus" - the point of maximum production and consumption of phosphorus. This would mean that over time phosphorus will become more difficult to obtain, and more expensive. This would be a major problem for society, since without sufficient supplies of phosphorus we will have difficulty feeding ourselves.
My co-author Patrick Déry came to the conclusion that we have passed peak phosphorus by running statistical analyses on data from the US Geological Survey (estimates of phosphate reserves and production). The specific dates for peak phosphorus are what are controversial. The fact that we will run out of phospate deposits is not in dispute. At some point, we will inevitably face a phosphorus problem.
Bottom line for Master Gardeners: Growing food will become much more important than it is now. Our skills and knowledge will be in even greater demand.
Recycling nutrients, e.g. through composting, will become more important. Expect to hear more about schemes like "urine diversion" and "humanure." .
If I remember correctly, we in Santa Clara are blessed with soils that are abundant in phosphorus. Perhaps an MG expert can verify.
Bart
Energy Bulletin
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Erik Hoffner Posted 11:58 am
13 Feb 2008
The Orion Grassroots Network: 1,100+ grassroots groups working for conservation & more
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Biodiversivist Posted 3:24 pm
13 Feb 2008
"Along with flogging Rather than flog biofuels, environmentalists [also] should be pushing for alternatives to the internal-combustion engine -- and for a return to sustainable agriculture."
Taking money away from biofuels is a form of flogging, yes?
In the end, it all comes down to biodiversity. Poison Darts--Protecting the biodiversity of our world
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314159265 Posted 7:42 pm
13 Feb 2008
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Ron Steenblik Posted 8:44 pm
13 Feb 2008
You are right that EtOH does not contain phosphorus. The phosphorus present in the corn kernels ends up therefore in the major co-product of ethanol production, dried distillers grains (DDG) or distillers grains with solubles (DGS).
This article from the Iowa State University Extension Service notes that one researcher has reported that feeding 20 or 40 percent DGS to feedlot cattle increased the amount of phosphorus in their manure by 60 and 120 percent, respectively, compared with feeding the cattle no DGS.
The article itself concludes, however:
In our example diets, feeding a 40 percent DDGS diet, compared [with] a diet with no DDGS, increased manure phosphorus by 42 percent.
Don't ask me to explain the discrepancy between the two results.
P.S.: Great article, Tom!
These are only my personal opinions.
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justlou Posted 9:59 pm
13 Feb 2008
How can we close the nutrient cycles between farm and consumer without massive infrastructure and energy investments assuming we attempt to keep our deeply flawed systems afloat?
The more we break elemental cycles, the more we undermine ecological services, the more we have to substitute energy hungry technological services. Ironically, the economy selects for and rewards these substitute technological services while doing little to bolster the ecological services they are intended to replace. Technocracy runs our lives and leaves only bad choices as we paint our civilization further into a corner.
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amazingdrx Posted 10:28 pm
13 Feb 2008
And how chemical fertilizer burned the 20 foot deep natural prairie soil down to inert, toxic, dust bowl ground, releasing millenia of stored carbon in the process.
Go with biogas from the waste stream, manure and crop waste, along with clean, easily stored grid backup power it produces organic fertilizer and carbon rich soil amendment. Bolstering the soil ecosystem that stores the CO2 that photosynthesis removes from the atmosphere.
http://amazngdrx.blogharbor.com/blog
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amazingdrx Posted 10:36 pm
13 Feb 2008
Independence huh? Have a nice drink of ethanol and dance with that lump of clean coal Barack. Go ahead. You support them both. Hehey.
It's not funny, someone ought to sit our next prez down and talk this all over with him, before he makes too many promises that no one should keep. To coal, nuke, and ethanol lobbies.
http://amazngdrx.blogharbor.com/blog
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Tom Philpott Posted 10:52 pm
13 Feb 2008
Biod, I meant "flog" as in "mindlessly promote" (hi, Vinod). But I can see how it was unclear, so I changed it simply to "promote."
Also, Ron Steenblik emailed me the link" to Global Subsidies Initiative's new reckoning on U.S. biofuel goodies. (I can never find the update; thanks, Ron.) The GSI had previously been figuring annual support at $5.5 billion to $7.3 billion. The new report states: "Under existing policies, the biofuels industry will, in aggregate, benefit from support worth over $ 92 billion within the 2006-2012 time frame." That comes out to about $13 billion/year, so I revised the post to reflect that. The new number makes sense to me, given the "renewable fuel" mandate in the Energy Act. If we reach 15 billion gallons of corn ethanol, that will be $7.5 billion just from the $0.51/gallon blender's credit -- one of many goodies in place for the industry.
Now to the question of phosphate in ethanol that remains in distillers grains. Yes, distillers grains are fed to cows (and hogs and chickens, too, in smaller doses), and the manure is often cycled onto farm fields near feedlots. But feedlot production tends to be concentrated geographically, and manure tends to be overapplied. So there is some recycling, but I'd bet a lot of the phosphate from distillers grain-manure ends up running off and ultimately, as Erik Hoffner reminds us, festering in the Gulf of Mexico, doing no one any good.
Victual Reality
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GreyFlcn Posted 11:22 pm
13 Feb 2008
Well, aside from the negative side effect of those plants offgassing N2O.
http://greyfalcon.net/n2o.png
The other catch is that apparently as carbon dioxide levels go up, plants are actually less able to use nitrogen that isn't ammonia based.
http://www.news.ucdavis.edu/search/news_detail.lasso?id=5 ...
Which essentially means we're going to be more dependent on ammonia fertilizers than ever before.
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enki Posted 11:29 pm
13 Feb 2008
I do not like factory farming of animals because I feel animals are sentient beings and deserve to live normal lives even if we do eventually kill them for food. On the other hand the world is what it is and I think that manure can be used more effectively as a resource.
Manure can be processed in a biodigester to produce methane. This methane can be used as fuel to produce electricity. The remaining solids can be used as fertilizer or further processed as described in the paper above.
I grew up in farming and we used manure exclusively for fertilizer and produced great vegetables year after year.
Mike Johnston
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spaceshaper Posted 11:49 pm
13 Feb 2008
The true meaning of life is to plant trees, under whose shade you do not expect to sit.
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justlou Posted 1:21 am
14 Feb 2008
But, we need to remind ourselves that feeding grains to cattle is one of the least efficient energy conversions we can make in the food chain and one of the costliest in terms of greenhouse gas emissions. Without citing the source, I read in the press recently that if US consumers would reduce our consumption of meat by just 20% it would be equivalent to all of us switching from sedans like the Camry to the Prius. That is significant, especially considering that the average consumer of meats in the US eats far more than is needed to satisfy dietary requirements. Ironically, putting more corn ethanol in our cars may force this change among many as meat prices escalate. Somebody will probably figure out some way of counting this as an offset and profiting from it.
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GreyFlcn Posted 1:47 am
14 Feb 2008
Who Needs Meat When You've Got Bugs?
http://www.alternet.org/environment/76948/
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GreyFlcn Posted 1:50 am
14 Feb 2008
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Pompey Road Posted 3:58 am
14 Feb 2008
The main problem is damage to structures due to blasting. The regulations are written so lose you can deflect the ground in a sideways motion up to 1/2 half an inch and still be within the federal guidelines.
The whold structure shakes when they blast close and it feels like a small earthquake. Pictures fall from the wall or dishes. Nerve racking and dusty, sometimes clouds of dust raise up from the explosion. Yes they blast right in communities, I live in a hollow 3 miles long and they are going right up the valley following the coal seam.
So the fuel and fertilizer consumed in strip mining is another factor to consider aside from MTR and Co2 emmisions.
Back on topic I feel the sugar cane used in South America is a better plant for ethanol. It has 7 times the btu of corn and is more comparable to petrol. The kind of sugar cane they grow will grow up to the midpoint of the country if not farther.
The use of corn a food and cattle feed staple has caused the cost of these products to offset any future savings derived from alcohol fuel. At this point there is none, the energy it takes to make a gallon of fuel offsets the savings and it gets worse when you factor in how much more corn fuel it takes to equate to a gallon of gas. You do not get the same milage with corn fuel. One of the countries in South America went to sugar cane fuel in 73 and they are energy independent right now.
I know with our current appetite for fuel we can not expect to reach that goal with sugar cane but it still seems a more logical fuel sorce than corn. We have a lot of southern states we need to wean of growing tobacco so cane would make a good replacement cash crop.
The eons of time and nature was good to us down here. It was not until we become civilized that destroying our habitat become fathomable or fashionable.
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sfj4076 Posted 5:54 am
14 Feb 2008
However, I have been delighted to learn that at least some of the new "cellulosic" bio-energy crops are not substantially fertilizer intensive. In fact, beyond weed control on initial establishment of the crop, some such as giant miscanthus do not require any fertilizer inputs, and are remarkably efficient at nutrient recycling.
Richard Heinberg's third axiom of sustainability is that "To be sustainable, the use of renewable resources must proceed at a rate that is less than or equal to the rate of natural replenishment."
If sustainability is the goal, this is something that all bio-fuels suppliers must aspire to achieve.
This is difficult/impossible to achieve with most current approaches to conventional biofuels, but some of the new second-generation approaches might just work.
I am developing a synthetic fuels plant in Illinois, and as we gradually transition from coal feedstocks to renewables, and if waste sources are not available, the next best bet is cellulosic bio-energy sources. We are applying a thermochemical conversion process, so we do not need any of the nutrient components of the plant. We are looking for BTUs, so low nutritional content in the grasses is not an issue.
Dr. Stephen Long and the University of Illinois at Champaign Urbana is doing the world-leading research on Miscanthus Giganteus. It is a fairly spectacular crop. Extremely high yields, noninvasive, and it recycles the nutrients back down into the rhizome prior to harvest, making it extremely efficient in retaining and efficiently recycling soil nutrients. It is planted once, and then grows for 30 years or more, meaning you don't have to till the soil, and you actually keep the crop in the fields until late winter, providing a much higher level of ecosystem services for wildlife until harvest.
I have personally focused on nitrogen up to now (it requires no nitrogen fertilizers), so I don't know specifically about phosphorus, but my present understanding is that this cellulosic bio-energy crop requires no fertilizer inputs.
You can learn more about it here: http://miscanthus.uiuc.edu/
So I guess what I am saying is that phosphorus is not necessarily the Achilles heel of cellulosic bio-energy. Some approaches to it? Probably. But not all.
As economics allow, and we make the gradual transition over to efficient second-generation biofuels, I believe that with proper research and implementation there is indeed a way to produce substantial quantities of transportation fuels efficiently and cleanly. We are doing it at our plant in Illinois.
I am not necessarily arguing a technofix here. Can we match our current consumption rates sustainably? Probably not. So efficiency and reducing our society's energy intensity will be a critical parallel initiative, but if we put our energy to it and work together, we can still meet the economy's needs without compromising the environment.
Best Regards,
Stephen Johnson
President
American Clean Coal Fuels
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LGT Posted 11:58 pm
25 Feb 2008
http://edro.wordpress.com/2008/02/05/drying-aquifers-sink ...
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