Grist | Topics | 48 Results

RESULTS		Results 1 – 25 of 48
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Headline	Author	Published	Section
How biofuels are like drugs Not all biofuels are the same; we can do biofuel well or poorly	Vinod Khosla	17 Jun 2008	Gristmill
To my surprise, recently I found myself the subject of an editorial by the Wall Street Journal which characterized me as a strong advocate of subsidies for food-based ethanol, and as a recipient of 'federal dole' who ought to 'take a vow of embarrassed silence.' I have not advocated subsidies for food-based ethanol. In fact, I strongly believe any nascent technology that cannot exist without subsidies beyond an introductory period will not gain market penetrati ...
Topics: biofuels, cellulosic ethanol, energy, ethanol (all these topics)

Biofictions Wall Street Journal editorial mischaracterizes both my position and biofuels	Vinod Khosla	22 May 2008	Gristmill
To my surprise, on Tuesday I found myself cited by the Wall Street Journal as a strong advocate of subsidies for food-based ethanol, and as a recipient of 'federal dole' who ought to 'take a vow of embarrassed silence.' While I appreciate the Journal's foray into fiction writing (and I'd love to discuss my status on the dole with my accountant, who recently filed my taxes), I would like to clarify a few facts and offer a more rounded view of biofuels and ethanol ...
Topics: ag policy, agriculture, biofuels, cellulosic ethanol, energy (all these topics)

Weed Wack Biofuel-bound grasses are often invasive species		21 May 2008	News
Posted at 8:30 AM on 21 May 2008 As biofuel sources go, weeds and grasses are looked on with more favor than land-ravaging, food-price-raising corn and palm. But there's no such thing as a free lunch-in-your-tank, says a paper presented by green groups at a United Nations meeting Tuesday: "Some of the most commonly recommended species for biofuels production are also major invasive alien species." The quick growth and need for ...
Topics: biofuels, cellulosic ethanol, energy, news (all these topics)

BusinessWeek drinks the ethanol-spiked Kool-Aid The newsweekly uncorks a whopper in defense of crop-based fuels	Tom Philpott	06 May 2008	Gristmill
The massive biofuel mandate embedded in the 2007 Energy Act, signed amid much bipartisan hoopla, is coming under heavy fire.The Wall Street Journal reported recently that two dozen Republican senators have formally asked the EPA to lower the mandate in response to heightened food prices (a power granted to the agency in the Energy Act). Perhaps not coincidentally, the food-processing giants now competing with biofuel plants for corn -- think Kraft and Kellogg -- have b ...
Topics: ag policy, agriculture, biofuels, cellulosic ethanol, energy (all these topics)

I read a letter to the editor, the other day, I opened, and read it, it said they was suckas	David Roberts	04 May 2008	Gristmill
A trio of fine letters in The NYT today, taking Richard Cohen to task for his reflexive praise of sugar-cane ethanol.
Topics: agriculture, biofuels, cellulosic ethanol, energy (all these topics)

Colbert on ethanol and the energy war	David Roberts	29 Apr 2008	Gristmill

Topics: cellulosic ethanol, climate, energy, ethanol, funnies, oil, TV (all these topics)

There's a hole in my energy bill Biofuels loophole in 2007 energy bill grandfathers in pollution	Glenn Hurowitz	28 Apr 2008	Gristmill
A recent report ($ub. req'd) by Greenwire's Ben Geman revealed a massive loophole in the 2007 energy bill that renders meaningless most of the climate safeguards for corn ethanol that Democrats have touted. The loophole exempts any ethanol refineries that have already been built or were under construction at the time the bill passed from meeting the global warming requirements. Those facilities have a combined production capacity of 13.7 billion gallons, just shy ...
Topics: biofuels, cellulosic ethanol, energy, legislation, politics (all these topics)

What the world needs now Three million more acres of industrial corn?	Tom Philpott	18 Apr 2008	Gristmill
According to USDA projections, U.S. farmers will plant 86 million acres of corn in 2008. At any time in the last 50 years, that would be plenty. Since 1958, USDA figures tell us, farmers have broken 80 million acres only ten times. In fact, if farmers meet expectations, 2008 will rank as the second-largest planting of corn since 1949. If you own shares in a fertilizer company -- corn being an extremely fertilizer-intensive crop -- you're celebrating. Indeed, shares o ...
Topics: agriculture, Big Ag, cellulosic ethanol, Department of Agriculture, industrial ag (all these topics)

ANWR of the heartland? Why plowing up Conservation Reserve Program land won't solve the food crisis	Tom Philpott	11 Apr 2008	Gristmill
Uh oh. The New York Times reports that 'thousands of farmers are taking their fields out of the government's biggest conservation program, which pays them not to cultivate.' Rather then let the ground lie fallow, they're planting it with corn, soy, and wheat -- the price of each of which stands near or above all-time highs. 'Last fall, they took back as many acres as are in Rhode Island and Delaware combined,' The Times reports. And there's serious pressure to bring mo ...
Topics: agriculture, Big Ag, business, cellulosic ethanol, economy, food, industrial ag (all these topics)

Lieberman-Warner is a mess Climate Security Act could be worse than the 2007 energy bill	biodiversivist	08 Apr 2008	Gristmill
Last year the Energy Independence and Security Act put into place mandates that will in all likelihood increase GHG emissions. The Lieberman-Warner act (critiqued by Sean here) could turn out to be just as ineffective. From an analysis [PDF] of the Energy Independence and Security Act by the NRDC: ... the requirement for renewable fuels, such as ethanol and biogasoline, will grow from 9 billion gallons in 2008 to 36 billion gallons in 2022. So far, so good, ...
Topics: biofuels, cellulosic ethanol, climate, energy, greenhouse-gas emissions, legislation, NRDC, politics (all these topics)

Up, up, and away: corn edition Corn hits a new record -- $6 a bushel	Joseph Romm	06 Apr 2008	Gristmill
At the end of February, I blogged on a Fortune article that had the subhead 'The ethanol boom is running out of gas as corn prices spike.' That article noted: Spurred by an ethanol plant construction binge, corn prices have gone stratospheric, soaring from below $2 a bushel in 2006 to over $5.25 a bushel today. As a result, it's become difficult for ethanol plants to make a healthy profit, even with oil at $100 a barrel. Just six weeks later, we have an AP article ...
Topics: agriculture, biofuels, cellulosic ethanol, Department of Agriculture, energy, food (all these topics)

Against the grain: What are they thinking? Part 2 Time bashes grain ethanol	Joseph Romm	03 Apr 2008	Gristmill
This post is by ClimateProgress guest blogger Bill Becker, executive director of the Presidential Climate Action Project. ----- All that glitters is not gold. And all that grows is not green. That is the belated realization about grain ethanol -- in fact, about any ethanol whose feedstock is grown on cropland. Joe Romm has done a good job posting on this issue, including his report on the recent studies featured in Science magazine. I'd like to weigh in with a few add ...
Topics: agriculture, cellulosic ethanol, deforestation, Department of Agriculture, energy, ethanol, magazines, renewable energy (all these topics)

NRDC vs. me Blogger Nathanael Greene takes on Philpott re: biofuels	Tom Philpott	31 Mar 2008	Gristmill
The Natural Resources Defense Council evidently remains pretty sanguine about biofuels as a "solution to energy dependence and global warming."Over on the group's Switchboard blog, senior policy analyst Nathanael Greene recently took exception to some unkind words of mine on cellulosic ethanol. I responded in the comments section. I hope a robust debate follows.
Topics: biofuels, cellulosic ethanol, energy, NRDC (all these topics)

Hurtling down a bridge to nowhere Another study says cellulosic ethanol ain't happening	Tom Philpott	20 Mar 2008	Gristmill
As the case against corn-based ethanol firms up, we're hearing a drumbeat of claims that corn is only a bridge to a bright cellulosic future. In this vision, ethanol won't be distilled from corn grown on prime land but rather from stuff no one wants: plant 'wastes,' wood pulp, prairie grass, pocket lint. The latest such claim comes from Nobel Laureate Steven Chu, director of the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory at Cal-Berkeley. Flush with a $500 million grant fr ...
Topics: agriculture, biofuels, cellulosic ethanol, energy (all these topics)

Misplaced priorities Thoughts from a cellulosic ethanol agnostic	biodiversivist	17 Mar 2008	Gristmill
Photo: rsgranne and danipt via Flickr. 'If America can win a race to the moon, we can win a race for a battery,' Bill Clinton said last night on TV, stumping for Hillary. He also pointed out that if our cars got 100 mpg, the rise in fuel prices -- which is inevitable -- will have a much smaller economic impact. In short, he thinks America needs to get its shit together and start leading the world again with innovation.Easier said than done, in my opinion. We se ...
Topics: biofuels, cellulosic ethanol, energy (all these topics)

Monday linkfest	David Roberts	10 Mar 2008	Gristmill
My browser's getting crowded. Time for a link dump! Yes! magazine has an entire issue devoted to climate change. There's tons to see, with good pieces from Bill McKibben and Peter Barnes, but I particularly liked this hopeful rundown of solutions. It's odd that I love reading about solutions but I don't write about them much. Not sure why that is. Remember how the Bush administration spent 7.5 years battling and thwarting binding carbon emissions treaties and then sa ...
Topics: cars, cellulosic ethanol, climate, energy, ethanol, green living (all these topics)

Bush: Not a Gristmill reader President hails cellulosic ethanol as a panacea	Tom Philpott	06 Mar 2008	Gristmill
I'm offended: President Bush evidently hasn't been following my string of posts about how cellulosic ethanol probably won't ever be viable. Addressing a renewable-energy conference, the president fretted that the ethanol boom he set in motion is 'beginning to affect the price of food.' He added: 'So we got to do something about it.' And what we 'got to do,' evidently, is throw more cash at cellulosic ethanol. Here's how The New York Times summed up his statement: ...
Topics: agriculture, biofuels, cellulosic ethanol, energy, ethanol, George Bush, politics (all these topics)

Cellulosic ethanol: not likely to be viable New study from mainstream ag economists at Iowa State	Tom Philpott	03 Mar 2008	Gristmill
Cellulosic ethanol represents a beacon on the horizon -- the justification cited by wiseguys like Vinod Khosla for dropping billions per year in public cash to prop up corn ethanol production. Corn ethanol, you see, is a bridge to a bright cellulosic future. But the beacon is looking more and more like a mirage, a ghost, a specter; the bridge we're hurtling down may well lead to a chasm. A quiet consensus seems to be forming among people you'd think would know th ...
Topics: ag policy, agriculture, biofuels, cellulosic ethanol, energy, ethanol, politics (all these topics)

Biofuel blight: tastes great, less filling Alcohol refinery may enhance tourist industry	biodiversivist	03 Mar 2008	Gristmill
Tourists, bird watchers, and native cattle herders in Kenya's Tana River delta may soon have a spanking-new alcohol refinery in the middle of their wetland. Granted, the wetland will be slightly less wet because a third of its water will be diverted to cropland. Always one to look for a silver lining, I would hope that this refinery will include an air-conditioned bar where tourists and herders alike can gather for happy hour after a long, hot day of wildlife viewing ...
Topics: agriculture, biofuels, cellulosic ethanol, energy, ethanol, Richard Branson (all these topics)

No More Required Why are biofuels losing steam in Europe -- and barreling ahead in the U.S.?	Tom Philpott	21 Feb 2008	Victual Reality
The signs are cropping up -- we just need to heed them. Photo: iStockphoto "Biodiesel: No War Required," reads a bumper sticker I see more often than you might expect in North Carolina. As in other states across the nation, a lot of activist energy here has gone into creating a market for diesel fuel made from vegetable oil. Of course, it's an uphill ride, given that ...
Topics: agriculture, biofuels, cellulosic ethanol, ethanol, European Union, progress, United States (all these topics)

Biofuels and the fertilizer problem Can a 'renewable fuel' rely on mining a finite resource?	Tom Philpott	13 Feb 2008	Gristmill
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 gre ...
Topics: agriculture, biofuels, cellulosic ethanol, energy, ethanol, industrial ag, sustainable ag (all these topics)

Biomass, part III The most critical assumption on cellulosic biofuels: yields	Vinod Khosla	25 Jan 2008	Gristmill
My most critical assumption with cellulosic biofuels is on land efficiency: tons of biomass per acre, and hence gallons of fuel produced per acre, and more accurately, miles driven per acre. I believe biomass yields per acre will multiply by two to four times from today's norms. The lack of genetic optimization and research on cultural practices, harvesting, storage, and transport with would-be energy crops -- miscanthus, sorghum, switchgrass, and others -- m ...
Topics: agriculture, biofuels, cellulosic ethanol, ethanol (all these topics)

Stock analysts v. venture capitalists Tom Konrad on cellulosic electricity	Guest author	24 Jan 2008	Gristmill
The following is a guest essay by Tom Konrad, a financial analyst specializing in renewable energy and energy efficiency companies, a freelance writer, and a contributor to AltEnergyStocks.com. ----- Romm v. Khosla In a persuasive series of articles entitled "Pragmatists vs. Environmentalists" (Parts I, II, and III), Vinod Khosla has provided the reasoning behind his "dissing" of plug-in hybrids, which drew the ire of Joseph Romm. Nei ...
Topics: biofuels, business, cellulosic ethanol, energy, ethanol, renewable energy (all these topics)

Biomass, part I Where will biofuels and biomass feedstocks come from?	Vinod Khosla	22 Jan 2008	Gristmill
When it comes to biofuels we have choices. We can do it poorly, using short-run approaches with no potential to scale, poor trajectory, and adverse environmental impact. Or we can do it right, with sustainable, long-term solutions that can meet both our biofuel needs and our environmental needs. We do need strong regulation to ensure against land-use abuses. I have suggested that each cellulosic facility be individually certified with a LEEDS-like 'CLAW' ratin ...
Topics: agriculture, biofuels, cellulosic ethanol, energy, ethanol (all these topics)

Why Vinod Khosla is very wrong A pragmatic view of cellulosic biofuels	Joseph Romm	17 Jan 2008	Gristmill
So Vinod Khosla is not happy with with my recent attack on his (willful) ignorance, 'Khosla blows his credibility dissing plug-ins.' Gristmill has given the billionaire a platform to defend himself, but he just spouts even more nonsense in the bizarrely titled post, 'Pragmatists v. environmentalists, part I': I have been accused of dissing hybrids. I was mostly discussing Prius-type parallel hybrids and all the support they get, when one can get the same carbon ...
Topics: biofuels, cars, cellulosic ethanol, electric vehicles, energy, ethanol, hybrids, Prius (all these topics)

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