Letters to the Editor
JackSparx
Published Letters: 433 Editor's Choice: 16
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@dcmeserve
[Read the article: A biofuel food-price bombshell]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]And the number of thoughtful environmentalists who support corporate corn production for ethanol fuel is around zero (although there are probably a few outliers).
I don't think there are any environmentalists in the Midwest who believe in ethanol. It's definitely seen as big agribiz hokum. On the West Coast though, it's sometimes seen, rather simplistically, as the grain counterpart to bio-diesel. I can name names. ;)
There is no doubt, though, that bio-diesel has been a hobby horse of the lefty-enviro crowd (of which I am a member). What made me a skeptic was 1. anticipating that bio-diesel demand could not be met by food grease waste and would require diversion from food crops and 2. knowing that cooking oil is one of the most expensive and scarce food resources for the worlds poor, and one of the most necessary calorie-dense resources for them. I also think cooking with oil reduces their need for scarce cooking fuel because it is generally faster.
Folks there is no ONE answer, and certainly no one technological answer to these problems. It's weird to watch people chase one idea after another. Similarly, there is no answer that is completely wrong. Bio-diesel makes sense up to the limit of grease waste, for example. There might be some small role for ethanol, though certainly not if its production is subsidized.
What bothers me most, though, is that the two best, and related, answers are the most overlooked--total reduction of resource consumption, and economically rewarding actors who reduce their consumption.
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Good to read people argue about small cars
[Read the article: Test drive: The Smart car is revolutionary]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]Better to argue the merits of the Smart versus the Fit versus the old Metro than Navigator vs Yukon vs Hummer.
I think there may be a snowball effect as these small cars become a larger share of the mix on the road. Safety concerns lessen as it becomes less likely that you will tangle with an SUV.
As a regular bicycle commuter, I'd rather take my chances getting hit by a Smart than some SUV behemoth. And it is less likely, since these cars are not only shorter, but less wide.
Lighter, smaller cars must result in savings to us all on road repair, lane sizes, parking space, etc. The gummint should provide more incentives to purchase these vehicles. And fund the incentives with a new tax for the gas guzzlers.
It's the patriotic thing to do.
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@rodian
[Read the article: A biofuel food-price bombshell]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]It's just amazing to me that no one wants to talk about the elephant in the room: there are too goddamn many people.
Incorrect.
The elephant is total consumption. If somehow the total population was reduced by half tomorrow, but that half all consumed like the wealthiest today, we'd be in even worse shape.
It is a common dodge among the privileged to point at excessive population as the problem. The problem is not how many humans there are, but how many resources those humans use in total. The numerous poor use far less per capita.
Note that China, which has drastically reduced its population growth, is an environmental basket case primarily because its resource consumption has risen so dramatically--and far faster then the slowing increase in its population.
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@rodian
[Read the article: A biofuel food-price bombshell]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]Persons A-H drive cars, fly often on aircraft, eat too much, own a big houses full of stuff and fill the garbage can each week, water enormous lawns, and feel overpopulation is causing environmental disaster. They write checks to the Sierra Club and post to Salon. They buy an expensive VW diesel and feel good about filling it full of bio-diesel fuel.
Persons I-Z ride old bicycles or overcrowded buses or walk, never fly, are rail-thin, live in tiny shacks thatched with waste plastic, pick garbage, get a few gallons of water at a public tap, and feel that overconsumption by people like Persons A-H is causing environmental disaster. They don't have checking accounts or computer connections. They go to the market and pay increased prices on basic staples like cooking oil and corn.
Maybe we can agree it's just a matter of perspective.
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@rodian re: Analogies to rodent population
[Read the article: A biofuel food-price bombshell]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]It's time to stop trying to see how many rats we can fit into one cage.
We won't agree, but I do want to point out the common logical fallacy used to support your common point of of view. Often, it's scientists themselves who make this error, variously citing studies of rats in cages, or organisms in a petri dish, or deer without predators, etc etc. All of these studies point toward rapidly reproducing species stripping available resources and then suffering sharp population declines.
There analogies do not adequately describe the resource problem humans face because human beings are the only species in which individuals can consume exponentially more resources than what they need to survive and reproduce. Humans also compete in abstracted economic markets in which basics like food (cooking oil or grain) and non-survival luxuries (like most uses of fuel) affect the cost of the other.
Let's modify your analogy to make it more real. You'd like to get rid of some of the "rats" so the remaining rats could consume much more and lead "richer" lives, by which you mean more consumption. Can you see why ten super-rats who consume ten times as many resources as they need to survive will have the same problems with resource depletion as one hundred regular rats who eat enough to get by?
To you, the amount of consumption is a confounding variable that I've introduced as a rhetorical slight of hand. But, to me, I don't think the environment cares whether three billion humans burn X amount of fuel or if two billion humans burn the same X amount of fuel. The emissions released by that same amount of fuel will impact the global climate just as much. I find your arguments magically anthropocentric.