The author completely mistates the reasons for the provision of the Climate Change bill that holds indirect land use under the microscope. The reason Congress is doing this is that the science on indirect land use is not robust enough to deliver conclusive determination of indirect effects of biofules or petroleum. This bill strengthens all efforts to mitigate climate change by making sure the science is correct.

Biodiesel has been proven to reduce GHG emission by 78% compared to petroleum. EPA’s proposed analysis of indirect land use change indicates that biodiesel may only be 22% better than petroleum. Which number is right? Is it the 78% number which has been published by the U.S. Department of Agriculture and the U.S. Department of Energy and has stood the test of over 10 years of public scrutiny and peer review, or is it the number contrived by EPA using modeling with hundreds of inaccurate data points and assumptions? As of June 26, EPA’s modeling has only been on the street for 55 days, and has completed no formal peer review. That is not nearly enough time to conclude that EPA did it right. In fact, there are numerous instances in EPA’s proposed rule where they state a great deal of uncertainty in the methods and results of their modeling. A critical function of the public comment period is for EPA to gather more data and to correct their mistakes.

If the author believes that biodiesel is worse than petroleum, I challenge him to actually read the 1400 pages of documentation released by EPA. You will understand the outlandish assumptions EPA has made in penalizing biofuels producers for planting decisions worldwide. Here is just one example. EPA assigns a carbon penalty to biodiesel for forests that may get logged or burned for livestock acres that may be needed to replace existing pasture land that may be displaced by a crop that may be planted in a response to a rise in commodity prices that may result from a use of biodiesel that will not be made from crops that came from land that was not cleared prior to December 2007 and that was, in all likelihood, in agricultural production before 1959, if not 1909. That’s five “may’s.” Each instance is one where EPA stands to be dead wrong. That didn’t stop them from assuming the worst case scenario at every turn. If anyone could predict just the first number assumed by EPA, a rise in commodity price, they could be rich beyond their wildest dreams. Rational people know that simply is not possible. That didn’t stop EPA from taking the number derived from the first model and successively putting the results in a string of other models. Garbage in, garbage out. If you put lots of wrong numbers in lots of models, the errors multiply themselves to give you very, very bad conclusions.

I’d like to point out the one certainly in EPA’s modeling. Biodiesel will not be made from feedstock procured from land that was not already in crop production. The National Biodiesel Board has adopted sustainability principles that provide for the protection of such natural resources, and the Energy Independence and Security Act that authorizes EPA’s proposed rule clearly states that renewable fuel can only come from land in production prior to enactment of the law. No new land is required to meet our goals of displacing petroleum with renewable biodiesel.

Further, real-world outcomes happen to be the exact opposite of what EPA predicts. Between 2004 and 2008, the US biodiesel industry grew at the fastest pace in history, from 25 million gallons to 690 million gallons per year. During this time, Brazilian soybean acres actually decreased, not increased as EPA’s model would predict.

The purpose of the ILUC clause in the Climate Change bill is not to let biofuels “slide by” with no quantification of GHG emissions. The purpose of the ILUC clause is to make sure the indirect effects are calculated correctly and that indirect effects of petroleum fuels are also quantified. We have to get the science right, because if we are wrong, and we continue to spew CO2 into the atmosphere from burning fossil fuels when more sustainable options are available, then we fail to protect the earth for ourselves and for future generations. It took millions of years to sequester all the carbon that exists in fossil fuels deep within the Earth’s crust. Once that genie is out of the bottle, there is no putting it back. Unlike Aladdin’s genie, this one won’t be granting any wishes and it will be too late to say “I wish we had used more biodiesel. I wish we had used more ethanol. I wish we had done the math before we jumped to a conclusion on biofuels.”

Why don't I hear anything about "Biochar", even in off-Mainstream media? It appears to be a dandy, cheap, "organic" fertilizer, and a very large carbon sequestering system. Why speak of

ethanol with anything other than contempt? disigny

It's not "American farmers" - it's American Agribusiness, the companies who also own the forest land that is being burned down in Central America, Indonesia, etc. The whole question of ethanol and biofuels and agriculture has to be looked at in a global perspective, where the bad guys (as usual) are American corporations.

Also, we get to beat our healthy smoke-free chests over the FDA now getting to regulate tobacco, not noticing that Big Tobacco has quietly moved their operations overseas, where tobacco farming in Africa now takes enough land that - did this crop not exist there - Africans could feed themselves. And then, of course, the tobacco is made into cigarettes that are sold completely unregulated in those countries.

But we Americans get to feel good about how "green" and "healthy" we are.

.....It's amazing how three simple words can so clearly demonstrate, the arrogance and stupidity of man.

There will be laments to the billions dead the irrevocable damage done to the environment.

It's quite certain at this point that most of the human population will die off this century. It hasn't been possible for twenty or thirty years to change course sufficiently to prevent it, and so it will be.

Mad Max is more of a documentary than a post-apocalyptic fiction.

"Every mammal on this planet instinctively develops a natural equilibrium with the surrounding environment, but you humans do not. You move to an area and you multiply until every natural resource is consumed. The only way you can survive is to spread to another area. There is another organism on this planet that follows the same pattern. Do you know what it is? A virus. Humans beings are a disease, a cancer of this planet..."

- Agent Smith

"We're not going to make it, are we? People, I mean."

"It is in your nature to destroy yourselves," said The Machine.