Environmental impacts of biofuels Impacts on: -water -soil -wildlife -climate genetically modified rapeseed global perspective sustainability

Impact on water About 860l of water are needed to produce 1l of ethanol. The water is used for: The irrigation of the crops The production in refineries  boiling and cooling The ready biofuel is lightly dangerous for the water, but less than fossil fuels

Soil Through the monocultures the soil is exploited Much more fertilizer is needed  bad for the environment „BIO- fuel“ if the fuel is really „BIO“ the production should also be „bio“

Tropicalrainforest

A palm-oil plant

Wildlife & biodiversity But arent palmoil-plants a kind of forests?  NO The biodiversity is lost The animals loose their living space Tropical- and rainforests are burned inorder to create fertile farming land

Biofuels aim to be carbon neutral/negative. But: Calculating of amount of produced greenhouse gasses is difficult. Most of the LCA studies show that biofuels can save 60-80% carbon emission as opposed to fossil fuels. Impact on climate

But these studies do not take into account nitrogen fixation, deforestation, land use or any indirect emissions. nitrogen fertilizers are used  high nitrous oxide emissions Which is 296 times more harmful than CO2 Original vegetation is removed

Advantages: resistant against herbicides Disadvantages: cross pollinating process EU does not allow genetically modified rapeseed in food Genetically modified rapeseed

Global perspective

800 mio. People are starving world wide 3.6 bilion people are living below the poverty level

The grain needed for one tankful can feed a humanbeing for about one year But we want to feed our cars with grain!

Food vs. Fuel

Why are people starting to grow „fuel“ instead of „food“?  the EU is supporting farmers of fuel plants Companies see this as a opportunity for big profits They buy for little money the field of local farmers  they create industrial MONOCULTURES Leads to :increasing foodprices cheap labour (nearly slavery) reintegration (bloddy conflicts) it‘s produced in 3rd world countries where especially food would be needed

Made of waste biomass Growing only on degraded or abandoned agricultural lands No using of fertilizers Sustainable biofuel production