Social, Political and Economic Impact:


Social Impact

 Pros:

  • Biofuel production creates opportunities for rural development.  It can also have a positive impact on agricultural employment and livelihoods, especially when the cultivation involves small-scale farmers and the conversion facilities located near the crop sources in rural areas. For example sugarcane in Brazil employs around 1 million workers and the number is expected to grow by 204,000 in the next five years. This is more jobs created than by fossil fuel production. 
  • The Colombian Government estimates that every farming family will earn two times the minimum salary (US 44,000 per year) through bioethanol production.
  • In China, the liquid biofuel program is predicted to create up to 9.26 million jobs across the country, thus leading to significant increases tin income generation and rural development. 















 Cons:

  • If more land is converted into land used for the production of energy crops, there is a likely chance it would exacerbate conflicts over land rights and 'landlessness' issues in many developing countries, thus forcing rural dwellers to migrate, losing their access to forest resources and ecosystem services. For example, large-scale plantations in Indonesia of palm oil have caused debate whether there was a violation of traditional land rights of local communities. 
  • With the deforestation of more land especially along the Amazon, these rainforests that are being burned down will cause more damage in the future even though they are being replaced by crops that are supposed to lessen the carbon footprints of automobiles. Rainforests are not replaceable and losing those vital lands will further worsen the dire situation the world faces with global warming and climate change.
  • It is argued that with more demand for biofuels, more farmers will instead convert their land for growing energy crops instead of food crops. This could lead to food shortages and higher food prices for consumers all around the globe. For example in Malaysia, demand for palm-based licenses have grown so fast the country decided to stop licensing new producers while the country works out how to divide the raw material between the food and energy sectors. They reached an agreement with Indonesia where they will set aside 40% of their crude palm oil output for solely biodiesel production.
  • Lester Brown noted in a Washington Post opinion piece that "the grain required to fill a 25-gallon SUV with ethanol would feed one person for a full year."


Political Impact 

 Pros:


Energy Policy Act of 2005

  • On July 29, 2005, Congress passed the Energy Policy Act of 2005, and President George W. Bush signed it into law on August 8, 2005. The $14-billion national energy plan includes provisions that promote energy efficiency and conservation, modernize the domestic energy infrastructure, and provide incentives for both traditional energy sources and renewable alternatives.
  • Several important sections of the Energy Policy Act relating to biofuels and bio-based products are summarized below. Additional sections that promote the use of biofuels and bioproducts, describe more specialized biofuels studies, and provide funds to cover loan guarantees associated with demonstrating the feasibility of producing certain biofuels can be found in Title II (Renewable Energy), Title IX (Research and Development), and Title XV (Ethanol and Motor Fuels) of this Act.

Section 932. Bioenergy Program

  • Authorizes the Department of Energy's biomass and bioproducts programs to partner with industrial and academic institutions to advance the development of biofuels, bioproducts, and biorefineries. Goals include using biotechnology and other advanced processes to make biofuels from lignocellulosic feedstocks cost-competitive with gasoline and diesel, increasing production of bioproducts that reduce the use of fossil fuels in manufacturing facilities, and demonstrating the commercial application of integrated biorefineries that use a wide variety of lignocellulosic feedstocks to produce liquid transportation fuels, high-value chemicals, electricity, and useful heat.

Section 941. Amendments to the Biomass Research and Development Act of 2000. 

  • This section amends and updates wording in the Biomass Research and Development Act of 2000. One important amendment introduces four new technical areas for R&D activities: (1) develop crops and systems that improve feedstock production and processing, (2) convert recalcitrant cellulosic biomass into intermediates that can be used to produce biobased fuels and products, (3) develop technologies that yield a wide range of biobased products that increase the feasibility of fuel production in a biorefinery, and (4) analyze biomass technologies for their impact on sustainability and environmental quality, security, and rural economic development.

Section 942. Production Incentives for Cellulosic Biofuels. 

  • This section authorizes the establishment of incentives to ensure that annual production of one billion gallons of cellulosic biofuels is achieved by 2015.

Section 977. Systems Biology Program. 

  • This section promotes the establishment of a research program (the Genomics:GTL program) focusing on microbial and plant systems biology, protein science, and computational biology to support DOE energy, national security, and environmental missions. Funds will be available for projects to plan, construct, or operate special instrumentation or facilities for researchers in systems biology and proteomics and associated biological disciplines.

Section 1501. Renewable Content of Gasoline (Renewable Fuels Standard). 

  • This section establishes a program requiring gasoline sold in the United States to be mixed with increasing amounts of renewable fuel (usually ethanol) on an annual average basis. In 2006, 4 billion gallons of renewable fuels are to be mixed with gasoline, and this requirement increases annually to 7.5 billion gallons of renewable fuel by 2012. For 2013 and beyond, the required volume of renewable fuel will include a minimum of 250 million gallons of cellulosic ethanol.
  • The departments of energy and agriculture will award $25 million to advance development of "technologies and processes" to produce so-called "next generation" biofuels that aren't refined from food crops like corn. The announcement follows an agriculture department  promise to loan $80 million to Range Fuels, a Colorado company that produces ethanol from wood chips, so it can build a refinery in Georgia.
  • The $25 million will finance projects focused on feedstock development, biofuel and biobased product development and biofuel development analysis. The goal is to create a wide range of "economically and environmentally sustainable" sources of renewable biomass that can be turned into fuel and cut greenhouse gas emissions at least 50 percent compared to fossil fuels, officials said.
  • "A robust biofuels industry-focused on the next generation of biofuels- is critical to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, reducing our addiction to foreign oil and putting Americans back to work."-Energy Secretary Steven Chu said in a statement.




 Cons:

  • Due to the aggressive biofuel policies the European Union and the United States pursued over recent years, there are many critics that accuse the government of short-sightedness of these policies. Some, like Cornell Professor Davidi Pimental and Berkeley Professor Tad Patzek, argues that a full life-cycle analysis showed that most biofuels are not carbon neutral at all. With these action plans and setting targets to promote biofuels, many states in the U.S were enforcing that corn be turned into ethanol. This path the government has chosen to take was done too fast and didn't put enough consideration into the potential consequences in the future.







 

In the picture above, President Obama meets with President Lula da Silva of brazil on Saturday, march 14, 2009 in the Oval Office. President Obama asked about Brazil's big move toward biofuels and the leadership they have undertaken as a global example of having the first sustainable biofuels economy. 





 

Pictured above is a typical Petrobras gas station in Brazil. It has a dual fuel service, marked A for alcohol (ethanol) and G for gasoline.






 Economic Impact:


 Pros:

  • With the hope that biofuels will be a thing of the near future, many private and public investments have been made in biofuel processing hoping to make an investment. This means that many entrepreneurs will invest in new processing plants not only in the U.S but around the globe. There will be growth in many areas including trucking and transportation of the crops and biofuels, construction for the new plants, investments in testing and inventing new types of biofuels for the future, and investments for biotechnology companies.
  • The World bank reports that biofuel industries employ 100 times more workers per unit of energy produced than the fossil fuel industry. 
  • Biofuels can also help limit demand for petroleum from foreign countries and hence contribute to limit the upward pressure on petroleum prices.
  • Biofuels made from the U.S will stimulate job growth in rural and metropolitan areas. With less petroleum needed to be imported from foreign countries, we will be less vulnerable to outside influences. In the near future, when energy is key for world power, the steps the U.S has taken to be closer to sustainability will better the chances we will remain a contender as a world leader.

 Cons:

  • Demand for ethanol and other biofuels is "a significant contributor" to soaring food prices around the world, World Bank President Robert Zoellick says. Droughts, financial market speculators and increased demand for food have created "a perfect storm" that has increased food prices. 
  • In the past two years, the price of corn in the United States has more than doubled, driven partly by demand for alternative fuels such as ethanol.  
  • For the developing world rural poor which compromise about 67% of those living below a dollar a day, food price increases often increase income as their subsistence farms become economic while for the urban poor food price increases are disastrous.