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Switchgrass: The magic wand that transforms crappy biofuels policy into gold

This short piece in Foreign Policy magazine is revealing, I think, of the congealing conventional wisdom in D.C. policy circles.

The basic thesis is this: Farm subsidies that now promote agricultural exports should simply be switched over to promote agricultural fuels -- i.e., ethanol. That way, Bush could get the WTO off his back about export subsidies, mollify the domestic agricultural lobby, and cure America's addiction to foreign oil. So easy!

One small note of caution:

So what's the catch? Corn farming is rough on the environment. Soil erosion due to wind and water is rampant. Fertilizer and pesticide runoffs produce algae blooms that result in "dead zones," including one in the Gulf of Mexico that is so polluted it cannot support aquatic life. Furthermore, building the ethanol processing plants will take 3-4 years, and gas stations would have to commit to providing ethanol. And, because ethanol uses only the starch in corn, not the oil, protein, or other components, converting corn into ethanol is attractive only if there is a market for the byproducts. Opinions differ, but some estimate that byproduct markets could saturate well short of 11 billion gallons of production.

Luckily, there's a handy solution to these problems. What is it?

Wait for it ... wait for it ...

Switchgrass! Whee!

Environmentalism’s elitist tinge has roots in the movement’s history

Pretty, yes, but what about the people? Photo: National Park Service. North Americans love their heroes, and environmentalists are no exception. The hall of fame includes some of the biggest hitters from our nation’s past: John Muir, David McTaggart, Marjory Stoneman Douglas, Paul Watson, David Brower, Rachel Carson, and Edward Abbey, to name just a […]

Recommended reading (really!)

Today's piece by Matthew Klingle and Joseph Taylor is a kind of minor miracle: interesting to mortals, despite being written by a couple of academic historians. Don't miss it.

Of course, as true academics, they couldn't resist sending us a partial bibliography of poverty and environment-related books. It's great background for their story, but also for this series in general. I hereby share it with you -- complete with handy shopping links!

Got any other suggestions? Feel free to add 'em.

Astroturf and the Endangered Species Act

Paul D. Thacker, who is doing kick-ass work these days, brings us another sordid tale of corporate influence, faux-grassroots ("astroturf") organizations, misleading PR, and political chicanery.

I won't ruin too much of it for you, but it focuses on the Save Our Species Alliance, an astroturf organization helping Rep. Richard "Dick" Pombo (R-Calif.) sneak through his "reforms" of the Endangered Species Act. Turns out SOSA has roots in Project Protect, a "grassroots" outfit that sank $2.9 million in advertising to back Bush's Healthy Forests bill.

Make no mistake: Corporate interests and the Congressfolk they've purchased have made this kind of manipulation of public sentiment into a science. The only effective response is to uncover the connections and expose the mechanisms. Paul's doing yeoman's work on that score.

Consumer Reports backtracks

Odograph will be happy to hear that Consumer Reports has admitted error: some hybrids save money after all.

Including fuel savings and tax credits, Consumer Reports said, the Toyota Prius hybrid would save about $400 over five years and the Honda Civic hybrid would save about $300 compared with conventionally powered models.

The magazine said it overestimated depreciation of the cars in arriving at its initial conclusion.

I guess the millions thousands tens zero people who were staying away from hybrids for this reason can now put them back on the shopping list.

(See original thread on CR report here.)

Elizabeth Chin responds

I am heartened, challenged, and stimulated by the interesting and engaged discussion that has emerged around my short piece, "I Will Simply Survive." It's always so interesting to see the ways in which I have managed (or not) to be clear in what I am trying to say.

My aim was not to cast blame on anybody (except mostly myself, I think), but rather to encourage critical self-examination of what spurs each of us to attempt simplicity, simplifying, eco-whatever. Furthermore, my aim was to expand thinking to embrace those whose choices are constrained by poverty. Of course pro-environmental choices aren't bad: I have a worm box, I buy organic, and my child has virtually never worn a piece of clothing that came new from a store. Even so, despite whatever environmentally friendly and thrifty things I do -- consciously and with enthusiasm -- the bald truth is that I, like most people in the U.S., have a ridiculously outsized environmental footprint compared to the rest of the world's population. The worm box isn't bad at all, but there's no doubt it's a drop in the bucket.

Tray’s Anatomy

Hospital menus getting green overhaul Soon “hospital food” may no longer mean the worst American factory-farmed cuisine has to offer. A handful of hospitals around the country are starting to put hormone-free meats, rBGH-free milk, and organic veggies on their menus. For years, the best advice of health-care professionals hasn’t been reflected in the typical […]

A little Exxon bashing

Nothing like a little fire breathing to start your day. So I give you Carl Pope, who really seems not to like Exxon much:

It is hard to imagine a more alarming scenario from the world's largest oil company -- we are entirely dependent on OPEC's being both willing and able to increase its production dramatically, even if we are very diligent about pursuing energy efficiency. If either one of those assumptions (cooperative, successful OPEC; energy-efficient consumers) fails to hold true, then we are cooked. So why is ExxonMobil running such soothing ads in the New York Times?

Because if the world does hit a major oil shortage, then prices will soar, and ExxonMobil, which just reaped a record profit, will become even richer.

What's really shameful is not that they feed us this toxic pabulum -- but that we seem to swallow it.

Foresight Is 20/20

Researchers identify 20 future conservation battlegrounds The soldiers of conservation have been given their marching orders. (Ah, martial metaphors … never can get the hang of them.) A new study has identified 20 future conservation battlegrounds around the world, from Alaska’s far north to the southern tip of the Australian island of Tasmania — hotspots […]

I Never Promised You a Community Garden

Largest community garden in U.S. to get evicted for a Wal-Mart warehouse L.A.’s South Central Community Garden, the largest and oldest such garden in the U.S. and a food source for more than 300 low-income families, sits on private property. Big mistake! Now the property’s owner plans to evict the growers and build a Wal-Mart […]