Chemical and biological engineering: One for the road

From The Economist print edition

A new biofuel made from fruit sugars promises more oomph than traditional ethanol

REPLACING carbon-rich fossil fuels with more environmentally friendly alternatives should slow global warming. As part of that drive, both America and Europe have embraced biofuels—liquids derived from plants that can be used to power cars and other vehicles. By their very nature, biofuels cannot be carbon-free because carbon is essential to life on Earth. Burning biofuels does indeed release carbon dioxide, a greenhouse gas. The attraction is that the volume of gas released exactly matches that taken up by the plant when it was growing. So overall (and with the huge proviso that you do not count the fossil fuel used to farm the stuff) biofuels are carbon-neutral.

In America the Department of Energy has set a target for 30% of the 2004 gasoline demand for vehicles to be met by biofuels by 2030. The European Union wants 25% of transport fuels to be derived from biofuels by the same date. At present, the most widely used substance is ethanol, which can be made from sugar cane, sugar beet and maize (or corn, as it is called in America). But ethanol does not pack a particularly powerful punch. It is also susceptible to absorbing water, further diluting its oomph. It takes days to ferment the stuff. A biofuel that did not suffer from these limitations would be welcome.

That is what a team led by James Dumesic of the University of Wisconsin-Madison claims to have developed. The researchers think they have devised a biofuel that has a 40% higher energy density than ethanol, that repels water and that can be made relatively speedily.

One of the most frustrating aspects of biofuels is the stark contrast between what exists in nature and what you can put in the tank. Plants are rich in carbohydrates, a group of organic compounds based on carbon and water, itself a combination of hydrogen and oxygen. These carbohydrates take the form of chains of thousands of sugar units; each unit contains six carbon atoms and a similar number of oxygen atoms. An ideal fuel, on the other hand, should lack oxygen. Its molecules should also be small, that is, they should contain few carbon atoms. Creating an efficient fuel from plants thus presents a headache. More...

Revolução à vista

Consumidores brasileiros serão atingidos em cheio pelo choque energético que está se formando

Por Raul Pilati
raul.pilati@correioweb.com.br

Duas linhas de evolução econômica do planeta conspiram a favor do Brasil. A crescente demanda por energia está ampliando um mercado já bastante aquecido. Some-se ao consumo em alta o desafio de atendê-lo reduzindo as emissões de poluentes que alimentam o efeito estufa. Os segmentos da área de biocombustíveis não poderiam estar mais entusiasmados.

Como o Brasil é o maior exportador de álcool do planeta, está em posição privilegiada. Não resta dúvida de que uma grande mudança de paradigma está a caminho. Junto com as oportunidades de negócios, porém, vem uma polêmica: os efeitos sobre os demais produtos agropecuários. Não é uma falsa discussão, como tentam apresentar alguns especialistas. Começou com os artigos de Fidel Castro, que questionou a destinação de terras e o trato aos trabalhadores. A iniciativa causou estranheza. Mas veio então a FAO (Organização das Nações Unidas para a Agricultura e Alimentação) e fez um alerta parecido.

Pressões
A demanda por biocombustíveis, segundo o organismo, vai fazer subir os preços dos alimentos a níveis recordes ainda em 2007. A elevação deve ser de 5%, com custo adicional de US$ 400 bilhões, segundo estudo recente. Principalmente devido às cotações do milho e dos óleos vegetais, como o de soja. Os mais afetados, afirma a FAO, serão os países em desenvolvimento, que gastarão este ano 9% a mais com importação de alimentos. Em relação a 2000, a alta será de 90%.

O Brasil respondeu por 42,5% da produção mundial de etanol em 2005 e os Estados Unidos, com o uso do milho, por 44,5%. A produção de biodiesel respondeu por 3,8 bilhões de litros. Segundo artigo da Foreign Affairs, para produzir 95 litros de etanol a partir do milho são necessários 200 quilos de grãos, o suficiente para alimentar uma pessoa por um ano.

Efeitos internos
Mesmo para os consumidores brasileiros, o movimento trará múltiplos efeitos. A popularização mundial do etanol como combustível implica mais concorrentes pelo mesmo produto. A inexpugnável lei do mercado vai levar usineiros e plantadores a optar pelo melhor preço — seja interno ou externo —, o que é um risco adicional de abastecimento.

Existem muitos investimentos em novas usinas em andamento. A produção brasileira pode atingir 38 bilhões de litros em 2012, mais do que tudo que foi produzido no mundo em 2005 (36,5 bilhões de litros). Bilhões de dólares estão sendo carreados para o segmento. Só a Petrobras está colocando US$ 2,5 bilhões. Mas até as novas usinas terão conseqüências. Avançando sobre áreas ocupadas por outras culturas, estão estimulando sua conversão em canaviais. O plantio de grãos e a criação de gado estão sendo empurrados mais para o interior do país, para fronteiras ainda incipientes. Portanto, mais distantes das estruturas de transporte e dos centros consumidores, o que leva a fretes mais caros.

É inevitável que o setor sucroalcooleiro brasileiro se beneficie da onda que está apenas começando. O choque de combustível, como descrito pelo presidente Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, é real e está só no início. Há uma revolução em curso. Mas não será indolor, nem neutra. É preciso responsabilidade dos produtores e bom senso do governo para não ficarmos apenas deslumbrados com a oportunidade que se abre. Leia a integra da coluna de Raul Pilati, no Correio Braziliense (para assinantes)

Biofuelled

Grain prices go the way of the oil price

From The Economist print edition

EVERY morning millions of Americans confront the latest trend in commodities markets at their kitchen table. According to the United States Department of Agriculture, rising prices for crops—dubbed “agflation”—has begun to drive up the cost of breakfast. The price of orange juice has risen by a quarter over the past year, eggs by a fifth and milk by roughly 5%. Breakfast-cereal makers, such as Kellogg's and General Mills, have also raised their prices. Underpinning these rises is a sharp increase in the prices of grains such as corn (maize) and wheat, both of which recently hit ten-year highs. Analysts are beginning to ask, as they have of oil and metals, whether higher prices are here to stay.

On the face of it, that is an odd question. After all, if the world runs short of corn or wheat, farmers can simply grow more, weather permitting. That is exactly what they have been doing. In the coming year, the International Grains Council, an industry group, estimates that global production of grains will reach a record of 1,660m tonnes, well above last year's figure of 1,569m. But demand for grain is growing even faster. The council reckons it will reach 1,680m tonnes this year. In three of the past four years, demand has exceeded supply.

The culprit is the growing use of grains to make biofuels, such as ethanol. Most grains are used as food either for people or for livestock. But the increase in human consumption has been slowing for decades as population growth moderates. Demand for animal feed, meanwhile, has grown steadily, as more people in booming countries such as China grow rich enough to afford meat.

Demand for biofuel feedstocks, by contrast, is soaring. The amount of corn used to make ethanol in America has tripled since 2000; ethanol distilleries now consume a fifth of the country's corn crop. And America is only one of 41 countries where governments are encouraging the use of biofuels to reduce oil consumption.

As a result, demand for grains has accelerated. During the 1990s, when oil was cheap and biofuels unheard of, demand grew by 1.2% a year, according to Goldman Sachs. But in recent years, it has increased by 1.4%, and over the next decade, Goldman projects, it will rise by 1.9% annually.

Farmers are struggling to keep up. The Economist Intelligence Unit, a sister company of The Economist, projects that demand for corn, at least, will continue to exceed supply until at least 2009. Moreover, even to produce as much corn as they are now, farmers are growing less soya and wheat, and so pushing up the prices of those crops too. With all the main grains to feed poultry and livestock becoming more expensive, the cost of meat and eggs is rising, and so it goes on.

When demand was growing more slowly, farmers could meet it through gradual improvements in their yields. But to cope with today's boom, yields will have to rise much faster, or farmers will have to bring more land into production.

Both are possible. Greater adoption of genetically modified strains of corn and wheat, for example, could improve yields. But they are expensive and politically controversial. There is also quite a bit of fallow land to be sowed, especially in developing agricultural powers such as Brazil and Ukraine. But those countries are far from the biggest markets and their idle land tends to be found in areas with poor transport links. A strong price signal will be needed to overcome such obstacles and induce extra supplies. More...

Oops, what I meant to drive was...

Barack Obama showed up for a sparsely-attended news conference in Brentwood Tuesday to outline his plans to reduce greenhouse gases. The scene was a gas station that sells fuel made from vegetable oils. Good so far.

Trouble was he drove up in one of those big hulking SUVs that political campaigns (and the Secret Service) are so fond of driving. "When I'm president," Obama said, "any vehicle purchased by the federal government" will have a flexible fuel system that can run on ethanol. "Government should lead the way," he said.

His stop in Brentwood, meant to underline his green credentials, came on a day when Obama quietly backtracked on his longheld support for a controversial plan to promote the use of coal, as Peter Wallsten explains in a Times story this morning.

According to The Times' Seema Mehta at the Brentwood gas station, Obama acknowledged he is behind Hillary Clinton by double-digits in this weeks Times Poll. "These polls are going to fluctuate and gyrate," he said. But he predicted a good showing in next month's quarterly campaign fundraising reports.

"We haven't gotten into the guts of this campaign," Obama said. "That will happen after Labor Day."

Whatever happened to starting campaigns after Labor Day of the election year, not the year before?

--Andrew Malcolm

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