Biofuels vs. Fossil Fuels (David Ross, 2005) Carbon dioxide, the chief byproduct of fossil fuel combustion, is a potent greenhouse gas that remains in the atmosphere indefinitely. In the U.S., the burning of coal for electricity pumps more than 2.4 billion metric tons of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere every year, according to the Energy Information Administration. People ask what about the cars? How do they affect the environment? The average American passenger car spits out 11,450 pounds of carbon dioxide every year. There are 246 million cars in the U.S. To cut down on carbon dioxide emissions, governments, car manufacturers and utility companies have been seriously pursuing alternative energy sources. Among the leading contenders are biofuels - renewable, clean-burning fuels made from plant- and animal-based source materials like corn, soybeans, discarded vegetable oil or animal fat. We hear a lot about biofuels and fossil fuels in the news, but sometimes the two terms can get tangled in our minds. Are fossil fuels really made from fossils? Can a regular car fill up on biofuels? Are there any clean-burning fossil fuels, like natural gas?.
It is significant to note that net energy analyses of both types of biofuels will differ based on source matter, differential processing technologies, crop production techniques, and the amount of biofuel being utilized. For example, bioethanol that is produced from wheat has a greater energy renewability efficiency value (ERenEF) (48%) than does ethanol produced from corn. ERenEF “measures the fraction of final fuel energy obtained from renewable resources” (Maca and Freire, 2006). This indicates that a greater percentage of the energy from wheat-based ethanol is renewable, as compared to energy from corn-based ethanol.
We ask ourselves how might human activities have affected global climate change? Well human activities contribute to climate by causing changes in earth's atmosphere in the amounts of greenhouse gases and cloudiness. Mostly it is burning fossil fuels. This releases carbon dioxide gas to the atmosphere. There are many ways that the humans can affect our environment. Deforestation, burning fossil fuels, and hydrocarbons are ways this can affect. In this paper i will explain how each one contributes to global warming. I will support my discussion with evidence and consequences of the effects of each activity. It will also have alternate energy and solutions included that are most sustainable in our area.
Biobutanol is a more feasible alternative to gasoline. It is a more viable motor fuel substitute to gasoline, as biomass – from which biobutanol is derived from – is readily available for production and more importantly is a renewable resource. Gasoline is a crude oil product derived from petroleum, which is finite and unsustainable as a motor fuel, because it is increasingly being used up faster than it is being produced. It is expected that with continued research, biobutanol could eventually surpass gasoline as the primary motor fuel. Evidence proves that biobutanol is more acceptable environmentally than gasoline and conveniently, biomass is readily available for the steady production of biobutanol. Biobutanol is more advantageous
Informative essay thesis statement: Nowadays, biofuels have become essential for future economic development and environmental protection. Primarily, their environment-friendliness and low carbon emissions are emphasized as the main advantages. However, in reality, few investigations were made to find out the disadvantages of such renewable alternative, and it may bring much more negative impacts than its advantages.
Biofuels are better than traditional fuels because they decrease the national dependency on foreign fuel. The Minnesota biofuel association provides the article “ETHANOL AND REDUCING FOREIGN OIL DEPENDENCY” expressing how the dependency of fuels decrease due to biofuels. “ethanol has helped America lessen its dependency on foreign oil. In fact, increased production of renewable fuels such as ethanol were key components of the Energy”(1). Biofuel contains materials that are found locally. Therefore, there would be no need to find fuels in foreign places. There would be no need to go underground or under the sea to find fuels. It would also decrease the dangers many people put themselves through in order to find the fuel. Also the article “what
Hence, biofuel is a recent scientific research undertaken in Australia and will be the greatest benefit towards society and the environment. As biofuel can help contribute environmentally through lowering levels of pollution, it also benefits the society by offering economic stimulation as well as
In the past nine years there have been major developments in the environmental regulations put forth by the United States government concerning fossil fuels. Petroleum, coal and natural gas have been used as the leading fossil fuels for both transportation and energy production. These fossil fuels are reasonably abundant and easy to extract from the earth; moreover, they are easily transported and combusted for energy. Most of the current infrastructure in place for energy production is designed to burn fossil fuels in order to produce electricity. Burning fossil fuels releases vast amounts of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere. The buildup of carbon dioxide and other gasses from combustion in the atmosphere results in a phenomenon called global warming.
In the world of global warming, all kinds of pollution and fuel shortages going on, renewable and clean/ green energy is increasingly the ideal solution of energy related problems we have to solve one way or another. Biofuel is one of the mainstream and highly supported solutions nowadays, an idea to make renewable fuel by living organisms such as fiber, corn, vegetable oil or sugar cane. Unlike nonrenewable fossil fuels over extracted by people causing various environmental problems like generating a considerable amount greenhouse gas, current technology already lets renewable fuel like biofuels to shrink a certain amount of greenhouse gas production, making it a more ‘clean’ source of energy.
One further cost especially deserving of mention is the environmental cost associated with fossil fuel use versus that of solar energy sequestration. Through widespread use of fossil fuels humans are responsible for the current global warming event. With the enormous output of carbon dioxide associated with fossil fuel consumption, it is no small wonder that there have been drastic environmental changes on the global scale. The sharp increase in carbon dioxide levels present in the atmosphere around the planet has caused significant disruption of planetary energy flows. This has led to melting of the polar ice caps, sea level rise, change in seasonal and weather patterns, and more.
Should Australia legislate vehicles to run on biofuels instead of petroleum? Two interconnecting critical issues present in societies globally is the declining supply of fossil fuels and the growing emissions of carbon released into the atmosphere. The burning of these fossil fuels release vast quantities of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere,
Humanity has contributed greatly to Earths climate. Since the beginning of the Industrial Revolutions, our atmosphere has been impacted with large amounts of greenhouse gases. Human activities such as; using automobiles, burning fossil fuels (oil, gas and coal), and farming livestock have pumped large amounts of carbon dioxide, nitrous oxide and methane into our ozone. The choices we make today have a dangerous domino effect on many of Earth’s biomes and species. For example, burning fossil fuels can lead to rising temperatures, which melts the polar ice caps, causing earth’s sea levels to rise at an alarming rate, leaving many species to go endangered or extinct.
The first advantage of biofuels is that it can reduce the carbon emissions by 50 to 60%. This is a great advantage due to the fact that the world is currently facing major climate change issues, which is becoming a problem, as carbon dioxide is part of the gases on earth. Every day we release an amount of carbon dioxide. As we burn certain substances to create Energy they release are harmful amounts of gases. The earth then starts to warm up as when the sunlight reaches the earths surface it's either reflected back into space or it can be absorbed by the earth, as it is absorbed it releases some energy back into the atmosphere as heat. This is then how are the earth is slowly heating up and makes it clear as to why biofuels are a better source
Biofeuls Introduction Our world is finite. That means that there is only a limited amount of air, water, rock, plants and animal material. Earth is like a spaceship with only so many resources. There are no supply ships to drop in and give us a refill of
Ecological Analysis of Corn Stover Biofuels 1.background To date, when issues related to environment, GHG(Green House Gas), sustainability are gradually concerned, increasing people is pursuing new ways to lower down the negative effect exerted by modern industry. This also attracts government’s attention upon encouraging utilization and production of alternative energy and offering financial aid for some newly high-tech companies. One solution to deal with this global concern is finding or develop alternate fuels to replace the fossil fuels such as biofuels. The utilization of biofuels as energy for transportation is mainly driven by the over-depletion of oil, the concerns about energy consumption and the emission of Green House gas. However due to some barriers, the most recently used biofuels will replace around 10% to 15 % of fossil fuels in the field of transportation[2]. The merits and demerits of adopting corn Stover as a feedstock to produce biobutanol, bioethanol and biodiesel[2] as well as diesel, soybean biodiesel, gasoline and corn ethanol are studied based upon LCA[3](Life Cycle Assessment), a new method to analyze the influence of the ecosystem output in the life cycle. LCA is commonly used for measuring environmental influences of a product system, including different life cycle period[4] and [5].