What About Competition With Food?
The concern on competitive land use between food production, animal feed and the recent trends in fuel production is mainly centred around the production of transport fuels. The reasons for this are mainly that:
- The oils, sugars and starches found in many crops are ideal starting materials in the synthesis of liquid biofuels.
- Arable land with high crop yields are increasingly in demand due to the growing Global population.
It is inevitable that this will continue to escalate as a controversial issue, particularly with so much of the world's population directly impacted by even a small change in food prices.
River Basin Energy recognises that industrial growth cannot come before human life and well being, and we have chosen to source our biomass raw materials from sustainable forests, or as wastes from forest operations, sawmills and paper mills. In this respect we expect to have no impact on the available farmland or the cost of food.
The forest lands that support our operations are chosen because they are well managed according to internationally accepted sustainable forestry standards. We also ensure that our operations can be sustained by taking only the normal annual growth in the forest, and do not contribute to a reduction in the overall forest volume.
By providing forest owners with a viable income, we contribute in our small way, to preserving the forest assets, with all the associated benefits of biodiversity and carbon storage.
For further reading:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Food_vs._fuel
http://www.agri-outlook.org