Science no image  Published on April 30th, 2008 | by greengrok
Biofuels Part I: Corn Ethanol Isn’t the Solution  Turning corn
into fuel unfortunately does not reduce global warming
pollutionWritten by Dr. Bill Chameides, dean of the Nicholas
School of the Environment and lead author of the forthcoming
blog The Green Grok. This post is Part 1 of a 2-part series on
biofuels. Today’s post looks at corn; Part 2 will examine the
most promising biofuels.  Who doesn’t want to be green? But
beware of automobile ads claiming environmental benefits from
home-grown ethanol. Almost all U.S. ethanol comes from corn and,
as a fuel, corn just isn’t as “amaizing” as they say.    A short
history of ethanol     As it turns out, it’s not that simple.
Why ethanol is not effective at fighting global warming  carbon
cycle       • cultivating and harvesting the crop,     •
refining the crop to ethanol, and     • its transportation to
market.       The silver lining of biofuels: Degraded or
abandoned land and waste     See also: