"..biomass that doesn’t compete with food crops."

Some will always complain that they compete for land and water. That is why I advocate making synthetic biofuels using corn stalks and wheat straw. We grow the crops anyway for food, use the stalks for fuel. No extra land nor water required.

Eucalypts are a native species and support native wildlife. Depends on where you live.

Since we have enough Oil and NG for 54+ and 92+ years respectively, at the current burning-combustion rate, wouldn't it be more appropriate to:

1. continue to use fossil fuels but use cleaner and more efficient combustion methods to reduce GHG and pollution and/

2. progressively switch to hybrid and electrified vehicles (HEVs, PHEVs, BEVs and FCEVs, e-trains, small e-planes etc) to wean ourselves of burning-combustion fuels and/

3. avoid using productive land, water and polluting the environment with production and combustion of bio-fuels and/

4. produce clean e-fuels for airplanes.

Which bio-fuel is really 100% CO2 neutral and is fully non-polluting? Certainly not corn ethanol.

"I advocate making synthetic biofuels using corn stalks and wheat straw"
--> Not a good idea IMHO as this depletes the soil’s organic matter slowly killing it resulting in reduced yields. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soil#Organic_matter

Recent studies have shown that you can use HALF of the corn stalks and wheat straw with NO adverse affects on the land. We make a fuel that is more CO2 neutral than fossil fuels.

All too often people come up with reasons we can not or should not do something and believe it even when they are wrong. Many will say it must satisfy ALL our fuel needs or forget it. Faulty thinking has always impeded progress.

During the pyrolysis of waste biomass into bio-crude oil, some biochar will be formed. The following from Wikipedia:

"Biochar is a name for charcoal when it is used for particular purposes, especially as a soil amendment. Like all charcoal, biochar is created by pyrolysis of biomass. Biochar is under investigation as an approach to carbon sequestration to produce negative carbon dioxide emissions.[1][dead link] Biochar thus has the potential to help mitigate climate change, via carbon sequestration. [2] [3] Independently, biochar can increase soil fertility, increase agricultural productivity, and provide protection against some foliar and soil-borne diseases. Furthermore, biochar reduces pressure on forests.[4] Biochar is a stable solid, rich in carbon and can endure in soil for thousands of years.[1]"

THe following quote gives some insight into the pyrolysis process of waste biomass:

"Pyrolysis produces biochar, liquids, and gases from biomass by heating the biomass in a low/no oxygen environment. The absence of oxygen prevents combustion. The relative yield of products from pyrolysis varies with temperature. Temperatures of 400–500 °C (752–932 °F) produce more char, while temperatures above 700 °C (1,292 °F) favor the yield of liquid and gas fuel components.[10] Pyrolysis occurs more quickly at the higher temperatures, typically requiring seconds instead of hours. High temperature pyrolysis is also known as gasification, and produces primarily syngas.[10] Typical yields are 60% bio-oil, 20% biochar, and 20% syngas. By comparison, slow pyrolysis can produce substantially more char (~50%). Once initialized, both processes produce net energy. For typical inputs, the energy required to run a “fast” pyrolyzer is approximately 15% of the energy that it outputs.[11] Modern pyrolysis plants can use the syngas created by the pyrolysis process and output 3–9 times the amount of energy required to run.[6]"

When renewable-energy H2 will be added during the pyrolysis process in the presence of appropriate catalysts, a bio-crude oil chemically similar to petroleum crude oil can result which can be transported via pipelines to refineries to produce transportation fuels. The fuel yield with the addition of H2 can double, thus allowing renewable energy from solar, wind, hydro, etc. to be converted to liquid hydrocarbon fuels at low cost and high efficiency. With more H2 addition, synthetic biomethane can be made and can triple the energy yield for a given amount of carbon incorporated within the waste biomass.

It is not a good idea to leave the cellulose to rot in the field because other organisms to convert or ferment these into methane which has very high GHG index, or into CO2, which we do not want to release. Instead, putting biochar back into the soil can serve dual roles as carbon sequestration and soil enrichment.

Goods points RP. Maybe, China with faster growing bamboo and eucalyptus could produce some of the essential fuels, gas and chemicals required for their very fast growing industry while reducing GHGs?

@ sault.

I'm not at all pro fossil fuels (coal, oil or NG) but they exist, are relatively very cheap and the world need most of it to maintain higher growth rates.

To vote a complete ban on fossil and bio fuels burning-combustion would be suicidal for any politician who would dare do it and it (the ban and the politician) would be rather short lived.

A progressive fossil and bio fuels combustion reduction and associated CO2 emissions is possible. A compromise solution would include but not be restricted to the following solutions:

1. CPPs and NGPPs can be cleaned up with CO2 and pollution capture.

2. Most ICEVs efficiency can be further increased to over 100 mpg to reduce liquid fuels usage and associated GHGs.

3. Current and future HEVs, PHEVs, BEVs and FCEVs can further reduce liquid fuels consumption and GHGs.

4. Adding a progressive pollution tax on combustion fuels (coal, oil, bio-fuels and NG) could promote and accelerate the sale of clean electrified vehicles and clean electricity production and storage.

By reducing consumption of fossil fuels (and bio-fuels), the world reserves would last 100+ years and GHGs would be spread over another century or so.

@Harvey,
Wise politicians would not ban fossil fuels right away, because right now, there is not enough alternative sources to replace them. However, what need to be done is a comprehensive program involve development of all non-CO2 energy sources like RE and nuclear along with electrification of transportation, parallel with a waste biomass synthetic fuel program that can combine the RE-H2 with the waste biomass with the capacity of eventually replacing all fossil fuel sources.

With these kind of program in place, the politicians will be able to announce in advance the time table for the start of carbon tax to be phased in gradually in 5-10 years from now. I repeat: NOT NOW, only after 5-10 years, in order to ensure PRIVATE investments into these synthetic fuel program in anticipation of future action. The carbon tax will be phase-in so gradually that no disruption to the economy will result, but instead, the economy will BOOM, due to all the investments and job creation into GREEN ENERGY. Once synthetic fuels and CO2-free energy will be available at cost parity with fossil fuels, then no one will object to carbon tax.

In this scenario, the politicians will want to take credit for the job creation during the transition toward 100% fossil-fuel free and so will want to be the ones that voted for the future carbon tax along with the rest of the plan to make the carbon tax feasible, just like Pres. Obama voted NO for the Iraq war and thus got elected.

Good point, HarveyD.

The world will continue to use fossil fuels because of the inertia and the high upfront cost of investment into RE and nuclear energy. However, once the investments are made to produce RE like solar and wind, RE and synthetic fuels produced from RE will prove to cost less than petroleum, while costing on par with Natural gas (NG) and coal, and will displace the use of fossil fuels.

The trick is how to induce rapid investments into RE collectors, transmission lines, and synthetic fuel production facilities.

One way to do it is for the USA and NATO to declare WAR on GLOBAL WARMING (GW). This will unleash at least 1/2 of the US and NATO defense budgets to fund these RE projects. All defense contractors as well as military personnel will be invited to participate, thus will guarantee easy
Congressional support. The Oil and Gas industry will be invited to participate as well, to set up facilities for gathering waste biomass and for production of crude bio-oil, using some of the money earmarked for the WAR on GW. Again, easy Congressional approval, due to the strong influence of these folks in our Govt.

With gov. money invested into the production of RE and synthetic fuels, you will see that the final products will cost a lot less than fossil fuels, because these non-fossil-fuel energy sources are heavily subsidized using Defense budget. Oil companies will stop investing into oil and gas drilling with their own money, when they can use US and NATO defense money to build up facilities for synthetic fuels.

These are the "carrots". Now comes the "stick" of the "Carrot and stick" method: Announce in advance the time table for commencement of the Carbon Tax...not now, but in due time, 7-15 years or more, when there will be sufficient production of RE and synthetic fuels...Thus, when will come the Carbon Tax, NO ONE will suffer from it, because RE and synthetic fuels will be more plentiful and cheaper than previous fossil fuels even before tax.

Nuclear for base load power, Hydro for peak load while solar for peak summer load, wind for nightly charging of PEV's, and excess of nuclear, solar, and wind for production of synthetic fuels. Every non-fossil-fuel energy source has important roles to play.

Nuclear is best for locations not rich in RE, while Hydro and geothermal are great wherever the resources are available. HVDC power lines can be used to even out the continental grid, however, due to the cost and energy security issue involved such as vulnerability to terrorist attack, should not be used for transmission of 100% of power demand of a region. Each region should have its own generation capacity, including synthetic fuel reserve for backing up RE sources.

Due to the limit availability of nuclear engineers, technicians and workers and nuclear fuel resources, RE should be developed in parallel with nuclear energy development in order to stop the GW runaway train to avert disasters. Without the storage requirement, RE's cost is on par with fossil fuels, and RE is ideal energy source for the production of synthetic fuels (H2, synthetic methane and gasoline and diesel).