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4 Tons Of Plants per Mile to Ride In Your Car
Roland Piquepaille writes "As you might know, I enjoy big numbers. So it's just natural that I was attracted by this news release from the University of Utah, "Bad Mileage: 98 tons of plants per gallon." "A staggering 98 tons of prehistoric, buried plant material is required to produce each gallon of gasoline we burn in our cars, SUVs, trucks and other vehicles." For a reasonably efficient car, riding 25 miles per gallon, this translates to 4 tons of prehistoric plants per mile, or more than two tons per kilometer. The research paper also mentions that everyday, we are using the fossil fuel equivalent of all the plants growing during a whole year just for our cars. Even if these numbers are too large, this still makes you think about how inefficient our cars are. This analysis describes the calculations and contains other details about the research paper which will be published in November by Climate Change."
"The research paper also mentions that everyday, we are using the fossil fuel equivalent of all the plants growing during a whole year just for our cars."
If there's 600,000,000 of plants and plant material out there to burn in fossil fuels...and we burn a years worth of it a day. And you divide 600 million by 365...that gives us 1643835 years worth of fossil fuels.
A much more optomistic projection that even the Skeptical Environmentalist!
I'm going to go drive my 5.7 liter Chevy truck around then just for the hell of it.
What are you suggesting? There is no shortage of clear proof that this is where the oil comes from. Coal contains clearly fossilised plant material.. oil and coal and natural gas are often all found together. The process of generating them can be simulated very easily.
I think the artical is misleading. Not all of the plant is converted to oil only a small part. This is intuitive, becouse your car dosen't carry 52 tons of gas in its tank. Also, gas is one of the best ways to back that much energy in to a small space.
-James
Thanks for bringing up Thomas Gold. There is really little evidence to go along with the fossil theory of petroleum, and increasingly more to support Thomas Gold. See this link
I hate to split hairs here, but as a geologist who has worked in oil and gas exploration I need to clarify a few points. First, if you assume a biogenic origin for hydrocarbon deposits then you realize that different types of organic matter generate different types of hydrocarbons. I need to quote F.K. North from his book Petroleum Geology. In it on page 53 he states " Oil is not derived, as coal is, from terrestrial plant materials." As a result plant material is responsible for the generation of natural gas. Liquid hydrocarbons originate from the sapropelic material that typically is aquatic algae and may include some spores and pollens.
So I do away with the process of turning plants into petroleum, and burn the plants directly in my engine. Anyone can do it! You only need:
With either method, waste vegetable oil from restaurants can be used, solving two problems at once!
With the exception of nitrous oxide and CO2, vegetable oil powered diesels are MUCH cleaner than petro diesels. Yes, they produce climate-warming CO2 in similar quantities to petro-diesel engines, but the CO2 they release was taken out of the atmosphere last year, NOT millions of years ago.
It is unlikely that Big Oil is going to embrace this, but you don't have to go it alone. Co-ops for producing and/or distributing biodiesel are sprining up like rapeseed oil plants. Google for "biodiesel," "SVO," "WVO" for more info, or visit www.GoBiodiesel.org for more information.
: What Constitution?
There are many alternative theories for petrolium formation, many are 'abiogenic' theories that say that 'fossil fuels' are actually primordial, that have existed since the Earth was created.
For more info read see this and "The Deep Not Biosphere" by Thomas Gold of Cornell university.
Who said anything about soybeans? Any plant that produces oil can produce transportation and heating fuel. It doesn't even have to be a wonderful nitrogen fixer like soybeans. (I would disagree they're "terrible for the soil.") Or you can alternate nitrogen-depletors like corn with beans, getting two oil crops that complement each other's soil use. (I grew up on a farm, so please don't tell me what is good or bad unless you can claim the same.)
"We are converting farmland back into forest in the US and if we met domestic demand for diesel through vegetable oil we would be back to deforesting and depleting. Bad idea."
First, I would argue both that we are NOT "converting farmland... to forest" in any significant quantity, and also that any resulting "managed" forest is no better than farmland with respect to environmental factors.
I never claimed that we should get all our transportation needs from farm crops. Indeed, if you re-read what I wrote, I was advocating using WASTE cooking oil. How you got from there to "soybeans" and "farmland" is beyond me.
"A far better option seem to be CWT. These guy say they can change any carbon into distilled water, balanced organic fertilizer and gasoline."
Well, I couldn't find any place where they claimed that!
Their process seems to consume unspecified hydrocarbons and produces various hydrocarbons. It appears to be energy- and water-intensive, with lots of heat and pressure required. It is unclear exactly what the feedstock is and exactly what the result is, except that it consumes a great deal of water and energy in the process.
A hydrogen energy economy is decades away. Vegetable oil diesel can serve as an important part of a transition away from fossil fuels. This can be done with today's technology -- indeed, in a handyman's garage -- using a waste stream that is currently a disposal problem.
Just don't tell me it can't be done, or I'll have to un-drive all those miles I've driven, powered by waste vegetable oil!
: What Constitution?