greencarcongress - A new study by economists at Oregon State University questions the cost-effectiveness of current biofuels and says they would barely reduce fossil fuel use and would likely increase greenhouse gas emissions. The researchers focused on the major mandated and currently used biofuels worldwide: corn ethanol, soybean biodiesel, cellulosic ethanol from switchgrass grown in the United States, canola biodiesel produced in Europe, and sugarcane ethanol produced in Brazil and exported to the US or Europe.
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| US costs and scope for reducing fossil fuel use and GHG emissions with alternative interventions. Jaeger and Egelkraut. Click to enlarge. |
...The researchers concluded that all of these biofuel mandates combined would reduce fossil fuel use by less than 2.5%, or the same amount that a gas tax increase of 25 cents per gallon could achieve, but at an estimated cost of $67 billion compared with a cost of $6 billion with a gas tax....
Their results indicated that all of the biofuel crops were much less cost-effective than the two alternative policies in terms of reducing greenhouse gas emissions and fossil fuel use.
Our results suggest that existing biofuel policies have been very costly, produce negligible reductions in fossil fuel use and increase, rather than decrease, greenhouse gas emissions. Each dollar spent on energy improvement programs would be 20 times more effective in reducing fossil fuel use and greenhouse gas emissions than a similar cost for the corn ethanol program. Likewise, a gas tax increase would be 21 times more effective than promoting cellulosic ethanol.
—Bill Jaeger, lead author
Overall, it was estimated that US-produced biofuels would cost between 20 and 31 times more than energy efficiency improvements that would reduce gas consumption by 1%. The study also reported that combining a gas tax increase with energy efficiency improvements could reduce US fossil fuel use by more than 15% (or cut petroleum fuel use by more than 35%)...greencarcongress
Resources
Jaeger, William K. and Egelkraut, Thorsten M. (2011) Biofuel Economics in a Setting of Multiple Objectives & Unintended Consequences