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H15141

Headlines : Environment

Summary:

The EU has begun to pursue a pro-biofuels policy with only slightly less fervor than the U.S. But as new research from the World Land Trust makes clear, there are far better ways of removing CO2 from the air which don’t involve stealing food and farmland from the global poor.

When the fossil fuel energy used in producing biofuels is subtracted from the amount of fossil fuels that those biofuels replace, it turns out that reforestation provides a far better way of cleaning the air.

When deforestation to clear the land for biofuel production is taken into account, the difference is still larger, with 50-100 years of biofuel production failing to compensate for the loss of the forests.

[Posted By Szamko]

By Staff
Republished from BBC News

Researchers claim that reforestation and habitat protection is a better strategy for absorbing CO2

The EU target of ensuring 10% of petrol and diesel comes from renewable sources by 2020 is not an effective way to curb carbon emissions, researchers say.

A team of UK-based scientists suggested that reforestation and habitat protection was a better option.

Writing in Science, they said forests could absorb up to nine times more CO2 than the production of biofuels could achieve on the same area of land.

The growth of biofuels was also leading to more deforestation, they added.

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