Second Globalwarming Awareness2007

Prairie grass against global warming?

You probably heard about replacement for fossil fuels to power our cars has to be found in a very near future. But where will this energy come from ? Hydrogen ? Biofuels made from soya beans or corn ? Researchers at the University of Minnesota think that mixed prairie grasses are a better source for biofuels than any other.

They already know that fuels made from prairie biomass are “carbon negative”.

Carbon negative ? Hey ? What does it means ? In fact, producing and using those knd of fuels would reduce the amount of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere. On the contrary, corn ethanol and soybean biodiesel are known as “carbon positive”. We still add carbon dioxide to the atmosphere. The researchers even say that producing fuels from prairie grasses growing on “degraded” land, like the one which are not suitable for agriculture, could reduce worldwide carbon dioxide emissions over 15% ! Of course, some other experts are a bit skeptical.

Trying to unify farmers worldwide would be a very difficult task. Nevertheless, I remain optimistic. I think we really need to accelerate our work on biomass production and its conversion into useful energy sources. Ultimately, this means we need to start paying farmers for all the services they provide society, for biofuels and for the removal and storage of carbon dioxide.