David Pimentel, a professor at Cornell University, published a paper in 2005 with Tad W. Patzek of the University of California, Berkeley stating that the corn-to-ethanol process powered by fossil fuels consumes 29 percent more energy than it produces. The results for switchgrass were even worse, the paper said, with a 50 percent net energy deficit. “I’m sympathetic, and I wish that ethanol production was a net positive and a help to this nation,” Dr. Pimentel said in an interview. “But I’m a scientist first and an agriculturalist second. I don’t think the U.S. will meet its goals with biofuels.” He also said the United States did not have enough agricultural land to displace gasoline with biofuels. “Even if we committed 100 percent of the corn crop to making ethanol, it would only replace 7 percent of U.S. vehicle fossil fuel use,” he said.
Monday, May 15, 2006
Tuesday, May 09, 2006
Friday, May 05, 2006
What is a poet?
"An unhappy person who conceals profound anguish in his heart but whose lips are so formed that as sighs and cries pass over them they sound like beautiful music."
— Soren Kierkegaard,
born this day in Denmark 1813
born this day in Denmark 1813
Wednesday, May 03, 2006
"Eat Your View"
I wish I could get that bumper sticker, seen in Europe. It’s quoted in Michael Pollan’s latest, The Omnivore’s Dilemma. I would put it on both my vehicles. What a beautifully succinct phrase of protest and sustainability all in one.
By all means, if you are reading this, go out and get the book and read it. He is an outstanding writer. I immensely enjoyed his two earlier books, The Botany of Desire (thank you Aimee) and Second Nature/A Gardener’s Education. This one, though, while being entertaining and highly informative, leaves me mostly…disturbed.
I feel further from Taneytown than ever. There, many a meal was prepared and consumed entirely with the fruits of the farm and woods, except for some spices and condiments. I had actually eliminated store-bought meat from our diet, between the broilers I raised, the deer, and an annual ration of pork from the hog or two Scott butchered in the spring. And of course, the eggs. And everything from the garden. With some help canning and preserving, the garden could have fed us all year long.
So now I read this book, and it painted a more vivid picture of industrial agriculture than I needed to have. Truly, I don’t want to eat factory meat anymore. I still have plenty of venison. And there is a local producer of grass-fed beef I intend to patronize. There are other local growers to be found, I’m sure, short of heading down to Polyface Farm in Shenandoah to buy from Joel Salatin. And there are the farmers markets I used to frequent, and intend to frequent again. But most I look forward to the day when I can again get firmer control over my own food destiny. That day will come.
But read the book. You’ll learn a lot. Including that Whole Foods and Trader Joe’s and so-called organic and free-range aren’t close to the answer. And that the price we pay for our food is never high enough.
Think about it: If we paid what we should for our food; if we paid what we should for our gas (which we are beginning to, but unfortunately just to profit the oil companies), then many fewer people could afford those McMansions…and the view might once again be good enough to eat.
By all means, if you are reading this, go out and get the book and read it. He is an outstanding writer. I immensely enjoyed his two earlier books, The Botany of Desire (thank you Aimee) and Second Nature/A Gardener’s Education. This one, though, while being entertaining and highly informative, leaves me mostly…disturbed.
I feel further from Taneytown than ever. There, many a meal was prepared and consumed entirely with the fruits of the farm and woods, except for some spices and condiments. I had actually eliminated store-bought meat from our diet, between the broilers I raised, the deer, and an annual ration of pork from the hog or two Scott butchered in the spring. And of course, the eggs. And everything from the garden. With some help canning and preserving, the garden could have fed us all year long.
So now I read this book, and it painted a more vivid picture of industrial agriculture than I needed to have. Truly, I don’t want to eat factory meat anymore. I still have plenty of venison. And there is a local producer of grass-fed beef I intend to patronize. There are other local growers to be found, I’m sure, short of heading down to Polyface Farm in Shenandoah to buy from Joel Salatin. And there are the farmers markets I used to frequent, and intend to frequent again. But most I look forward to the day when I can again get firmer control over my own food destiny. That day will come.
But read the book. You’ll learn a lot. Including that Whole Foods and Trader Joe’s and so-called organic and free-range aren’t close to the answer. And that the price we pay for our food is never high enough.
Think about it: If we paid what we should for our food; if we paid what we should for our gas (which we are beginning to, but unfortunately just to profit the oil companies), then many fewer people could afford those McMansions…and the view might once again be good enough to eat.
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