Are bio-fuel a good way to go for a 3ed world county, in need of inexpensive fuel sources?

Question

For example certian 3rd world countries are seriously exploring the posibility of using these oils? Who is monitering them? Who came up with this research anyways?

Answer 1

You're a few centuries too late. Third world countries have been using biofuels (wood, dung) since fire was discovered. If you mean something like biodiesel, it's possible, provided that they have the capacity to process it more cheaply than they can buy and process petroleum. It's all market-driven and will probably continue to be so.

Answer 2

THey already do. Brazil uses sugar cane Ethanol instead of gas and it works great.

Answer 3

Generally third world countries would be better off producing food rather than getting into the sort of energy wasting and environmentally damaging practices that the "developed" world has got hooked on.

As fossil fuels are exhausted the "developed" world will need to learn how to survive from the third world, unless the third world has already gone down the same dead end.

The only good bio-fuel is a waste product and even these cause pollution.  Growing crops for fuel is a terrible waste of land, and energy (tractor fuel, transport, fertiliser and pesticide manufacture).

Answer 4

Bio-fuels are fine... except for bread and food in general getting a lot more expensive as the land is dedicated to bio-fuels.

But maybe we prefer to feed our cars instead of people !

Answer 5

absolutely. not only are renewable bio fuels the only way to go as far as the environment is concerned, it can also be a good economic thing for a developing country as bio fuel feed stocks and their production can be a great boost for the agriculture of a 3rd world country. It also makes sense from a security standpoint. Crude oil is a finite resource and we will run out some time. Some experts figure we got about 50 years of crude left, but long before we run out it will be too expensive for many. We are already fighting one war over oil and there will be more if renewable and less polluting alternatives are not developed. Incidentally, Rudolph Diesel the inventor of the diesel engine ran his engine at the Paris expo in 1900 on peanut oil and said in 1911: "The Diesel engine can be fed by vegetable oils and would help considerably in the development of agriculture of the countries which use it.." One year later in 1912 he said the following: "the use of vegetable oils for engine fuels may seem insignificant today. But such oils may become in the course of time as important as the oil and coal tar products of the present (1912) time."

Had the world only listened we'd all be better off today, with less pollution, global warming and a renewable fuel infrastructure. You can thank big oil and our lousy government for putting us into this spot.

Answer 6

For an ongoing discussion of these issues, check out the Biopact blog (http://www.biopact.com/). They do an excellent job of covering biofuels use and research as it effects the developing world.

Laura L. Barnes, MSLIS

Illinois Waste Management and Research Center Library

Answer 7

your question ask " in need of inexpensive fuel sources"

at this time bio-fuels are far  from inexpensive so the answer to your question would be NO!

once techniques are improved and perfected and we develop a way to use more non-food grains and grasses then perhaps this will become a yes.

Answer 8

Oikos is right. They have been using dung, bio gas, Methane, sugarcane for eons. But if you are talking about fuel for cars - its a chicken and egg situation. Research in bio fuel is expensive. So its up to the richer  nations to do the work so they can sell the 3rd world the cars. But the 3rd world do not have enough money to buy too many cars. Food is more important. So why should the rich nations do expensive bio fuel research if the 3rd world don't buy enough cars to use the fuel? By the way, India, Thailand, Laos, Cambodia are using jarak (johoba) vegetable oil in their tractors and farm machinery for decades. Why dont the 1st world country follow suit? Because there's no money to be made. Period.