Cellulosic beef

It's a thing

Posted by David Roberts at 8:36 AM on 02 Aug 2007

Read more about: agriculture | food | ethanol | biofuels | energy

Tom Konrad ponders the ethanol situation and wonders: what if, instead of feeding most of our corn to cows, and then growing a bunch of grass to make cellulosic ethanol, we use all the cow corn for ethanol and feed the grass to the cows?

Gimmicky hook, but quite a fact-filled, educational article.

For story: Cellulosic beef
9 Comments | Post a Comment

Makes sense to me

I don't eat meat, but if you do, grass-fed is so much better than conventional for a number of environmental and animal welfare reasons. Cows deserve to be fed the food that's natural to them. What most of the cattle in this country are being fed now is causing them health problems, which leads to antibiotic overuse.

by amc89 at 8:53 AM on 02 Aug 2007

His concluding paragraph

"Corn ethanol is certainly not going to bring the United States anywhere near energy independence, and it does little or nothing for the fight against global warming."

He confirmed that the two main arguments for using it are bogus for the millionth time.

"It has, however, provided a relatively harmless use for the massive glut of corn created by US agricultural policy, at least in comparison to feeding ever greater amounts of corn to cattle and high-fructose corn syrup to humans."

In other words, corn ethanol has no value what so ever other than to buy votes for competing politicians. How much exactly is "relatively" and "glut." Rising food prices, conversion of conservation reserve land, and all of the other attending ills have all been exacerbated. Logically, the corn now going into gas tanks has been replaced by something else grown somewhere else. Either that or we are starving someone somewhere and will find out about it after the fact.

His idea that the beef industry should bear the costs of transporting bulky grass instead of cellulosic biofuel refineries suggests that cellulosic may go the way of hydrogen because of high costs. Food producers and fuel producers are just now starting to go head to head over resources. Will our politicians give deference to our cars?

In the end, it all comes down to biodiversity. Poison Darts--Protecting the biodiversity of our world

by biodiversivist at 9:03 AM on 02 Aug 2007

I wouldn't really call it

I wouldn't really call it "Relatively harmless"

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-David Ahlport

by GreyFlcn at 9:58 AM on 02 Aug 2007
[ Parent ]

This Guy is full of Crap

Some of these so called consultants are so detached from how the real world works that they spew nonsense for a living. Not worth the carbon sourced energy I am consuming to write this.

by justlou at 10:20 AM on 02 Aug 2007

why not?

Why not feed the grass to cows (and sheep and goats and pigs and poultry), and use some of the "cow corn" to make polenta and tortillas, and use some of the land to grow other fruits and vegetables for local/regional consumption? And restore the rest of it to (native?) prairie? Which, by the way, could be used to graze livestock, and support native wildlife, and even make into ethanol.

And while we're at it, why not develop sensible transit infrastructure, so we don't need as much liquid auto fuel?

by gmunger at 10:28 AM on 02 Aug 2007

Sugar Beets

Corn is the least efficient way to generate energy from biomass.

A better way is the use of sugar beets.

At one time most American's made their own auto fuel. That's because cars ran on alcohol, there was a larger farming population and they all had stills.

by jabailo at 10:48 AM on 02 Aug 2007

beef industry

biodiversivist: "His idea that the beef industry should bear the costs of transporting bulky grass instead of cellulosic biofuel refineries suggests that cellulosic may go the way of hydrogen because of high costs. Food producers and fuel producers are just now starting to go head to head over resources. Will our politicians give deference to our cars?"

If beef and dairy prices go up as a result, I'm certainly not going to lose sleep over it since Americans need to be eating far less meat and dairy anyhow.

by amc89 at 11:12 AM on 02 Aug 2007

Grass to Cows

The primary feed for cows is already grass and forage crops consumed on the pasture or on the farm the cows were reared on (before some of them are finished on corn and other fatteners in the feed lots). So, bringing grass hundreds of miles to feed lots, as proposed by the subject of this post makes absolutely no sense. Plus, most of the native grasses are palatable to livestock only in earlier stages of their growth while they are young and tender and before they would yield much cellulosic biomass. So, this too, made little sense in the ag world (but great sense to some arm chair interneters).

We, of course, would be much better off eating younger cattle or bison directly off the pasture or prairie instead of sending them to feed lots. We are very much on an SUV diet that is contributing to our monumental health (and environmental) costs.

The problem again is not our choice of energy but the choice of what we have to power up to live. We are powering up way more than we need.

by justlou at 11:26 AM on 02 Aug 2007

Amc89

Just how far would you have to raise food prices to get people to stop eating beef, cheese and milk? Don't you suspect that only the poor might be affected? Raising the cost of food for the poor so that we can fuel our cars with it is a really bad idea.

In the end, it all comes down to biodiversity. Poison Darts--Protecting the biodiversity of our world

by biodiversivist at 11:48 AM on 02 Aug 2007

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