14 DAY TRIAL // German investigators warn in a new report that it may be safer for scientists to conduct a new series of analyses on the effects of using biomass as a source of energy. Long touted as a potential source of cleaner, renewable energy, biomass is now slowly coming under fire for its perceived effects.
Some say that making the switch from fossil fuels to biofuels may not be worth it, due to the fact that the latter may not provide the environmental benefits that researchers first suggested. In fact, it could be that certain kinds of biomass may harm the environment more than fossil fuels do.
In short, what the German team is saying is that biomass-derived energy may present a series of under-appreciated risks, which may ultimately prove to counter-balance the perceived benefits of using them at a large scale.
The group is not saying that we should stop using biomass altogether, simply that we need to take a more careful approach to employing them at a large scale. First, they argue in the new document, we need to make sure that we know what we are doing.
Details of the investigation were published in the latest issue of the top journal Nature Climate Change.
“A precautionary approach is needed. Before further expanding bioenergy, science has to deliver a more comprehensive risk assessment to policy makers – dealing with the uncertainties inherent to projections of bioenergy use up to now,” researcher Ottmar Edenhofer explains.
“Novel kinds of risk management for land-use change are needed,” adds the scientist, a chief economist of the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research (PIK) and also a professor at the Technische Universität Berlin (TU Berlin).
The main concern expressed in the new report was that cultivating crops of the types best suited for applications in bioenergy could lead to the emission of large amounts of greenhouse gases, especially nitrous oxide from fertilizers. This chemical is 300 times more potent than carbon dioxide.
“Scientists need to be very clear about the assumptions that their analyses rest upon and the effect alternative assumptions may have on their conclusions when they aim to systematically explore the risks associated with alternative policy options,” adds Felix Creutzig.
“Bioenergy is a matter of heated debate. Policy makers may choose to only allow further bioenergy deployment under very restricted circumstances,” concludes the expert, who is the lead author of the new paper.