RE: [Biofuel] PR Posing as Science in Crop Biotechnology
Greetings Readers, A question and an opinion from a newbie; What does GMO stand for? The opinion is on recycling - there are huge amounts of waste organics being land filled instead of recycled. May I respectfully suggest that some of you PhD's and entrepreneurs use your resources towards figuring out how to economically recycle more of our waste into energy instead of politicking. Once an activity becomes economically viable it will follow whoever leads into the mainstream. Looks like using used restaurant grease and oils is on the way to stardom. It is used for producing biodiesel and a host of other commercial products. Eh wot? Ed (for Mondays Thursdays-Main Ofc.) | Ed Starr | Star Marketing | 949-496-0050 | FAX 949-388-7828 | [EMAIL PROTECTED]| Dana Point, CA, USA (for Tue., Wed. Fri-Home Ofc.) | Ed Starr | Star Marketing | 619-749-9647 | FAX 619-749-9648 | [EMAIL PROTECTED] Hello All, As the GM foods are not labeled, there is no way that their health impacts on the population can be identified after they are released. The same goes for biofuel. It seems to me that we ought to also be aware of GMO biofuel as much as we are aware of GMO food, though there is surprisingly little awareness in this respect. There is no explicit label for GMO foods, Not in the US anyway, though surveys have shown that most people favour labelling. and many people who are buying biofuel as a green alternative to petroleum may not realize that GMO biofuel is actually a contribution to the problem and not the solution (to global warming, corporate control, inefficiency, etc. -- you decide). I've said this before: If you just swap fuels instead of changing the entire disaster you'll end up with wall-to-wall industrialized monocrops of GMO soy and canola. Big Biofuels may not turn out to be much better than Big Oil. Silly thing about it is that industrialized monocropping of biofuels crops would be (is) just as fossil-fuel-dependent as industrialized monocropping of anything else is. What's the use of finding a cure for cancer if it gives you a heart attack? But is it really that simple? From a couple of recent messages: Something worth saying though, that I've pointed out here before, is that GM still is a very promising technology, but not in the hands of the likes of Monsanto, as is very obvious. With their slant on things and their history, we don't need any more Brave New Worlds brought to us by the Monsanto's and Dow's of this world any more than we need a 21st Century sponsored by Big Oil. It's to be hoped that the fully justifiable public outcry against Monsanto's antics with GMOs aren't going to permanently discredit the technology in the public eye and put it out of bounds. And: I want a Mother Nature engineered soybean and claim this on my biodiesel for my future clean fuel gas station. Very good! Though, whether non-GMO or not, soy might not be the best choice for an oilseed crop. This is a complicated argument. You could argue the GMO stuff shouldn't be growing at all, but life is seldom ideal and the fact is that huge quantities of GMO crops are being grown in the US and elsewhere. With soy, the oil is something of a by-product, the main product being the seedcake, which is fed to livestock (concentrated factory farms). The oil is stored in the world's biggest tank farm, generally with a massive surplus. It's hard to find any aspect of any of this that you can say anything good about. None of it is sustainable, all of it is abhorrent in various ways. It's all heavily dependent on fossil fuels, and extremely wasteful. But, it happens. Resistance is mounting on many fronts, but it'll go on happening until it ends, and go on producing this noxious stuff that oughtn't to be in the food chain. Maybe burning it in diesel motors is about the best thing you can do with it. You could just as well claim that as a public service if you used GMO oil. There was (?) something of a similar discussion over BSE, Mad Cow Disease: it should never have happened, and would never have happened but for the madness of feeding cattle parts to cattle, vegetarian grazing animals specially adapted to eat grass. But rendering the condemned and slaughtered beasts and making biodiesel from the tallow surely would have been a better solution than landfilling them or incinerating them. I am grateful that JtF and this list increases awareness of this fact -- community self-reliance is a real value, we do not simply advocate using biofuel just for the sake of using biofuel, but as a means to a more sane ends. Right, and thankyou. It's become something of a mantra that simply substituting biofuel for fossil-fuels is no answer - a rational energy future requires great reductions in energy use (waste), great improvements in energy efficiency, and probably most important, decentralisation of supply to the local level, along with the use of all available renewable
RE: [Biofuel] New bio dieseler
Where do you live ? Santee, California which is just 8 miles east of San Diego. Met vriendelijke groet, Pieter Koole Netherlands ___ Biofuel mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://wwia.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/biofuel Biofuel at Journey to Forever: http://journeytoforever.org/biofuel.html Biofuel archives at Infoarchive.net (searchable): http://infoarchive.net/sgroup/biofuel/ ___ Biofuel mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://wwia.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/biofuel Biofuel at Journey to Forever: http://journeytoforever.org/biofuel.html Biofuel archives at Infoarchive.net (searchable): http://infoarchive.net/sgroup/biofuel/
RE: [Biofuel] GM Cotton Fiascos Around the World
Greetings Concerned Cotton People, There is a simple answer to eliminating pests of all kinds from cotton and any other plant. It is called Vermiculture. Granted it is more trouble than just spraying on a chemical but it doesn't hurt any living thing and it helps the heck out of plants - they grow up to twice their normal rate and size. As to pests, they don't like the chemistry of the castings and therefore they stay away. None are actually killed but that is not the goal - as long as the pests leave your crops alone you are just fine. I realize many will sniff in a critical manner, but no one yet has designed a better system than this one which nature devised millions of years ago. By the way, in the end it is overall a cheaper than pesticide system because of yield increases, no environmental impact therefore no safeguards necessary, no soil erosion, and many more benefits. For the desperate and the believers among you, see the 2 attachments. Good luck, Ed Starr (for Mondays Thursdays-Main Ofc.) | Ed Starr | Star Marketing | 949-496-0050 | FAX 949-388-7828 | [EMAIL PROTECTED]| Dana Point, CA, USA (for Tue., Wed. Fri-Home Ofc.) | Ed Starr | Star Marketing | 619-749-9647 | FAX 619-749-9648 | [EMAIL PROTECTED] -Original Message- From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Keith Addison Sent: Friday, January 28, 2005 9:01 AM To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: [Biofuel] GM Cotton Fiascos Around the World The Institute of Science in Society Science Society Sustainability http://www.i-sis.org.uk ISIS Press Release 26/01/05 GM Cotton Fiascos Around the World mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]Rhea Gala A http://www.i-sis.org.uk/full/GMCFATWFull.phpfully referenced version of this article is posted on ISIS members' website. http://www.i-sis.org.uk/membership.phpDetails here GM cotton not environmentally friendly or safe Cotton is responsible for more than 10% of world pesticide use including some of the most hazardous, and 25% of all insecticide use. As weeds and insects become resistant, more and more pesticides are needed in a vicious circle that's a recipe for socio-economic, health and environmental disaster. About half of the GM cotton grown in the United States is herbicide resistant, and a comprehensive analysis by Dr. Charles Benbrook, a former Executive Director of the Board on Agriculture of the US National Academy of Science, confirmed that it required more herbicide than conventional varieties. Most GM cotton crops worldwide are engineered with Bt for resistance to insect pests and promoted by firms like Monsanto as environmentally friendly, because they need less pesticide. Monsanto's GM cotton 'Bollgard' carries the cry1Ac gene from soil bacterium, Bacillus thuringiensis, (Bt) to produce a toxin that kills some cotton pests including the boll weevil. However, Bollgard does not resist sucking pests, such as aphids, that might also damage the crop and will therefore require subsidiary spraying. GM cotton not friendly to farmers GM cottonseed prices include a 'technology fee' that can go up every year, and is calculated on supposed savings from reduced pesticide use with the Bt variety in a particular location. All farmers growing Monsanto's Bt cotton sign a contract, called a Technology Use Agreement that is strictly applied. It stipulates that, Farmers cannot save seed for replanting Farmers are prohibited from supplying seed to anyone else Farmers must pay 120 times the technology fee, plus the legal fees of Monsanto, if they violate the contract. The Indonesian experience: A cautionary tale Indonesia was the first country in Southeast Asia to permit commercial GM farming against the warnings of scientists and activists on the environmental and socio-economic impacts. Fortunately, permission was granted only on a year-by-year basis, and the government reviewed the impact of the failed Bt crop. The review was scathing. This Gene Revolution, it said, seemed to be a modern tool for cementing farmers' dependence on seeds and transnational agrochemical corporations appearing in developing countries in different guises. The evidence from Indonesia is that GM crops are nothing more than a profit-motivated deployment of scientific power dedicated to sucking the blood of farmers. Monsanto promised Bt cotton would return 3-4 tonnes of cotton per hectare while requiring less pesticide and fertilizer than Kanesia, the local cotton variety. The seed was given to farmers with pesticide, herbicide, (including Roundup) and fertilizer as part of a credit scheme costing sixteen times more than non- Bt cotton. In fact, the average yield was 1.1 tonnes per hectare and 74% of the area planted to Bt-cotton produced less than one tonne per hectare. About 522 hectares experienced total crop failure. Despite
[Biofuel] Bio-fuel in San Diego Co.
Greetings All, Anyone out there from San Diego County? Any hobbyists? Anyone thinking about producing bio-d? Any producers? Any one know of any B100 or B20 or?? stations pumping for the public in San Diego County? I am in the interested - searching info to put a small production plant up category. Regards, Ed P.S. The following contact info relates to my day job not bio-d. (for Mondays Thursdays-Main Ofc.) | Ed Starr | Star Marketing | 949-496-0050 | FAX 949-388-7828 | mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] [EMAIL PROTECTED]| Dana Point, CA, USA (for Tue., Wed. Fri-Home Ofc.) | Ed Starr | Star Marketing | 619-749-9647 | FAX 619-749-9648 | mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] [EMAIL PROTECTED] ___ Biofuel mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://wwia.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/biofuel Biofuel at Journey to Forever: http://journeytoforever.org/biofuel.html Biofuel archives at Infoarchive.net (searchable): http://infoarchive.net/sgroup/biofuel/
