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Palm Oil Was Supposed to Help Save the Planet
- izend 8y agoIt is amazing that around 2007 the US had declining oil production, an oil price shock and peak oil scare which probably were the primary reasons for the invasion of Iraq and terrible ethanol and biofuel policies. Now, there is talk of the US not requiring any imported oil by 2025 (not sure if that counts imports from the biggest supplier Canada), how times change due to a technological advancement in drilling practices. I believe US foreign policy will potentially have very large changes due to their new found energy independence.
- andrepd 8y agoDon't forget political will to disregard the consequences and externalities of such drilling practices.
- CarVac 8y agoRe: externalities Check out what fracking has done to Pennsylvania's formerly wild forests compared to New York; there is a hideously ugly network of access roads and cut clearings for fracking wells . https://www.google.com/maps/@41.9889724,-78.7814974,8036m/data=!3m1!1e3 https://www.google.com/maps/@41.9889724,-78.7814974,8036m/da... My friend pointed this out to me and I was truly disgusted...
- hervature 8y agoWell, it could be worse as seen in such "formerly wild forests" of New York. https://www.google.com/maps/place/Manhattan,+New+York,+NY,+USA/@40.7591704,-74.0392715,18362m/data=!3m2!1e3!4b1!4m5!3m4!1s0x89c2588f046ee661:0xa0b3281fcecc08c!8m2!3d40.7831411!4d-73.9709473 https://www.google.com/maps/place/Manhattan,+New+York,+NY,+U...
- whynotminot 8y agoDisgusted by some roads?
- snowwindwaves 8y agoSame with all of british columbia, logging roads everywhere
- DrPhish 8y agoAt least that's for logging and not fracking. Logging sequesters millions of cubic meters of carbon (trees), and the BC forest license program requires audited 3rd party replanting, ensuring continuously increasing sequestration. Even the amount of carbon sequestered in wooden telephone poles across North America is staggering, let alone houses and other structures.
- slavik81 8y agoHere's the same place, just zoomed out a little: https://www.google.com/maps/@41.9889724,-78.7814974,128506m/data=!3m1!1e3 https://www.google.com/maps/@41.9889724,-78.7814974,128506m/... Pretty much everything that's light green on that map is forest that was cleared for farmland. By 1872, the eastern states had cleared 52% of their forests, mostly for agriculture. Habitat destruction is an underappreciated problem, but let's keep things in perspective. Those dirt access roads are narrow strips of forest, and they'll be quickly overgrown once they're abandoned.
- wahern 8y ago"The ultimate irony is that what created the U.S. energy revolution—nimble, private-sector companies using new technologies to extract previously untapped crude—keeps the United States from wielding its energy strength in the way that Saudi Arabia, Russia, and other big producers with state-owned firms willing to put geopolitics above profits do." https://foreignpolicy.com/2018/11/14/why-american-oil-hasnt-been-a-total-game-changer/ https://foreignpolicy.com/2018/11/14/why-american-oil-hasnt-...
- khuey 8y agoThe US has other more conventional levers of international power to wield. Taking oil off the table is a win for the US.
- jedberg 8y agoCredit where credit is due: It was because of the Bush administration’s policies around the strategic reserve and opening drilling that got us off of our dependence on middle eastern oil. I’m no fan of the Bush admin, but this is one of the few things they probably got right.
- behringer 8y agoExcept for the irreparable environmental impact of it all...
- jedberg 8y agoCertainly true, but more complex than it may seem. How much environmental damage has been saved by not having to ship oil from the middle east and not propping up those countries and all of the environmental damage they do? I don't think it's possible to know.
- ImprovedSilence 8y agoMeh, I'd rather keep ours in the ground and be the last to run out. Maybe that's a selfish and defeatist mindset, but it's another way to look at things besides just "lets not ruin our own environment".
- oh_sigh 8y ago"Last to run out" makes it sound like oil will be increasingly valuable as time goes on. What if you leave yours in the ground, and eventually it is worth almost nothing, because the world has moved on?
- Baeocystin 8y agoOil has much greater economic value when used as a feedstock for non-fuel purposes. It is almost certainly a better idea to let any reserves you possibly can stay in the ground for as long as possible, and let everyone else sell theirs for cheap first.
- NeedMoreTea 8y agoA huge part is not about energy. As the American Chemistry Council are delighted to tell, $200bn has been invested since 2010 in increased production from fracking for ethane and other products for plastics and chemicals[0]. Yet they still find it necessary to campaign against chemical regulations and restrictions on plastic carrier bags. So we're still accelerating nicely towards that precipice. [0] https://www.americanchemistry.com/Media/PressReleasesTranscripts/ACC-news-releases/US-Chemical-Industry-Investment-Linked-to-Shale-Gas-Reaches-200-Billion.html https://www.americanchemistry.com/Media/PressReleasesTranscr...
- oh_sigh 8y agoWhen did America invade Iraq post 2007?
- zorga 8y ago> I believe US foreign policy will potentially have very large changes due to their new found energy independence. Yup, that was the one of the main reasons we bore the cost of being the world's policeman and securing global shipping routes. We're going to largely stop doing that, and turn inward, leaving the rest of the world to scramble over how to secure shipping routes on their own resulting in new alliances. The oil will start flowing to China mostly and Russia will expand its borders by force. China will be too busy trying to stop its fake economy from crashing to care.
- freeflight 8y ago> how times change due to a technological advancement in drilling practices. Is it really just that or maybe also the erosion of environmental protections? [0] [0] https://library.fes.de/pdf-files/id/10665.pdf https://library.fes.de/pdf-files/id/10665.pdf
- thanosnose 8y ago> I believe US foreign policy will potentially have very large changes due to their new found energy independence. It's possible but I think corporate interests, rather than our energy independence, will be the driving force of US foreign policy as it had been in the past. As long as banks, oil companies, etc stand to make a lot of money in the middle east, our foreign policy won't change much.
- xvilka 8y agoI believe we are already at point of no return and our grandchildren will live in mostly sterile world compared with what we have now. Probably only external expansion to the Solar system can save tiny bits of wild life they will have at that time.
- thenanyu 8y agoCan you help me understand this? I keep hearing about expansion to other planets but it seems to me that no matter how inhospitable Earth becomes, we’ll be starting off from a much worse position elsewhere.
- glial 8y agoThere's no understanding it because it doesn't actually make sense. Lasting solutions to earth-scale issues like climate change must ultimately be social solutions (regulations, taxes, treaties, and ultimately alignment of incentives). Terraforming Mars seems easier than developing social solutions to some people, so that's what they fixate on. But trying to spread into the solar system because we're afraid of having the hard conversations about social solutions is a gross misapplication of imagination and resources.
- randallsquared 8y agoThe fact that we're using "hard conversations" as a euphemism for large scale violence is a wry comment on just how hard those conversations will actually be. I don't expect that colonization of Mars or other distant places will save "us", but it might well save many of those who go. There are lots of ways in which places on Mars are less hospitable to human life than places on Earth, but if things get really bad on Earth, the surrounding weather will not be nearly as bad as how other people are reacting.
- adrianN 8y agoIt will take a really long time before any off-planet colony could be self-sustaining. Just think about how long the supply chains for even the simplest things needed for repairs are. Until then Earth is either fucked due to climate change or we have a local solution to the problem.
- rory096 8y agoThis is why taxing carbon is better policy than patchwork regulations.
- quickthrower2 8y agoThis only helps if you can fully audit carbon released from burning rainforests etc.
- JumpCrisscross 8y ago> This only helps if you can fully audit carbon released from burning rainforests Murder laws aren’t rendered useless by unsolved murders. A carbon tax makes sense even if only large-scale domestic production is initially covered.
- quickthrower2 8y agoAh sure. I wasn't making the point not to have a carbon tax. Just that it would help here unless carefully thought out. A bit like the biodiesel law.
- briandear 8y agoNot at all. That creates an effective subsidy on non-domestic production. Carbon tax on my factory in California? I’ll move it to Nairobi. Add a tariff? Then other countries retaliate and domestic companies can no longer sell their goods abroad. Domestic consumers would pay higher prices and the economy grinds to a halt due to reduced production from reduced international trade.
- JoeSmithson 8y agoAre there measures to combat global warming that you do support?
- icebraining 8y agoWhy wouldn't companies start producing less carbon intensive products? Seems to have worked pretty well with cars, which even with the recent dieselgate, are much more efficient than before. Currently there's an effective subsidy on air polluters; I can sue my neighbor who dumps waste on my land, but I can't sue the people dumping carbon in my lungs. Is that subsidy not concerning?
- Sephr 8y agoI thought bioengineered algae oil (e.g. http://algawise.com/ http://algawise.com/) was supposed to help us save the planet, seeing as it's both healthier and more sustainable than palm oil.
- greglindahl 8y agoIf it worked, sure. Just like cellulosic biofuels, mentioned in the article. Neither is cost-effective, despite a fair amount of investment.
- FlyMoreRockets 8y agoThe problem with algae derived oil is the algae requires lots of fertilizer. We need to grow azolla to use as a feedstock. It is remarkably efficient at pulling both nitrogen and carbon from the atmosphere, able to double in mass every 2-3 days in ideal conditions with minimal inputs other than sunlight and water. Makes a fairly good fertilizer, too.
- cratermoon 8y agoRepeat after me: Capitalism and the "Free Market Fairy" will never solve any problem that threatens profits.
- Tossrock 8y agoThis is powerful stuff - palm oil production is clearly an evil. But what really struck me from this was the rather cavalier mention of their guide killing dozens of people with a machete, during an ethnic cleansing. Isn't there a court for people like that? In The Netherlands?
- balibebas 8y agoYou want to see evil look at Malasian deforestation due to production of this crap. It's not even a tasty in cooking. Coconut is.
- chemicalnovae 8y agoAnd where do you think oil coconuts are grown?
- refurb 8y agoWriting laws is the easy part. Actually enforcing the law is an entirely separate endeavor.
- jgbond 8y agoThe article doesn’t touch on it much, but the palm oil industry basically runs on slave labor, too.
- chaostheory 8y agoI thought it was just supposed to prevent a health crisis ie prevent heart attacks and other health issues. I don't remember any marketing for palm oil related to saving the environment. Am I wrong?
- eksemplar 8y agoIt’s used for bio-diesel. The cars that run on it are sold as green, but by burning the rainforest to make enough palm oil, the cars that run on it are instead the least green.
- chaostheory 8y agoI don't remember reading any articles about palm oil being used as biodiesel in US media. Most of the coverage centered around palm oil being the savior from trans-fats.
- skybrian 8y agoThe headline doesn't really fit the article. Here's the bit that explains it: "Imports of biodiesel to the United States surged from near zero to more than 100 million gallons a month. As fuel markets snatched up every ounce of domestic soy oil to meet the American fuel mandate, the food industry also replaced the soy it had used with something cheaper and just as good: palm oil, largely from Malaysia and Indonesia, which are the sources of nearly 90 percent of the global supply." Biodiesel was supposed to be good. It can be made out of a variety of vegetable and animal oils. I don't think they talked about palm oil in particular.
- coverband 8y agoAfter reading some of the informed comments, I take it that the cause-effect relationship is not as direct as what's described in the article. Specifically, most of palm oil being used for food in fast-growing Asian countries, along with how much more palm oil can be produced from the same land -compared to corn oil- suggest it may not be a naive political decision from a decade ago that's now reducing the Indonesian forest footprint.
- niftich 8y agoWhile the 'unintended consequences' story is powerful, the article undermines its credibility by suggesting at first that palm oil's use in US biodiesel is a significant contributor to this clusterfuck, but only halfway through does it admit that US biodiesel is chiefly made with corn and soy, ostensibly leaving less of these oils for the US food industry -- forcing imports of other oils. But the truth is even more complex: for the last two decades, US society has gone through a nutritional awakening about the risk of trans fats, and widespread phase-out of trans fats has occurred due to consumer demand and regulatory pressure. Trans fats are a hard-to-avoid byproduct of partial hydrogenation of unsaturated oils: a process you want in food manufacturing to convert a liquid oil to a solid shortening. Corn oil and soybean oil largely consist of unsaturated fats, so partial hydrogenation will turn a fair bit of product into trans fats. But palm oil and coconut oil are naturally high in saturated fats, which gives them desirable properties by natural means and without trans bonds. This is the primary reason for US food manufacturing's increased palm oil imports into the US: if widespread partial hydrogenation were still on the table, plentiful cottonseed oil could have been used instead. Crisco and Wesson were both early pioneers of hydrogenated cottonseed oil, but even today's Crisco -- the archetypal hydrogenated shortening -- has been reformulated with palm oil and soybean oil. Then there's the matter of occasional palm oil boycotts in the US and Europe, protesting about food companies' use of palm oil from plantations that haven't been certified sustainable. Other than the inherent fuzziness and conflict of interest about a trade group deciding what it means for clearcut-type agriculture to be 'sustainable', these protests unfortunately cause the average price of all palm oil to drop, leaving others whose priorities are different to buy them up on the cheap. For example, palm oil is widely used as a cooking oil in the Indian Subcontinent, because it's cheap, is produced nearby (as opposed to in the Americas or Europe), and those countries have populations whose demand for simple cooking oils well outstrips their domestic supply. There are many factors to this story: the ones investigated in the article, and others that I hope to have shown were missing. This shows that reality is sometimes maddeningly complex, different actors are frequently at odds, and one group's good intentions rarely survive the realities and the intricacies the global economy and local situations on the ground where the rubber meets the road.
- bunderbunder 8y agoFully hydrogenated fats contain (virtually?) no trans fats. I'm curious why the shift was to palm oil, rather than to just fully hydrogenating the oil and then blending it with unhydrogenated oil to achieve the desired consistency.
- scythe 8y agoPalm oil is a great example of the Jevons paradox: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jevons_paradox http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jevons_paradox Vegetable oil was expensive and took a lot of land to produce, then the oil palm made it cheaper and produced more in less land. But now we spend more money on vegetable oil and cultivate more land than before.
- emj 8y agoThank you for that, interesting like branching before and after git (and all), if something is easy and effortless you do it more.
- deleted 8y ago[deleted]
- neverminder 8y agoIn UK rain forest anti deforestation TV ad "Rang-tan" was banned for being "too political" - https://www.standard.co.uk/news/world/how-the-world-is-waking-up-to-palm-oil-in-the-wake-of-banned-iceland-orangutan-advert-a3992311.html https://www.standard.co.uk/news/world/how-the-world-is-wakin...
- lkramer 8y agoIt was not the ad that was deemed too political. The problem was that it was made by a political organization. If Iceland had made it themselves, it would likely have been fine.
- SmellyGeekBoy 8y agoThought I was on Facebook for a moment there
- alkonaut 8y agoReminder: Don’t buy crap with palm oil in it, at least not things with oils not clearly marked as sustainably/ethically produced.
- brianwawok 8y agoSo I should eat hydrogoneated oil instead and have a heart attack?
- deleted 8y ago[deleted]
- mannykannot 8y agoThe more general pattern is that, because of the sheer volume of demand, solutions that merely substitute one material resource for another no longer work.