Shinkansen wrote:... and I cannot stand this demonisation of genetically modified crops.
Norman Borlaug, a Nobel Peace Prize winner and Plant Geneticist has been involved in the creation of disease-resistant and increased-yield crops over his lifetime. Without these crops, more than ONE BILLION people in impoverished third-world countries would have starved to death. They don't have the technology (such as tractors, irrigation systems, fungicides, pesticides etc) we have so these crops are absolutely essential to their survival.
Just facts.
Don't demonise the science, demonise the corporations that abuse the technology, for example, corporations that create "suicide seeds" that are genetically bred to die after one or two harvests to encourage repeat custom. Much like planned obsolescence in the technology sector.
Like anything, genetic modification has the power for good and the power for bad, but without GM crops we simply cannot feed everyone on this planet. Fact.
Any volunteers?
who's demonising the scientists?.....like i said "they sell the idea of GM foods to the general public by saying it will stop world hunger....but in reality companies like Monsanto use it to manipulate,control and enslave farmers and producers the world over.".....i'm not saying the scientist isn't sincere in his efforts.
apart from when theres interference from humans...when do living entities within the animal kingdom die of starvation?....what i see is every living entity is catered for by nature.
"food mountains"or "agricultural waste" or whatever name its given
http://www.environment-agency.gov.uk/business/sectors/32777.aspx
Agricultural waste is any substance or object from premises used for agriculture or horticulture, which the holder discards, intends to discard or is required to discard. It is waste specifically generated by agricultural activities.
For example, waste which came from a farm shop or a vegetable packing plant would not be agricultural waste.
Some examples of agricultural waste are:
empty pesticide containers;
old silage wrap;
out of date medicines and wormers;
used tyres;
surplus milk.
i'm trying to point out that the market/industry is rigged for maximum profit and not humanitarian aid.......if i had hungry people outside my house,and i'd cooked excess food for tea,it would make more sense to give it to the hungry fella....than throw it in the bin
digressing a little...
what i have notice in the fields (so far this year) is the abundance of "rapeseed",also known as "oilseed rape"
http://www.agrimoney.com/news/uk-farmer ... -3687.html
from 2002....but interesting....
Biodiesel Production
The aim of this section of the investigation is to quantify the amount of biodiesel that could be produced from the available land within the UK as worked out in the previous section.
Similar to bioethanol it is first necessary to assess the potential yields of the most suitable crops.
The main energy crop which would be grown in the United Kingdom to produce biodiesel would be Oilseed Rape. Other potential crops would include sunflowers, linseed and castor, however Oilseed rape is by far the most suitable for UK agriculture.
Rapeseed Yields
The Table to the right shows the average annual rapeseed yields since 1998 (ref17), the average yield over this time is 3 tonnes per hectare. For the purpose of this investigation this value shall be used to calculate how much biodiesel can be produced from rapeseed.
Assuming that all of the 644,000 hectares of UK setaside land is used to produce biodiesel from rapeseed then:
Rapeseed Yield = 644,000 * 3 = 1,932,000 Tonnes per year
Seed to Oil Yield
We know from the what is biodiesel section that the production process for biodiesel requires the vegetable oil to be extracted from the seed. This can be done simply by crushing the seed and extracting the oil or by solvent extraction. Either way there is generally a 40% oil content available by mass within the seed.
Therefore:
Oil Yield = 0.4 * 1,932,000 = 772,800 Tonnes per year
Biodiesel Yield From Oil
Again refering to the what is biodiesel section we know that there is around a 97% conversion from the raw vegetable oil to the biodiesel during the transesterification process.
Therefore:
Biodiesel Yield = 0.97 * 772,800 = 749,616 Tonnes per year or 851,836,000 litres per year
Total Biodiesel Production
The total biodiesel production assuming use of 100% of the set aside land would be 851,836,000 Litres. For simplicity this can be rounded to 0.85 billion litres.
In 2002 the UK released for consumption 19.764 billion litres of diesel (ref18). By volume, the biodiesel produced from the set aside land could displace 4.3% of this diesel. This figure however is inaccurate unless the energy content of the fuel is taken into account.
Similar to bioethanol, biodiesel has a lower energy content than its equivalent traditional fuel, however in the case of biodiesel and diesel the difference is not as great. Diesel has an energy content by volume of around 37.9 MJ/L. Biodiesel has an energy content by volume of around 35.6 MJ/L.
The total energy contained in 19.764 Billion litres of diesel:
= 19.764 billion * 37.9 = 749 billon MJ
The total energy contained in 0.85 billion litres of biodiesel:
= 0.85 billion * 35.6 = 30.3 billion MJ
This means that using all the setaside land to produce biodiesel could displace 30.3 billion MJ of the energy contained within the petrol, this is a 4% displacement by energy. 30.3 billion MJ of energy equates to 0.8 billion litres of diesel. Therefore 0.8 billion litres is the volume of diesel that would be saved over the year using all the setaside land.
Summary
Using all the set aside land to produce Biodiesel would result in:
A production of 0.85 billion litres of biodiesel
A 4.3% displacement by volume
A 4% displacement by energy
A saving of 0.8 billion litres of petrol
If, for example, a 2% displacement by volume was required then we wouild require:
0.4 billion litres of biodiesel
303000 hectares of land
A fraction under half of the setaside land
http://www.esru.strath.ac.uk/EandE/Web_ ... diesel.htm
fields and fields of the stuff.....its always been about,but i've (and others who know the land) never noticed as much as this year....makes one wonder...oilseed rape,will run our diesel cars....but they still sell the diesel fuel @ £1.50 a litre...because the majority of the population are ignorant to these facts
anyhow its late...
mad
putting these links here to look at
http://www.esru.strath.ac.uk/EandE/Web_ ... diesel.htm
http://www.fwi.co.uk/Articles/12/07/200 ... iofuel.htm
http://unitedoilseeds.co.uk/news/2012/0 ... owers/0/0/
http://www.farmersguardian.com/the-gree ... 84.article
