Environmental Engineering Reference
In-Depth Information
5
Biomass/Bioenergy
I'm the Lorax who speaks for the trees, which you seem to be chopping as fast as you
please.
—Dr. Seuss (
The Lorax
)
Even on the eve of the end of the world, plant a tree.
—Koran
The wretched and the poor look for water and find none,
Their tongues are parched with thirst;
But I the Lord will give them an answer,
I, the god of Israel, will not forsake them.
I will open rivers among the sand-dunes
And wells in the valleys;
I will turn the desert into pools.
And the dry land into springs of water;
I will plant cedars in the wastes,
And acacia and myrtle on the barren heath
Side by side with fir and box.
—
Isaiah
41:17-20
A nation that runs on oil can't afford to run short.
—Old oil industry slogan
Study: Fuels from corn waste not better, greener than gas.
Biofuels made from the leftovers of harvested corn plants are worse than gasoline
for global warming in the short term, a study shows, challenging the Obama admin-
istration's conclusions that they are a much cleaner oil alternative and will help fight
climate change.
Cappielo (2014)
INTRODUCTION
In an article in
The New York Times
, Thomas Friedman (2010) stated that, “The fat
lady has sung.” Specifically, Friedman was speaking about America's transition from
the “Greatest Generation” to what Kurt Anderson referred to as the “Grasshopper
Generation.” According to Friedman, we are “going from the age of government
handouts to the age of citizen givebacks, from the age of companions fly free to the
age of paying for each bag.” Friedman goes on to say that we all accept that our par-
ents were the greatest generation, but it is us that we are concerned about and that it is
the “we” that comprise the Grasshopper Generation: “We have been eating through
the prosperity that was bequeathed us like hungry locusts.”
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