Can biofuels hurt the environment?

Here's a twist to the biofuel movement. Expanding the use of biofuels could result in burning down rainforests to facilitate growing more crops.

For example, there are plans to open 6 million hectares (a hectare is 10,000 square meters) to biofuel plantations in Indonesia, and environmentalists worry that suppliers will burn down trees to clear land for palm oil and sugar fields. Burning down trees that absorb greenhouse gasses would wipe out any climate-change advantage associated with burning cleaner fuels in automobiles.

Just another example of how delicate the balance of nature is.

Here are some related stories on this balance:

• Forest conservation beats fuel conservation
  
• USDA grants $4.2 million to turn biomass into fuel, reduce fire hazard
• Biofuels just another politically-expedient attempt to look green

[Source: Reuters via alertnet.org]