Mandate for Biofuels Production Requires Science-Based Policy
URBANA – In his State of the Union Address on January 23, 2007, President Bush stated that, in order to substantially lower foreign oil imports, “We must increase the supply of alternative fuels, by setting a mandatory fuels standard to require 35 billion gallons of renewable and alternative fuels in 2017.”
[ ]…”Increasing the production of cellulosic materials to produce alternative fuels could have many social and environmental benefits, but it could also create problems for the environment and society that we haven’t anticipated. In some instances we haven’t had time to do the research while, in others, we have overlooked the obvious.”
Wander said that the article in Science cautions that although cellulosic feedstocks show promise by lessening the need for nitrogen fertilizer and other chemical inputs, the effects on biodiversity, water and soil could be negative if marginal land is claimed in order to prevent competition with food crops.
With all respect to M’s Wander and the University of Illinois lets not get carried away. Science based decisions, rather then faith or special interests based. That’s madness. Nothing positive could come of that. Isn’t the market supposed to decide whether a product or resource is used regardless of environmental considerations. Then there are all those regulations. Recent housing and financial news, years in the making, suggests we’re a nation that loves to let disasters simmer and build up to an appreciable level of drama. While there more imminently colorful catastrophes then water and food shortages caused by producing cheaper fuels so people could enjoy the height of Jeffersonian ideals like the Cadillac Escalade and the Humvee, some strict laissez faire old timers might get a kick out of it.
First this research is from the University of New South Wales in Sydney, Australia. Just my experience, but U.S. middle and high middle management might be a little more diverse then Australia so we don’t see this behavior as much now as say the sixties and seventies (Madmen), Why your boss is white, middle-class and a show off
Prehistoric behaviours, such as male domination, protecting what is perceived as their “turf” and ostracising those who do not agree with the group is more commonplace in everyday work situations than many of us want to accept, according to the research which was carried out in hospitals.
“This tribal culture is similar to what we would have seen in hunter gather bands on the savannah in southern Africa,” says the author of the paper, Professor Jeffrey Braithwaite, from the Institute for Health Innovation in the Faculty of Medicine.
[ ]…“It’s a surprise just how hard-wired this behaviour is,” says Professor Braithwaite. “It’s predictable that a group will ostracise a whistleblower, for instance. It’s not good, but it’s understandable in the tribal framework. It explains all sorts of undesirable behaviours, including bullying.”
Its not be a team player to fit in as much as be one of the white male dominant figure’s tribe. Those outside the tribe tend to suffer, but the enterprise may suffer as a negative environment effects producivity. I don’t have any studies at the moment that show whether minorties or women tend to take on many of the same bad habits as they more up the power structure.
inkbluesky 