The Dirty Underside of Lula's Clean Energy Revolution

When you fill up your car with a gasoline and ethanol blend most likely you are burning ethyl alcohol produced from U.S. corn. A few years from now, however, your commute may be powered by ethanol made from sugar cane cultivated in the Brazilian cerrado. An economic powerhouse dynamically bursting forth on to the world stage, Brazil is the Earth's largest producer of sugar cane ethanol. President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva has jumped on the ethanol bandwagon, repeatedly remarking that his country's fortunes depend on a future in which "we plant and harvest fuel." In São Paulo, a sprawling city of 18 million, motorists can fill up their tanks with either gasoline or ethanol, known in Brazil as alcool. Most opt for ethanol, not surprising given that this biofuel costs half the price of gasoline.

Though Brazil's exploration of ethanol production goes back to the 1920s, it wasn't until the 1970s that the industry started to gain any traction. Buffeted by the oil price shock of 1973, the country's military dictators grew concerned about Brazil's reliance on foreign imports of fossil fuels. Their solution: Pour government subsidies into the sugar industry and mandate ethanol distribution at the pumps. Today one can buy so-called "flex-fuel" cars (known as carros flex in Portuguese) that run on gasoline, ethanol, or any combination of both. Because ethanol is cheap, the public has bought up the cars, and currently a full 90 percent of new vehicles sold can run on alcool.

There's no escaping it: Brazil has become deeply committed to ethanol, and economists expect that "alcohol fever" could attract some $100 billion in investment. The industry hopes that this will lead to the construction of one hundred new distilleries by 2012, by which time domestic ethanol production will have doubled.

On the surface of it, Brazil's ethanol boom has proven to be both economically and environmentally desirable. The sugar cane-based fuel is 30 percent less expensive to produce than the corn-based variety coming from Iowa. Sugar ethanol is also efficient: One acre of sugar cane can yield more than twice as much ethanol as an acre of corn. Compared to corn, sugar cane also looks pretty environmentally friendly: Brazilian farmers use less fossil fuel to convert sugar cane to alcohol than Iowa's farmers do to produce corn ethanol. Even better, plant waste from sugar cane can be used to produce heat and electricity right in the distillery itself.

As a result of its turn toward ethanol, Brazil avoided emitting 600 million tons of carbon between 1974 and 2004. So what's with environmentalists who complain about ethanol -- won't they ever be satisfied?

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ALFONSO OMAR

6:40 PM ET

April 10, 2010

Developing Vs. Developed

The author seem oblivious to what is going on in the wider Brazilian society. Brazil is a developing country that has through is own ingenuity found a niche in the energy market that it can dominate. As the author acknowledged himself sugar cane ethanol is cleaner and better for the environment than what we here in the U.S. and what the Europeans are producing; so why is he bashing Brazil? From the British to the French, from the Germans, to the Americans, and Russians what the developing countries have learned is that a country needs an industrial and manufacturing base in order to develop, and they have taken this lesson to heart. For the developed countries to now tell those developing nations not to use their God given natural resources is beyond hypocritical, its insane.

If a hungry man sees a fat man eating cake and the fat man says " Don't be like me." what do think that hunger man is going to think. That he is keeping all the cake for himself. Perhaps we humans will destroy the world in our goal of becoming better off, but it seems like that is the price of development;and believe me the other 5 billion people outside of the West are willing to pay it.

SQUEEDLE

1:12 PM ET

April 12, 2010

Are you listening to

Are you listening to yourself? "why is he bashing Brazil?" Did you actually read the article? The author makes it pretty clear that first, he's not bashing Brazil specifically, but sugar cane industry in Brazil. As for why - terrible working conditions, continued violation of Brazil's own laws that protect the rainforest, and the emission of greenhouse gases far worse than carbon dioxide, like methane. It was pretty obvious to me.

"Perhaps we humans will destroy the world in our goal of becoming better off, but it seems like that is the price of development;and believe me the other 5 billion people outside of the West are willing to pay it."

It is unbelievably arrogant of you to speak for 5 billion people. I suspect a large number of them would would disagree with such a nonsensical statement, one which says you would be willing to destroy yourself in order to be better off.

I find President Lula's response that we are all "just jealous" and that we just don't want Brazil to be powerful, not only childish but disingenuous, and one which I keep hearing from citizens of other countries. The complaint rings hollow with me. If the US hates having anybody with economic power so much, we'd have done something to stop China, India and Japan a long time ago, and we'd have tried pretty hard to defeat the formation of the EU. Such accusations are baseless and a poor attempt to deflect valid criticism.

I am pretty sure most US businesses, for example, would love to have a newly enriched middle class in Brazil to purchase American products. Creating wealth in poor countries helps everyone. However, that is not what appears to be happening. I suspect the ones making money are a handful of capitalists of Spanish descent, literally at the expense of its displaced, poverty stricken indigenous population - basically the same thing that has been going on for the last 500 years. Perhaps it's that people have are deciding they aren't going to buy goods made by suffering hands any more.

PUMPERNICKEL

1:22 PM ET

spanish descent

Errr... We are not of spanish ascent in Brazil. Even though I sympathize with your broad argument regarding the paranoia that people in Brazil sometimes have towards western powers, you cannot deny that people from these countries also like to point a finger to Brazil as a way to purge their own sins.

IAN

5:55 PM ET

To you're first pragraph, I

To you're first pragraph, I agree, he was bashing the industry, rather than Brazil itself. However, as to the working conditions, while I agree with how bad they most likely are and see that as a massive failing, the West went through the very same thing, child labour, horrid working conditions, etc. in the 1800's in order to modernize society. Just because we are now "past that", should we now not allow Brazil to develop themselves, instead holding them back (that's exactly how they see it). Bad things happen when industry expands at an exponential rate. As it levels off and people generally get more money and education, things improve. Hopefully it doesn't last long in Brazil and they can continue their growth under a better, more humane ideal.

To your "I find President Lula's response that we are all "just jealous"...". Ummm, I actually kind of agree with him on this one. The US has always considered the Western Hemishpere its own backyard, after all, they are called the Americas and the US is American... Brazil, could easily become a thorn in the US's backside as a world leader who doesn't see eye to eye with "American" interestes. If other American nations align with Brazil rather than the US, a "revolution" of sorts could happen in the US home soil, sparking a further loss of respect and persuasive power throughout the world. While the US would never say anything like that aloud, I'm sure there are people in some circles of government who think this way and are looking at ways to slow down or make Brazil's economic development more dendant on US support. As for the other nations you mentioned and the EU, those are either longterm allies or people that act as a bulwark against possible enemies, so should be strong, just never strong enough to directly threaten the US, whic they mostly aren't. In the end, the criticism is still valid, though.

I totally agree with the ending, except the part about people buying stuff from suffering workers. That will never stop, because its cheaper, and man loves money. The more the better, and if they have to spend it, it better be cheap.

MIKE GREEN

7:48 PM ET

Brazil's ethanol success

This article seems more like an effort to discredit growing global recognition for Brazil's successful ethanol production than an attempt to inform. Many of the arguments are badly outdated, incomplete or just plain false. If you're going to mention cane cutters, you're deceiving your readers if you don't add that the cane harvest is mechanizing rapidly in Brazil, and companies are busy developing retraining programs so cuters can either be reabsorbed by the industry in new, better qualified and better paying jobs, or take jobs in other sectors. The cane burn is also mentioned, but the fact that it will end later this decade is omitted, which seems less than transparent on the author's part. The entire point about the Atlantic Forest is simply false. Yes, most of the Atantic Forest has been cut down, and the author correctly explains that the forest has been replaced by what is today Brazil's most developed region, along the Atlantic coast. What the author doesn't say is that sugarcane regions are not along the coast, with the exception of Brazil's Northeast, which accounts for only about 10% of the country's cane fields. There is no established correlation between sugarcane growing and the cutting down of the Atlantic Forest, and any inference about the existence of large amounts of cane in the Amazon is equally false - the entire northern region of Brazil, which is very large and includes the Amazon, accounts for only 0.3% of the country's sugarcane and has seen no expansion - this is public data, which I was able to obtain rather easily and find it difficult to believe the author had no knowledge of.

11:28 AM ET

but there are problems

Even though I agree with you on the alarmist tone of the article, it cannot be denied that all the concerns expressed by the author are widespread through brazilian society. there are improvements, to be sure, but we cannot lower the guard,

JACK34

6:44 AM ET

Ethanol & Environmental Effects

Ethanol produced from sugarcane provides energy that is renewable and less carbon intensive than oil. Bioethanol reduces air pollution thanks to its cleaner emissions, and also contributes to mitigate global warming by reducing greenhouse gas emissions.
One of the main concerns about bioethanol production is the energy balance, the total amount of energy input into the process compared to the energy released by burning the resulting ethanol fuel. This balance considers the full cycle of website hosting and the producing the fuel, as cultivation, transportation and production require energy, including the use of oil and fertilizers. A comprehensive life cycle assessment commissioned by the State of São Paulo found that Brazilian sugarcane based ethanol has a favorable energy balance, varying from 8.3 for average conditions to 10.2 for best practice production. This means that for average conditions one unit of fossil-fuel energy is required to create 8.3 energy units from the resulting ethanol. These findings have been confirmed by other studies

11:24 AM ET

It's partly true

Though the environmental and humanitary concerns are valid,I think the report fails to say that Brazil is investing a lot to improve ethanol producing technology. Just recently, I heard, a state-of-the art research facility has been created in São Paulo state to improve on ethanol technology. This been said, I also believe the world community has to put pressure on Brazil to do things right, regarding the environment and labor conditions.

CTHORNE

3:29 PM ET

Brazil's energy independence

The best thing the US can import from Brazil is its resolve to become energy independent.

Otherwise, it is clear that the questions about labor and environmental standards in Brazil should give pause to anyone who promotes Brazilian ethanol over US grain or cellulosic ethanol.

NENEM

1:09 PM ET

May 4, 2010

Things are different outside Brasilia

I live in Recife, Northeast of Brazil.
This is the second largest producer of sugarcane in Brazil (the largest is Sao Paulo).

In the offices of Brasilia, the Presidential speech makes it look like Brazil is concerned with the world Environment.

Over here, sugarcane and ethanol are just business, as it has been for nearly 500 years.
Cane croppers are still paid minimum wage (US$ 300/month) to work under the Sun for ten hours a day.
Fire is still used to prepare the plantations for cropping.

When the price of sugar goes up (as it happened recently), the crop is directed to sugar, instead of ethanol fuel.
Brazilians are not more concerned with environmental issues than the American farmers are.

Foreign Policy Magazine

Inside National Security

Brazil's biofueled paradise is looking more and more like a carbon-spewing wasteland.

BY NIKOLAS KOZLOFF | APRIL 9, 2010

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