Where Sources of Biofuel are Planted is Key
The conversion of forest to oil palm (which is increasingly used as a source of biofuel) could actually hasten climate change by removing one of the world's most efficient carbon storage tools, intact tropical rain forests, according to Finn Danielson, the lead scientist in the study.
Oil Palm Plantation
Other tropical crops that are used for the production of biofuels such as soybean, sugar cane and jatropha are likely to have similar impacts, according to the Physorg.com article.
The study, which is posted in the Conservation Biology Journal, states that reducing deforestation is likely to represent a more effective climate-change mitigation strategy than converting tropical forest for biofuel production.
Planting biofuels on degraded grasslands, instead of tropical rain forest would produce a net removal of carbon from the atmosphere in 10 years, but it would take more than 75 years when biofuel plantations are established on forest lands.
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