Brazil is known for land exploitation, urbane beach-life, slums, traffic jams and, recently, gang violence. In our columns “Spinning Data, Spinning Wheels,” 20 Sept 2004 and “Regional Rigor Mortis,” 6 June 2005 at db4.dev.baconsrebellion.com we summarized the state of traffic congestion in Sao Paulo, Brazil’s largest urban agglomeration this way:
In the Brazilian New Urban Region of Sao Paulo:
The extremely rich travel by helicopter
Daredevils ride motorbikes
The very poor walk
The vast majority of the region’s 20-million citizens who attempt to travel in buses, jitneys or cars are stuck in traffic jams that stretch for 60 miles.
Now comes news of ironic twists with respect to energy and mobility that should concern those who are contemplating the future of transport in the Commonwealth.
Because Brazil is petrochemical-poor it has worked to achieve “energy independence” by generating ethanol from sugar cane. Warren Brown opens his WaPo “On Wheels” column (page G 1 28 May 2006) with a summary of why he found it hard to favorably review the Audi Q7, a $60,000 SUV that gets 19 mpg highway.
Brown has just been to Brazil and he witnessed the social and economic impact of managing a nation-state to make the rich more rich and achieve energy independence. He noted “the debilitating poverty of much of the Brazilian population, including families sleeping along roadsides on the outskirts of Sao Paulo.” His column is worth reading for the irony of his take on the “free” market.
There has been a lot of coverage recent in MainStream Media on the economic, environmental and social impacts of converting the Mid-West (and Virginia) into an ethanol factory. Brazil with lots of sun, water and cheap land has found a way to raise cane sufficient to fuel Autonomobiles for those who can afford them.
This form of energy independence is not a victory for sustainability.
The problem is the same one that makes throwing money at traffic congestion in Virginia a lose / lose proposition.
It is the human settlement pattern that generates huge private-vehicle travel demand, stupid!
Irony of irony’s. Also in WaPo today, the Metro section has an item on Roger and Victoria Sant donating $20 Million to the World Wildlife Fund for conservation. The Sant’s (who make their money from energy production–coal, nuke, hydro) are donating the money to help prevent Brazil from deforesting land. In general, that is a good thing for lots of reasons.
The irony is that the Sant’s money is going to keep the Brazilians from clearing land. What will they do on the deforested land? They will raise more sugar cane and become more energy independent. They can also raise soy beans and cattle and other products so those at the top of the economic food chain can pay for big cars like the Audi Q7 and cover the cost of helicopters.
One might tut-tut and suggest something more sustainable for Autonomobiles like hydrogen. As we will point out in future column the “hydrogen economy” and hydrogen to burn in Autonomobiles requires energy to produce hydrogen. Hydrogen does not grow on trees and cannot be pumped out of places where it has been stored for 2 or 3 billion years. It has to be produced with current, real-time energy.
Most of the energy consumed in the Untied States is used directly or indirectly for mobility and access and to heat and cool dysfunctionally located and designed buildings. Shifting to alternative energy sources means cutting down jungle to grow sugar cane, over fertilizing and dewatering the aquifers of Middle America to produce corn or putting up miles of wind farms.
Energy is not free and not without environmental impact.
Sustainability will depend on fewer people (See our post POPULATION AND SUSTAINABILITY of 25 May) and less energy consumption. That means Balanced Communities not alternative ways to produce energy that is wasted on dysfunctional settlement patterns.
EMR