My wife, Toree and I have decided to sell our van. Although finances play a part in us making this decision, it has largely been part of my wife’s seeing the Kingdom of God invading her life. Since we’ve surgically impaired one of us(yes it was me 😦 ) to stop having more children, a large van just doesn’t make much sense, especially at 16.7 mpg.
So the attractive choice in front of us is to go biodiesel. 45-50 mpg, environmentally sound, what more could one ask for. Yup, that is it! Decision has been made, I am ready to pull the trigger… until I read this article this morning with the following quote.
“Ethanol was initially promoted as a vehicle for America to cut back on foreign oil. In recent years, biofuels have also been touted as a way to fight climate change, but the food crisis does not augur well for ethanol’s prospects.
“It takes around 400 pounds of corn to make 25 gallons of ethanol,” Mr. Senauer, also an applied economics professor at Minnesota, said. “It’s not going to be a very good diet but that’s roughly enough to keep an adult person alive for a year.”
Now, I’ve heard in the past how the future of our great earth will greatly be benefited by us using Ethanol. The only thing is that it takes 400 lbs of it to make enough gas for me to drive to my favorite mall and back.
Someone needs to get fired. Who was the mathmetician who figured this out (more likely politician with some great kick backs). Yes, let’s take 400 lbs of edible, usable corn to make fuel. Do we not know people are actually dying of starvation. A person dies every 3.6 seconds. Every 3.6 seconds! That means in my 45 minute trip to my favorite mall in my ethanol juiced car 750 people will die of starvation. Again someone needs to get fired. Really. Seriously.
So back to my dilemna. Biodiesel. What evil is lurking behind that. How many vegetables am I killing in order to get to my Starbucks in the morning?
Guess this is another reason to ride by bike to get my coffee in the morning.
If you want to make a difference, I have just recently been introduced to a group that is getting their hands and feet into real life situations.
LifeWind International – The Village Changers
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Out of the desert and into the Sun... 
April 25, 2008 at 11:17 pm
The thing that I’ve been thinking about is this–all our solutions may be good…but when we do them without moderation they end up being just as big an evil as the thing we’re trying to solve…ick…
over population. I hate to be calloused but there are just to many people in the world.
This is part of the reason why Jessie (my wife) and I are seriously considering not having another child–at most adopting another. I just can’t think of a great reason to have one other than some esoteric concept of how I want my life to look…it certainly isn’t doing anything good for God’s good creation around me…and it might actually be in some ways a rejection of the children who are hurting for lack of care in their lives already…dunno..just thoughts I’ve been having of late.
Hey…you gotta show me about those little tags at the end of your posts…whatda they do?
April 26, 2008 at 1:52 am
Ethanol is a bad deal. Biodiesel isn’t. For one thing, you can use a ton of different things to make biodiesel, some of which are waste products. Diesel engines can also run on straight out vegetable oil once the engine gets started on diesel or biodiesel. Additionally, research is being done on very high yield oilseed crops that can grow on marginal land, such as land that is too salty to grow corn, rice or wheat. Moreover, diesel engines are inherently more fuel efficient, which is why most of Europe uses diesel cars. They’ve been dealing with $4 and up gas for a long time.
Did we take advantage of their experience and push for more diesel cars? Noooooo. 😛
Ethanol really ought to be done away with, especially the subsidies for ethanol which are criminal considering the amount of fuel it takes to make that 400 pounds of corn and move it around, not to mention people starving.
April 26, 2008 at 9:57 am
Thanks for the info. That makes me feel a lot better about biodiesel. Has the green movement hit there like it has here in WA and OR?
It is amazing that we would ignore the experience and science of Europe. Ahh, ignorance. Thanks again for the info.
April 26, 2008 at 10:10 am
Britt, I have loved to see the Lord’s journey be as practical as it has for you and Jessie even to the point of His life infecting you to the point of changing your views on children and adoption. That is great. May the Lord increase your tribe, whether through adoption or adaption. The more I think about adoption the more I really see the Lord’s life in it.
April 26, 2008 at 10:24 am
Kev (and Tor)…I was just thinking how amazing it is that your getting rid of your van for kingdom reasons…we can talk about gas prices and mileage and all that…but when those things become kingdom things–well it just shows how much work the Lord has done in your lives.
It’s just awesome. I’m continually astonished at how the Lord works with us.
Thanks for thinking deeply about these things…they are practical and they are kingdom issues.
Briz
April 26, 2008 at 10:29 am
And now for the TV! (“come on aren’t we taking this kingdom life a little too seriously” says the little red deviled Kevin on my shoulder.
April 27, 2008 at 12:12 am
Alas, Dallas is as backwards in such matters as any city could be. Our major achievement is light rail, which is a big help, but lots of the suburbanites bought Gigantormobiles before gas really shot up, and so you see a lot of expensive behemoths on the road. The Northwest has long been way more progressive in such matters than we have, Texans are more like the “Endangered Species Barbecue and Cookout” type of folks, lol. Dallasites sort of become green kicking and screaming all the way, I half expect whale blubber burgers or baby seal shishkabob to be the next big thing. 😉
But as always, there are always people who don’t fit in with the prevailing climate, and I think everyone everywhere will have to become more green. It will be a necessity.