Agricultural research for the Tropics: caught between energy demands and food needs.

Publikations-Art

Zeitschriftenbeitrag (peer-reviewed)

Autoren

Asch, F., Huelsebusch, Chr.

Erscheinungsjahr

2009

Veröffentlicht in

Journal of Agriculture and Rural Development in the Tropics and Subtropics

Band/Volume

110/1

Seite (von - bis)

75-91

The use of plant biomass for fuel is almost as old as mankind. However, a continuously growing population and the increasingly rapid exploitation of both fossil fuels and natural resources such as soil, water and biodiversity, have stimulated a debate of how to balance the needs and demands for food, feed, non-food raw materials and most recently energy in agricultural systems. Against the background of the current population growth, mankind faces the problem that the global system is closed and the available resources are finite. Energy is the only resource constantly supplied to the system from outside. All energy resources available on earth are in one way or the other transformations
of one of the four following: a) solar energy - which can be exploited directly, is transformed into biomass by photosynthesis, and drives the global wind and water cyle, b) tidal force owing to gravitational pull between earth and moon, c) the earth’s internal heat exploited as geothermic energy and d) nuclear energy. Of these, solar, tidal and geothermic energy are energy sources, which are not finite in time periods humans can still grasp. Based on data on fossil fuel reserves and consumption figures....(continue)