A paper to be published in Environment Magazine Tuesday says the production and use of petroleum fuels does generate indirect greenhouse gas emissions and that they are potentially large. The report says military activities related to acquiring and protecting oil imports from the Middle East generate significant GHG emissions that have so far been unaccounted for in fuel and climate regulations. In the paper University of Nebraska Professors Adam Liska and Richard Perrin write that the greenhouse gas emissions from that military activity are relevant to U.S. fuel policies related to climate change.
Renewable Fuels Association President Bob Dinneen says the paper represents a groundbreaking development in the study of indirect GHG emissions. According to Dinneen this is a landmark study in that it is the first rigorously researched and published estimate of this source of indirect emissions for oil. To date the debate over indirect emissions has been narrowly focused only on biofuels and the concept of land use change.
Using previously published estimates of the fraction of military expenditures attributable to securing oil supplies, the authors found the consequential approach to military security emissions alone is 17.5 grams carbon dioxide equivalent per mega-joule. A recent Purdue University Study estimated theoretical indirect land use change emissions tied to corn ethanol expansion at 13.9 g/MJ.
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