Should agroenergy serve life or capital?

Leonardo Boff

15/11/2010

Opinión

^-A ⁺A

In a previous article, we tackled energy as one of the main enigmas of the universe, especially the Underlying Energy that sustains the cosmos and every being. Now we will look at agroenergy, highly coveted at present, given the rapid depletion of the fossil energy matrix. It is like a sort of Noah's Arc savior of the present system.

Naturally, energy, no matter its type, is indispensable for everything. In particular, it is the motor of the market economy, and of all civilization.

Anyone who wants a well documented summary of the topic from a global perspective, going through the producer countries and analyzing the principal agrocombustibles and bioenergy in general, should read François Houtart: Agroenergy: a climate solution or a way out of the crisis of capital (La agroenergía: solución para el clima o salida de la crisis para el capital, Editorial Ruth, 2009). Houtart, a Belgian sociologist, is well known in the Third World for having founded the Centre Tricontinental, CETRI, (Tricontinental Center) in Leuven, Belgium, where he forms high level teams from the Great South, among them many Brazilians, to take transformational actions in their home countries. He is one of the founders and promoters of the World Social Forum.

Renewable energy is a response to two imperatives: first, the rapid depletion of hydrocarbons, about 40 years for oil; 60 for gas, and 200 for coal. Second, is the protection of the environment and control of global warming that, if not addressed, will endanger all of civilization.

Even so, agroenergy as a substitute for fossil fuels is not attainable, even in the medium term. In 2012, it will represent only 2% of global energy consumption, and could reach 7% in 2030 only if all arable land from Australia, New Zealand, Japan and South Korea were used. If all Earth's productive lands were utilized, the equivalent of oil production would be attained, namely, 1.4 billion barrels a day. Present demand is at 3.5 billion, and rising. Here a systemic impasse appears, that should cause us to look for a different mode of production and consumption, one that is less energy voracious.

If there were a sense of the collective future, compassion for the suffering of humanity, a large part of which is subjected to hunger, lack of potable water, and every kind of disease, and if we prevailed in caring for Mother Earth, against whom we are waging total war; on the ground, under ground, in the air, the rivers and oceans, we would think seriously about finding a way of inhabiting the planet in greater synergy with the rhythms of nature, with collective responsibility to include everyone, and with benevolence towards the community of life. The time to do so is now. But we lack the requisite wisdom, and still believe in the illusory possibilities of the disastrous capitalist system that has brought us to the present impasse.

The drama surrounding alternative energies lies in the fact that they have been kidnapped by the logic of capital. Its objective is always profit, and it never considers the «externalities», that do not enter into the economic calculus, (the degradation of nature, air pollution, global warming, the growth of poverty.) They are only taken seriously when they become so negative that that harm the capitalist system. Thus, let us not deceive ourselves with enterprises that brag about the "green" character of their production. «Green» is good, as long as it neither affects profits nor diminishes competitiveness.

This must be clearly said: the search for clean alternative energies does not look for ways of saving humanity and its vital capabilities. Rather, it seeks to preserve the capitalist system, with its win-lose logic.

This system, with disturbing flexibility and adaptation, can produce limitless goods and services, but only by exploiting nature, and creating perverse social inequalities. Today it rests on the limits of the Earth, whose resources are being exhausted. Marx's prediction, that capital would destroy the two sources of its wealth: nature and labor, is coming true. We are witnessing the fulfillment of that sinister prophesy.

Agroenergy cannot be used to revive a corpse, it must strengthen life, which demands a different means of production, and a non-destructive relationship with nature. Time is short to accomplish this, if we are not to be too late.

- Leonardo Boff, Theologian, Earthcharter Commission

(Free translation from the Spanish by Servicios Koinonia, http://www.servicioskoinonia.org, Refugio del Rio Grande, Texas, EE.UU.)

https://www.alainet.org/es/node/145490?language=en