His stance on ethanol sets Cal professor apart

It began benignly enough as an assignment for the 15 freshmen in Tad Patzek's UC Berkeley college seminar class. But it soon mushroomed into something much larger.

Patzek found himself in the national spotlight as his scientific paper published in June touched raw nerves throughout the nation's energy and farm industries. Gas prices were climbing higher; Congress was in the midst of drafting an energy policy; and the article criticized one possible solution -- making ethanol fuel from corn.

Hundreds of newspapers wrote about the publication. E-mails flooded Patzek's in-box. People yelled at him over the phone. He was invited to the National Press Club in Washington to debate the issue and to Chicago to speak to investors.

Patzek and David Pimentel, a Cornell scientist who had been a lone public voice against corn ethanol for more than 30 years, argued that corn ethanol did the environment more harm than good. Growing corn, fertilizing the fields, transporting it to the factories and then out to where it was needed took more energy than the resulting ethanol would ultimately generate, they said.

Detractors, including corn growers, federal government researchers and other academics, took offense at Patzek's stance. They saw ethanol as an environment-friendly way of reducing the nation's dependence on foreign fossil fuels.

Opponents pointed to Patzek's oil industry days, saying he had ulterior motives. They said he and Pimentel knew nothing about agriculture and had relied on irrelevant data. They even criticized the premise of Patzek's arguments, which were based on the first and second laws of thermodynamics.

Patzek, 52, took the criticisms in stride. He is a mostly good-humored man who possesses an unflappable, but not pretentious, confidence in his intellect. And having grown up in post-World War II Poland under the Communist regime, he already knew well the role of rebel.

Patzek's rebellious roots extend at least as far back as his grandfather, a Polish officer during World War II who spent five years in a German concentration camp. To stave off the boredom and despair that permeated the camp, Patzek's grandfather, a physicist, taught physics to anyone who would listen, and organized a theater.

In postwar Poland, Patzek's father also rebelled. He joined a student militia group when the Russian army liberated the town of Gliwice where he was studying at the university. When he fired on Russian soldiers threatening some women, he was expelled, although later allowed to return. He also refused to join the Communist party, though the choice meant he could not teach despite a doctorate in chemical engineering.

As a young boy, his father continually quizzed Patzek, giving him hypothetical situations, then asking him to decide between right and wrong.

In high school, Patzek took his education into his own hands. He liked learning on his own better than at school and began staying home three of six days to study. When his teachers got wind of his program, they agreed to it, but only if he met higher standards than the other students.

Patzek rebelled against Communism in high school and college. His views were so well-known that like his father he was forbidden to teach at Silesian Technical University after graduating with a master's degree. Communist officials told him he would "deprive the Polish youth of their innocence."

While a graduate student at the Polish Academy of Sciences, Patzek, then 26, helped organize the first Solidarity chapter at the chemical engineering center -- before it was legal to do so.

If the foundation of his defiance was laid in Poland, so too was a fierce loyalty to the environment. His family's house lay on the edge of fields and forest that stretched as far as the eye could see. Returning for a visit to Poland in 1991 after 10 years in the United States, he saw the destruction wrought by industrialization. Large homes had replaced the fields. Gone were the swamp, creeks, frogs and storks.

"It was affirmation of what I already knew," he said. "That we humans do a lot of bad things to the environment."

Patzek's life is nearly consumed by his work. "He is a workaholic, that's for sure," said his wife of 25 years, Joanna.

When not at work, he's often reading, late at night and during meals. He even reads while they watch a movie, though that doesn't stop him from commenting, she said. Typical books have titles such as "Carbon-Nitrogen-Sulfur, the Environmental Science of Dirty Water," "The Solar Fraud: Why Solar Energy Won't Run the World" and the three-part volume of "A History of Common Human Delusions."

At parties and at the dinner table, he's always teaching or prompting discussions around "what we should and shouldn't do," Joanna Patzek said. Current topics include saving water with shorter showers, dangerous chemicals in cosmetics and, of course, ethanol.

In his personal life, Patzek thinks somewhat obsessively about how to be a good citizen to the environment. During the summer, he rides his bike a few times a week to UC Berkeley from the Oakland hills. He drives his Nissan Altima, which gets 34 miles per gallon, only about 8,000 miles a year. Walks on the beach were never just that; he, his wife and their three grown children are always armed with bags to pick up trash. Insulating his house is an ongoing project, and he plans to try solar panels on the roof.

But until he joined the corn ethanol debate, Patzek's professional work didn't touch directly on environmental concerns. Instead, he focused on energy, working for seven years at Shell Development Co. His contribution to society was to help provide the fossil fuels it needed, he told himself.

By the time he left Shell, his philosophical views had changed. "I realized that society will never have enough energy," Patzek said. "We are incurable addicts. Our national policy is to satisfy the addict."

As a professor at UC Berkeley, he continued research that looked at how to efficiently extract fossil fuels. But he was bothered by the increasing environmental damage done as the oil fields became depleted. He began thinking about how he as a scientist could take a bigger, more relevant and more holistic approach to society's problems.

The ethanol corn debate may have thrust him into just that. What started almost as a whim after reading a book by Pimentel has become much larger. Patzek is now planning a center at UC Berkeley to take a careful look at all energy sources, including fossil fuels, biofuels like ethanol, solar and nuclear. He wants scientists to devise a common framework for evaluating the advantages and disadvantages of each. Such a forum is necessary to inform U.S. policy, he said.

Patzek's opponents on the other side of the corn ethanol discussion have similar concerns about the diminishing supply of fossil fuels.

But to hear them debate one can't help but wonder whether either hears anything the other says. Each accuses the other of misrepresenting, misusing and excluding data, as well as not understanding the full scope of the problem. And while supporters argue corn ethanol can be part of the energy solution, Patzek argues vehemently that it cannot.

"However you look at it, this is a rather inefficient way of concentrating solar energy into fuel," he said. It takes more energy to make ethanol than what is produced, he said.

In addition, he argues that ultimately, ethanol can contribute only a single-digit portion of the nation's fuel. Yet it causes environmental damage with pesticides and fertilizers, and co-opts land that could otherwise be dedicated to food.

There is no magic bullet to replace fossil fuels, Patzek said. He says the United States drastically needs to reduce its energy use. Fuel efficiency standards need to rise. People must commute less by living closer to work. Food should be produced locally, instead of shipped and trucked from far-away places.

Patzek's harshest critics in the corn ethanol debate say he is ignorant and arrogant.

"I think he needs to do his homework, spend some time actually learning things before he talks about them," said Bruce Dale, a professor of chemical engineering and materials science at Michigan State University.

Friendlier opponents, like Rick Tolman, CEO of the National Corn Growers Association, say Patzek has no practical knowledge of farms or a typical ethanol production plant. Nonetheless, Patzek earned Tolman's respect at the National Press Club debate when he remained composed and friendly even when eight people consecutively stood up to shoot his logic down.

"Patzek's point is the same as ours," said John Sheehan, a senior engineer at the National Renewable Energy Laboratory in Colorado. "The size of the energy problem is huge."

For the sake of the country, the differences between the two sides should be worked out, Sheehan said.

"It has to be worked out," he said. "Because this country has to make rational choices."

Another link:
http://www.coe.berkeley.edu/labnotes/0305/patzek_print.html

"All told, he believes that the cumulative energy consumed
in corn farming and ethanol production is six times
greater than what the end product provides your car
engine in terms of power."

As with biodiesel, fuel ethanol might be a worthwhile use
of an otherwise wasted crop (e.g. pest infested and
unsuited for consumption), but I suspect the prof has a
point about the net energy budget.

"ever heard the term "free market"?"

The government regulates automobiles, including the fuel efficiency. We are looking at ways to reduce consumption, have a cleaner environment, etc. and people want to drive vehicles that put out 3 times the pollution and use 3 times the fuel as an ordinary car. It makes sense to raise the fuel efficiency and that would be a big step in solving the problem IMO. There is no need to be driving vehicles that get 10 mpg.

"Hint: If you don't believe in personal freedom in an area like this, you're not really conservative."

Well I guess I am not conservative on this issue then because it makes no sense to be driving vehicles that get 10 mpg. That is our problem in this country. Get higher efficiency and most of our problem is solved.

The free market is a superb engine for economic stability in those markets in which it is actually relevant; the energy environment is not one. Professors Smalley and Deffeyes (both at Rice) and their writings, especially Prof. Deffeyes' book: '' View From Hubbert's Peak'' authoritately explains the anomaly that is the energy exploration, transportation, consumption and replishment so-called markets.

I think if America uses more ethanol as an additive to gasoline they should forget about using corn, which is not a very efficient crop to get large amounts of ethanol. How about growing really high carbohydrate count plants like sugar beets, soybeans, and jojoba beans (in the desert regions) to meet the ethanol need?

After all, Brazil gets its own ethanol for motor fuels sourced from sugar cane, which is a high-carbohydrate plant.

If gasoline hits the $5/gallon mark will ethanol be more cost effective? Ethanol is a renewable resource that we can produce ourselves. I would rather put our own farmlands to work than contribute to the wealth of a middle eastern country.

I have read up a bit on the subject and it is interesting. Try visiting http://www.ethanol.org/ or http://www.e85fuel.com/index.php

Ethanol is currently the best replacement for gasoline at the current time. Most gasoline now has a 6& to 8% ethanol content (check the stickers on the pump next time you fill up). Why don't we bump up the ethanol percentage and it will help reduce our gasoline usage.

"I might not agree with the choices other people make, but that doesn't give me or you the right to dictate every aspect of other people's lives."

When their choices cause 3 times the pollution and I am having to breath that pollution, I think it does entitle me to have a say in what types of automobiles are sold. That is where personal freedom interferes with my freedom to breath clean air.

You nailed that one--these guys are getting all the credit for what thousands of other scientists have been questioning for a decade. I and countless others have never seen any credible evidence that burning ethanol produces a net energy gain. Using ethanol is more a way of using excess corn production and I think that is fine for that purpose. I have to confess, I am a part-time farmer myself and have raised lots of corn over the years.

Again, I say coal and nuclear are in our energy future. We will have to control the nasty pollutants but coal can be used to make diesel, gasoline and natural gas should the need arise.

If we are driving SUVs that put out 3 times the pollution because they use 3 times the fuel of an ordinary car, then it does not make sense to allow them to be sold.

That may be fine for where you live, but you won't be getting through a North Dakota blizzard in a Yugo. Chances are you'd freeze to death unless someone in one of those evil SUVs or a whopping large pickup stopped to pick you up (which they would).

My point is that not everyone has the same vehicle needs, so do not judge everyone by the standards of the more temperate latitudes. If a vehicle has less than 4 inches of minimum ground clearance (lowest point) around here it isn't really suitable for winter use unless it is a snowmobile.

..."because it makes no sense to be driving vehicles that get 10 mpg. That is our problem in this country."

How do you know that there's no reason to drive a 10 mpg vehicle? Can you think of no reasons at all? I can think of many. So, just leave the decision making up to me. I'll be the arbiter of who is, and who isn't "allowed" to drive such vehicles. I'll be the car-czar, and everything will be so much better. Please send me all pertinent info regarding your family size, driving habits, current vehicles owned, etc, so that I can approve or disapprove of your vehicle choice. I'm much more qualified to decide what kind of car you need than you are.

There is no need to be driving vehicles that get 10 mpg

Firstly, even the largest generally-purchased SUVs get nearly double that on the highway.

Secondly, maybe you don't need and SUV, but plenty of people do.

From hauling plywood/drywall, to hauling a boat, RV or trailer, to living in rural areas, to needing a vehicle capable of plowing a driveway, there are plenty of non-professional reasons to own a SUV, plus they are invaluable to tradespeople (I include pickups and FS vans as SUVs because they are essentially the same chassis).

Sure, there are some people who don't need an SUV and buy one anyway, but there are plenty of people that need the features that only SUVs can provide (especially since fs station wagons were driven out of the market by the very same laws that your are advocating).

When you need an SUV rarely, you can rent one. At some point, though, the cost of renting an SUV on top of your regular vehicle exceeds the cost of buying the SUV outright. Until you can afford both an SUV and a more economical car, the SUV is the only choice.

"Freedom of choice...."

A person's freedom of choice should not interfere with my rights to breath clean air. Should I be able to play loud rock music all night long and disturb my neighbor because it is my "freedom of choice" to play rock music. I don't think so.

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