Rethink biofuel, says Nobel laureate

A Nobel laureate has cautioned the government against rushing into biofuel development because there’s little energy to be gained from it.

Dr. Hartmut Michel, the 1998 Nobel Prize winner for chemistry, who was in Manila last week for a talk, said investing in biofuel development was “counterproductive.”
“When you calculate how much of the sun’s energy is stored in the plants, it’s below one percent,” he said at a forum at the Philippine International Convention Center in Pasay City on Wednesday.

“When you convert into biofuel, you add fertilizer, and then harvest the plants. There’s not real energy gained in biofuel,” said Michel, 59, whose prize-winning research with two other chemists dealt with the process of photosynthesis.

Inquirer