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by AstralStorm 2338 days ago
Growing biomass is carbon neutral, burning fuel derived from it never is.

Thus even bioethanol is not carbon neutral unless used in chemistry where it's not burnt.

2 comments

> Growing biomass is carbon neutral,

No, growing biomass sequesters carbon.

> burning fuel derived from it never is.

Burning fuel derived from biomass releases the carbon sequestered in growing it. So, the whole process is carbon neutral.

(Yes, that means fossil fuels are carbon neutral viewed over the entire time window from when the biomass from which they were derived was grown. They aren't carbon neutral over the timescales we care about, but anything derived from recent and sustainable biomass production is.)

Growing biomass is carbon negative, burning biomass is carbon positive. If you combine the two, and your biomass production process doesn't itself require carbon releases (fertilizer, diesel for farm equipment, etc) then the entire process can be carbon neutral.