cuba sugar ethanol aff and neg - unt 2013.docx

8/14/2019 Cuba Sugar Ethanol Aff and Neg - UNT 2013.docx

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Plan Text

The United States federal government should authorize the licensing of American companies to

participate in the development of Cubas sugar ethanol industry and allow Cuban sugar ethanol

imports.


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Contention 1: Sugar Ethanol Shift

Cuban sugarcane-based ethanol market is superior to American corn-based

ethanol. It will slow the rate of climate change, pesticide use, and dead zones.Specht 13[Jonathan-J.D. Wash. U St. Louis, Legal Advisor, Raising Cane: Cuban Sugarcane Ethanols Economicand Environmental Effects on the United States, Environmental Law & Policy Journal, Univ. of CaliforniaDavis, Vol. 36:2,http://environs.law.ucdavis.edu/issues/36/2/specht.pdf]

IV. Environmental Effects of EthanolAssuming that Cuba is able to meet all the challenges standing in

the way of creating a sugarcane-based ethanol industry, including the removal of U.S. legal

barriers, and it begins importing ethanol to the United States,the United States would

benefit environmentally in two ways.First, Cuban sugarcane-based ethanol would directly

benefit the United States by reducing the negative environmental effects of corn-based

ethanol production , to the extent to which it replaced domestically produced corn-based ethanol. n55 Second, by

reducing greenhouse gas emissions, Cuban sugarcane-based ethanol would indirectly

benefit the United States as well as the rest of the world by reducing the speed of global

climate change . n56A. Environmental Effects of Corn-Based EthanolA chief argument in favor of the

domestic corn-based ethanol industry is that it is environmentally beneficial because it

reduces greenhouse gas emissions. n57 Scientists, industry advocates, and critics hotly contest the degree to whichgreenhouse gas emissions are reduced by replacing a percentage of U.S. gasoline consumption with domestically-produced corn-basedethanol. It is beyond the scope of this Article to weigh in on which evaluation is correct. n58 [*182] Nonetheless, the factors that gointo these scientific evaluations, are important for understanding the larger picture of the ethanol issue, and thus will be discussed.

Using any form of ethanol as a transportation fuel combats climate change because the

carbon released when ethanol is burned was captured out of the atmosphere by the plants

used to make the ethanol.Contrastingly, the carbon released when gasoline is burned had been

stored in the earth for millennia in the form of crude oil. n59 This simple fact is complicated by the realitythat the entire process of getting ethanol into the fuel tanks of drivers - from growing crops,

to creating a refined product, to delivering blended ethanol to gas stations - is reliant on

fossil fuels. According to one report, "If corn growth required only photosynthesis, if ethanol were produced using solar power, ifcorn were instantly transported to ethanol plants, and if no land use changes were needed to grow the corn, then displacing a gallon ofgasoline with ethanol would reduce greenhouse gas emissions by approximately [the equivalent of] 11.2 kilograms of [carbon

dioxide]. However, fossil fuels are used to grow corn and produce ethanol." n60The debit side of

the domestic ethanol industry's climate-change ledger begins to subtract from the credit

side before the corn it uses is even planted. " America's corn crop might look like a sustainable, solar-

powered system for producing food, but it is actually a huge, inefficient, polluting machine that guzzles

fossil fuel." n61 While advocates for corn production would dispute this characterization of the industry as "inefficient" and

"polluting," it is undeniable that conventional corn production techniques use large amounts of

climate change-exacerbating fossil fuels. Conventional (non-organic) corn production techniques

involve annual applications of fertilizers and pesticides ,both largely derived from fossil

fuels . n62The process by which incentives for ethanol production change land use patterns

and thereby impact climate change , known as indirect land use change (ILUC), happens roughly as

follows. n63 By increasing demand for corn, corn-based ethanol production drives up the

price of corn. As the price of corn [*183] increases, farmers want to grow more of it . By making

corn more appealing to farmers to grow than other crops, and thereby increasing national levels of corn-
http://environs.law.ucdavis.edu/issues/36/2/specht.pdfhttp://environs.law.ucdavis.edu/issues/36/2/specht.pdf


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production, the corn-based ethanol industry makes the negative environmental effects of

corn production more widespread. Conventional corn-growing techniques involve applying

more pesticides and fertilizers to corn than is usually applied to other row cropssuch as

soybeans. n64 This effect is exacerbated when high corn prices disincentivize crop rotation. n65 A

common technique in American agriculture today is rotating corn and soybeans. n66 Because

soybeans are a nitrogen-fixing crop(that is, they take nitrogen out of the atmosphere and release it into the soil), corn

grown on land that was used to grow soybeans the year before requires a lesser input of nitrogen fertilizer. By boosting theprice of corn relative to other crops like soybeans, however, the domestic ethanol industry

encourages farmers to use the same piece of land to grow corn year after year. Growing

corn on the same land in successive years rather than rotating it with soybeans significantly

increases the climate change effects of corn production because "nitrogen fertilizer

applications are typically fifty pounds per acre higher for corn planted after corn" and

"nitrous oxide has a global warming potential more than 300 times that of [carbon dioxide]."

n67 Additionally, the application of fossil fuel-derived nitrogen fertilizer has other environmental

impacts beyond exacerbating climate change. The collective nitrogen runoff of the Mississippi River

basin has caused a process called hypoxia, which kills off most marine life, in a region of the

Gulf of Mexico.Scientists have linked the so-called Dead Zone to corn production and,

thus, to the domestic ethanol industry. n68


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most of the biosphere with us .The Black Sea is almostdead, 863 its once-complex and productive ecosystem almostentirely replaced by a monoculture of comb jellies, "starving out fish and dolphins, emptying fishermen's nets, and converting theweb of life into brainless, wraith-like blobs of


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plowing native grasslands in the Great Plains starkly outweigh their benefits. "Plowing up our nation's last remnants ofnative grasslands to grow more corn for ethanol is like burning the Mona Lisa for firewood." n90Along with grasslands,

wetlands are the other major habitat type in the Great Plains that are being damaged by

the domestic corn-based ethanol industry. The draining of wetlands to convert them to agricultural production is apractice in American agriculture that predates the domestic ethanol industry. n91 This trend has been exacerbated by a number of legaland policy factors unrelated to ethanol production (including a 2001 Supreme Court decision interpreting the [*187] Clean Water

Act). n92 To the extent that it increases demand for corn and thus the price of corn, however,

the domestic ethanol industry is clearly a factor driving the conversion of wetlands to corn

production. This conversion process is a land use change with wide-ranging environmental consequences. The Prairie

Pothole region of the Dakotas and surrounding states- which is composed of a mixture of

grasslands and wetlands - is a habitat of international significance. n93 Nearly forty percent of

all species of migratory birds in North America- over 300 species - utilize this habitat at

some point in their life cyclesor yearly migrations. n94 The region is where "millions of

ducks and geese are born each year." n95 The two greatest threats to North American ducks

are the destruction of wetlands and the degradation of prairies, both of which are being

driven by the expansion of U.S. corn production. n96 In addition to providing habitat for wildlife, both

grasslands and wetlands help to clean up pollution and prevent flooding. n97 "Those areas withnative vegetation, and the soils beneath their surface, also retain the water longer throughout the season and use up the water throughevapotranspiration." n98 Thus, converting grasslands and wetlands to cropland for corn increases the risk of flooding. n99Takentogether, the consequences of converting grasslands and wetlands in the Great Plains to increase corn production for the domestic

ethanol industry are devastating.If we proceed along the current trajectory without changingfederal

policies[including those promoting corn-based ethanol], the prairie pothole ecosystem may be

further degradedand fragmented, andthe many services it provides willbe impossible to restore. The region will

no longer be able to support the waterfowl cherished by hunters and wildlife enthusiasts across the country. Grassland bird

populations, already declining, will be unable to reboundas [*188] nesting sites are turned into row crops. Water

will become increasingly pollutedand costly to cleanas the grasslands and wetlands that once filteredcontaminants disappear. n100

Monoculture model independently causes extinction

Leahy 7[Stephen- international environmental journalist, Biodiversity:Farming Will Make or Break the FoodChain, Inter Press Service, 5-3-07,http://www.commondreams.org/archive/2007/05/03/945/]

"Ifall agricultural lands adoptthe industrial, monocultural model, there will beenormous impacts on

water andother essential services provided by diverse ecosystems," Jackson told IPS.Societies need to

recognize the value of ecosystem services and encourage farmers to use methods that benefit biodiversity, she says.Biodiversity

refers to the amazing variety of living things that make up the biosphere, thethin skin of life that

covers the Earthand is, as far as we know, unique in the universe. The trees, plants, insects, bacteria, birds

and animalsthat make up forest ecosystems produce oxygen, clean water, prevent erosion and

flooding, and capture excess carbon dioxide, among other things."There is an unbreakable link

between human health and well being and ecosystems," Walter Reid, director of the Millennium EcosystemAssessment (MA) and a professor with the Institute for the Environment at Stanford University, told IPS last year.The MA is a 22-million-dollar, four-year global research initiative commissioned by the United Nations, and carried out by 1,360 experts from 95countries. Its mission has been to examine ways to slow or reverse the degradation of the Earth's ecosystems, including a look at what

the future may be like in 2050.The more species and diversity there are in an ecosystem, the more

robust it is. Remove some species and it will continue to function. However, like a complex house of cards,removing key cards or too many cards results in a collapse .For many ecosystems such as oceans,

scientists do not know what the key cards are or how many lost species is too many.


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Scenario 3: Climate Change

Global Warming is happeningmost recent and best evidence concludes that

it is human induced

Muller7-28-20

12[Richard, professor of physics at the University of California, Berkeley, and a former MacArthur Foundation

fellow, The Conversion of a Climate-Change Skeptic, http://www.nytimes.com/2012/07/30/opinion/the-conversion-of-a-climate-change-skeptic.html?pagewanted=all]

CALL me a converted skeptic. Three years ago I identified problems in previous climate studies that, in my mind, threw doubt on the

very existence of global warming. Last year, followingan intensive researcheffort involving a dozen scientists,I

concluded that global warming was real and that the prior estimates of the rate of warming were correct . Im

now going a step further: Humans are almost entirely the cause. My total turnaround, in such a short time, is the

result of careful and objective analysis bythe Berkeley EarthSurfaceTemperature project, which I founded with my

daughter Elizabeth. Our results show that the average temperature of the earths land has risenbytwo and a half degrees Fahrenheit over the past 250 years, including an increase of one and a half degrees over the most recent

50 years. Moreover, it appears likely that essentially all of this increase results from the human emissionof greenhouse gases. These findings are stronger than those of theIntergovernmental Panel on Climate Change [IPCC],the United Nations group that defines the scientific and diplomatic consensus on global warming. In its 2007 report, the I.P.C.C.concluded only that most of the warming of the prior 50 years could be attributed to humans . It was possible, according to theI.P.C.C. consensus statement, that the warming before 1956 could be because of changes in solar activity, and that even a substantial

part of the more recent warming could be natural. Our Berkeley Earth approach usedsophisticated statisticalmethods developed largely by our lead scientist,Robert Rohde, whichallowed us to determine earthland

temperature much further back in time. We carefully studiedissues raised by skeptics: biases from

urban heating(we duplicated our results using rural data alone), from data selection(prior groups selected fewer than 20

percent of the available temperature stations; we used virtually 100 percent), frompoor station quality(we separately

analyzed good stations and poor ones) and from human intervention and data adjustment(our work iscompletely automated and hands-off). In our papers we demonstrate that none of these potentially troublesome effects undulybiased our conclusions. The historic temperature pattern we observed has abrupt dips that match the emissions of knownexplosive volcanic eruptions;the particulates from such events reflect sunlight, make for beautiful sunsets and co ol the earthssurface for a few years. There are small, rapid variations attributable to El Nio and other ocean currents such as the Gulf Stream;

because of such oscillations, the flattening of the recent temperature rise that some people claim is not,in our view, statistically

significant. What has caused the gradual but systematic rise of two and a half degrees? We tried fitting the shape to

simple math functions (exponentials, polynomials),to solar activity and even to rising functions likeworld population. By farthe best match was to the record of atmospheric carbon dioxide(CO2),measured from atmospheric samples and air trapped in polar ice.

CO2 is the primary driver of climate changeoutweighs all alt causesVertessy and Clark3-13-2012[Rob, Acting Director of Australian Bureau of Meteorology, and Megan, Chief ExecutiveOfficer at the Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation, State of the Climate 2012,http://theconversation.edu.au/state-of-the-climate-2012-5831]

Carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions account for about 60% of the effect from anthropogenic

greenhouse gases on the earths energy balanceover the past 250 years. These global CO2 emissions aremostly from fossil fuels (more than 85%),land use change, mainly associated with tropical deforestation (less than 10%), andcement production and other industrial processes (about 4%). Australia contributes about 1.3% of the global CO2 emissions. Energygeneration continues to climb and is dominated by fossil fuelssuggesting emissions will grow for some time yet . CO2 levels arerising in the atmosphere and ocean. About 50% of the amount of CO2 emitted from fossil fuels, industry, and changes in land-use, stays in the atmosphere.The remainder is taken up by the ocean and land vegetation, in roughly equal parts. The extra carbondioxide absorbed by the oceans is estimated to have caused about a 30% increase in the level of ocean acidity since pre-industrial

times. The sources of the CO2 increase in the atmosphere can be identified from studies of the

isotopic composition of atmospheric CO2 and fromoxygen (O2)concentration trends in the

atmosphere.The observedtrends in the isotopic (13C, 14C)composition of CO2 in the atmosphere and

the decrease in the concentration ofatmospheric O2 confirm that the dominant cause of the

observedCO2 increase is the combustion offossil fuels.
http://theconversation.edu.au/state-of-the-climate-2012-5831http://theconversation.edu.au/state-of-the-climate-2012-5831


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Global warming makes global agricultural production impossibleresulting

in mass starvation

Potsdam Institute, 2012(Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research and Climate Analytics, Turn Down theHeat: Why a 4C Warmer World Must be Avoided, A report for the World Bank, November,

http://climatechange.worldbank.org/sites/default/files/Turn_Down_the_heat_Why_a_4_degree_centrigrade_warmer_world_must_be_avoided.pdf)

The overall conclusionsof IPCC AR4 concerningfood production and agriculture includedthe following: Crop productivity is projected to increase slightly at mid- to high latitudes for local mean temperature increases of up to 1 to 3Cdepending on the crop, and then decrease beyond that in some regions (medium confidence) {WGII 5.4, SPM}. At lower latitude s,especially in seasonally dry and tropical regions, crop productivity is projected to decrease for even small local temperature increases

(1 to 2C) which would increase the risk of hunger (medium confidence) {WGII 5.4, SPM}. Globally, the potential for

food production is projected to increase with increases in local average temperature over a

range of 1 to 3C, but above this it is projected to decrease (medium confidence) {WGII 5.4, 5.5, SPM}.These findings clearly indicate a growing risk for low-latitude regions at quite low levels of temperature increase and a growing riskfor systemic global problems above a warming of a few degrees Celsius. While a comprehensive review of literature is forthcoming in

the IPCC AR5, the snapshot overview of recent scientific literature provided here illustrates that the concerns identified in

the AR4 are confirmed by recent literature and in important cases extended. In particular, impactsof extreme heat waves deserve mention here for observed agricultural impacts (see also Chapter 2). This chapter will focus on thelatest findings regarding possible limits and risks to large-scale agriculture production because of climate change, summarizing recentstudies relevant to this risk assessment, including at high levels of global warming approaching 4C. In particular, it will deliberately

highlight important findings that point to the risks of assuming a forward projection of historical trends. Projections for food

and agriculture over the 21st century indicate substantial challenges irrespective of climate

change. As early as 2050, the worlds population is expected to reach about 9 billion people (Lutz and Samir 2010) and demand forfood is expected to increase accordingly. Based on the observed relationship between per capita GDP and per capita demand for cropcalories (human consumption, feed crops, fish production and losses during food production), Tilman et al. (2011) project a globalincrease in the demand for crops by about 100 percent from 2005 to 2050. Other estimates for the same period project a 70 percentincrease of demand (Alexandratos 2009). Several projections suggest that global cereal and livestock production may need to increase

by between 60 and 100 percent to 2050, depending on the warming scenario (Thornton et al. 2011). The historical context

can on the one hand provide reassurance that despite growing population, food production

has been able to increase to keep pace with demandand that despite occasional fluctuations, food prices

generally stabilize or decrease in real terms (Godfray, Crute, et al. 2010). Increases in food production have mainly

been driven by more efficient use of land, rather than by the extension of arable land,with theformer more widespread in rich countries and the latter tending to be practiced in poor countries (Tilman et al. 2011). While grain

production has more than doubled, the area of land used for arable agriculture has only increased by approximately 9 percent

(Godfray, Beddington, et al. 2010). However, although the expansion of agricultural production has

proved possible through technological innovation and improved water-use efficiency,

observation and analysis point to a significant level of vulnerability of food production and

prices to the consequences of climate change , extreme weather, and underlying social and

economic development trends. There are some indications that climate change may reduce arable landin low-latitude regions, with reductions most pronounced in Africa, Latin America, and India (Zhang and Cai 2011). For example,

flooding of agricultural land is also expected to severely impact crop yields in the future: 10.7percent of South Asia s agricultural land is projected to be exposed to inundation, accompanied by a 10 percent intensification ofstorm surges, with 1 m sea-level rise (Lange et al. 2010). Given the competition for land that may be used for other human activities(for example, urbanization and biofuel production), which can be expected to increase as climate change places pressure on scarce

resources, it is likely that the main increase in production will have to be managed by an intensification of agriculture on the sameor

possibly even reducedamount of land (Godfray, Beddington et al. 2010; Smith et al. 2010). Declines in nutrient

availability(for example, phosphorus), as well as the spread in pests and weeds, could further limit

the increase of agricultural productivity.Geographical shifts in production patterns

resulting from the effects of global warming could further escalate distributional issues in

the future. While this will not be taken into consideration here, it illustrates the plethora of factors to take into account whenthinking of challenges to promoting food security in a warming world. New results published since 2007 point to a more rapidlyescalating risk of crop yield reductions associated with warming than previously predicted (Schlenker and Lobell 2010; Schlenker andRoberts 2009). In the period since 1980, patterns of global crop production have presented significant indications of an adverse effectresulting from climate trends and variability, with maize declining by 3.8 percent and wheat production by 5.5 percent compared to a


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case without climate trends. A significant portion of increases in crop yields from technology, CO2

fertilization, and other changes may have been offset by climate trends in some countries (Lobell et

al. 2011). This indication alone casts some doubt on future projections based on earlier cropmodels. In relation to the projected effects of climate change three interrelated factors are important: temperature-induced effect,

precipitation-induced effect, and the CO2 -fertilization effect. The following discussion will focus only on these biophysical factors.Other factors that can damage crops, for example, the elevated levels of tropospheric ozone (van Groenigen et al. 2012), fall outside

the scope of this report and will not be addressed. Largely beyond the scope of this report are the far-reaching and uneven adverseimplications for poverty in many regions arising from the macroeconomic consequences of shocks to global agricultural productionfrom climate change. It is necessary to stress here that even where overall food production is not reduced or is even increased with lowlevels of warming, distributional issues mean that food security will remain a precarious matter or worsen as different regions areimpacted differently and food security is further challenged by a multitude of nonclimatic factors.

4 degrees of warming make sustaining biodiversity impossiblethe impact is

extinction

Potsdam Institute, 2012(Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research and Climate Analytics, Turn Down theHeat: Why a 4C Warmer World Must be Avoided, A report for the World Bank, November,http://climatechange.worldbank.org/sites/default/files/Turn_Down_the_heat_Why_a_4_degree_centrigrade_warmer_world_must_be_avoided.pdf)

Ecosystems and their species provide a range of important goods and services for human society. These include water, food, culturaland other values. In the AR4 an assessment of climate change effects on ecosystems and their services found the following: If

greenhouse gas emissions and other stresses continue at or above current rates, the

resilience of many ecosystems is likely to be exceededby an unprecedented combination of change in climate,associated disturbances (for example, flooding, drought, wildfire, insects, and ocean acidification) and other stressors (global change

drivers) including land use change, pollution and over-exploitation of resources. Approximately 20 to 30 percent of

plant and animal species assessed so far are likely to be at increased risk of extinction, if

increases in global average temperature exceed of 23 above preindustrial levels. For increasesin global average temperature exceeding 2 to 3 above preindustrial levels and in concomitant atmospheric CO2 concentrations,

major changes are projected in ecosystem structure and function, speciesecological

interactions and shifts in species geographical ranges, with predominantly negative

consequences for biodiversity and ecosystem goods and services, such as water and food supply. It is

known that past large-scale losses of global ecosystems and species extinctions have been

associated with rapid climate change combined with other ecological stressors. Loss and/ordegradation of ecosystems, and rates of extinction because of human pressures over the last century

or more, which have intensified in recent decades, have contributed to a very high rate of extinction by geological

standards. It is well established that loss or degradation of ecosystem services occurs as a

consequence of species extinctions , declining species abundance, or widespread shifts in

species and biome distributions(Leadley et al. 2010). Climate change is projected to exacerbate the situation. Thissection outlines the likely consequences for some key ecosystems and for biodiversity. The literature tends to confirm the conclusionsfrom the AR4 outlined above. Despite the existence of detailed and highly informative case studies, upon which this section will draw,

it is also important to recall that there remain many uncertainties (Bellard, Bertelsmeier, Leadley, Thuiller, and

Courchamp, 2012). However, threshold behavior is known to occur in biological systems(Barnosky et al.

2012) and most model projections agree on major adverse consequences for biodiversity in a

4C world(Bellard et al., 2012). With high levels of warming, coalescing human induced stresseson ecosystems have the potential to trigger large-scale ecosystem collapse (Barnosky et al. 2012).

Furthermore, while uncertainty remains in the projections, there is a risk not only of major loss of valuable

ecosystem services, particularly to the poor and the most vulnerable who depend on them,

but also of feedbacks being initiatedthat would result in ever higher CO2 emissions and thus rates of global warming.Significant effects of climate change are already expected for warming well below 4C. In a scenario of 2.5C warming, severeecosystem change, based on absolute and relative changes in carbon and water fluxes and stores, cannot be ruled out on any continent(Heyder, Schaphoff, Gerten, & Lucht, 2011). If warming is limited to less than 2C, with constant or slightly declining precipitation,small biome shifts are projected, and then only in temperate and tropical regions. Considerable change is projected for cold and


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tropical climates already at 3C of warming. At greater than 4C of warming, biomes in temperate zones

will also be substantially affected. These changes would impactnot only the human and animal

communities that directly rely on the ecosystems, but would also exact a cost (economic and otherwise) onsociety as a whole, ranging from extensive loss of biodiversity and diminished land cover, through to loss of ecosystems services suchas fisheries and forestry (de Groot et al., 2012; Farley et al., 2012). Ecosystems have been found to be particularly sensitive togeographical patterns of climate change (Gonzalez, Neilson, Lenihan, and Drapek, 2010). Moreover, ecosystems are affected not only

by local changes in the mean temperature and precipitation, along with changes in the variability of these quantities and changes by

the occurrence of extreme events. These climatic variables are thus decisive factors in determining plantstructure and ecosystem composition (Reu et al., 2011). Increasing vulnerability to heat and

drought stress will likely lead to increased mortality and species extinction. For example,temperature extremes have already been held responsible for mortality in Australian flying-fox species (Welbergen, Klose, Markus,and Eby 2008), and interactions between phenological changes driven by gradual climate changes and extreme events can lead to

reduced fecundity (Campbell et al. 2009; Inouye, 2008). Climate change also has the potential to facilitate the

spread and establishment of invasive species(pests and weeds) (Hellmann, Byers, Bierwagen, & Dukes, 2008;

Rahel & Olden, 2008) with often detrimental implications for ecosystem services and biodiversity.Human land-use changes are expected to further exacerbate climate change driven ecosystem changes, particularly in the tropics,

where rising temperatures and reduced precipitation are expected to have major impacts (Campbell et al., 2009; Lee & Jetz, 2008 ).

Ecosystems will be affected by the increased occurrence of extremes such as forest loss

resulting from droughts and wildfire exacerbated by land use and agricultural expansion

(Fischlin et al., 2007). Climate change also has the potential to catalyze rapid shifts in ecosystems

such as sudden forest loss or regional loss of agricultural productivity resulting fromdesertification(Barnosky et al., 2012). The predicted increase in extreme climate events would also drive dramatic ecosystemchanges (Thibault and Brown 2008; Wernberg, Smale, and Thomsen 2012). One such extreme event that is expected to haveimmediate impacts on ecosystems is the increased rate of wildfire occurrence. Climate change induced shifts in the fire regime aretherefore in turn powerful drivers of biome shifts, potentially resulting in considerable changes in carbon fluxes over large areas(Heyder et al., 2011; Lavorel et al., 2006) It is anticipated that global warming will lead to global biome shifts (Barnosky et al. 2012).

Based on 20th century observations and 21st century projections, poleward latitudinal biome shifts of up to 400

km are possible in a 4 C world (Gonzalez et al., 2010). In the case of mountaintop ecosystems,for

example, such a shift is not necessarily possible, putting them at particular risk of extinction(La

Sorte and Jetz, 2010). Species that dwell at the upper edge of continents or on islands would face a

similar impediment to adaptation, since migration into adjacent ecosystems is not possible

(Campbell, et al. 2009; Hof, Levinsky, Arajo, and Rahbek 2011). The consequences of such geographical shifts, driven by

climatic changes as well as rising CO2 concentrations, would be found in both reduced species richness andspecies turnover (for example, Phillips et al., 2008; White and Beissinger 2008). A study by (Midgley and Thuiller, 2011)

found that, of 5,197 African plant species studied, 2542 percent could lose all suitable range by 2085. It should be

emphasized that competition for space with human agriculture over the coming century is

likely to prevent vegetation expansion in most cases(Zelazowski et al., 2011) Species composition

changes can lead to structural changes of the entire ecosystem , such as the increase in lianas in

tropical and temperate forests (Phillips et al., 2008), and the encroachment of woody plants in temperate

grasslands (Bloor et al., 2008, Ratajczak et al., 2012), putting grass-eating herbivores at risk of

extinction because of a lack of food availablethis is just one example of the sensitive intricacies of ecosystem responses to

external perturbations. There is also an increased risk of extinction for herbivores in regions of

drought-induced tree dieback, owing to their inability to digest the newly resident C4grasses(Morgan et al., 2008). The following provides some examples of ecosystems that have been identified as particularlyvulnerable to climate change. The discussion is restricted to ecosystems themselves, rather than the important and often extensiveimpacts on ecosystems services. Boreal-temperate ecosystems are particularly vulnerable to climate change, although there are largedifferences in projections, depending on the future climate model and emission pathway studied. Nevertheless there is a clear risk oflarge-scale forest dieback in the boreal-temperate system because of heat and drought (Heyder et al., 2011). Heat and drought relateddie-back has already been observed in substantial areas of North American boreal forests (Allen et al., 2010), characteristic ofvulnerability to heat and drought stress leading to increased mortality at the trailing edge of boreal forests. The vulnerability oftransition zones between boreal and temperate forests, as well as between boreal forests and polar/tundra biomes, is corroborated bystudies of changes in plant functional richness with climate change (Reu et al., 2011), as well as analyses using multiple dynamicglobal vegetation models (Gonzalez et al., 2010). Subtle changes within forest types also pose a great risk to biodiversity as different


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plant types gain dominance (Scholze et al., 2006). Humid tropical forests also show increasing risk of major climate induced losses. At4C warming above pre-industrial levels, the land extent of humid tropical forest, characterized by tree species diversity and biomassdensity, is expected to contract to approximately 25 percent of its original size [see Figure 3 in (Zelazowski et al., 2011)], while at 2Cwarming, more than 75 percent of the original land can likely be preserved. For these ecosystems, water availability is the dominantdeterminant of climate suitability (Zelazowski et al., 2011). In general, Asia is substantially less at risk of forest loss than the tropicalAmericas. However, even at 2C, the forest in the Indochina peninsula will be at risk of die-back. At 4C, the area of concern grows toinclude central Sumatra, Sulawesi, India and the Philippines, where up to 30 percent of the total humid tropical forest niche could bethreatened by forest retreat (Zelazowski et al., 2011). There has been substantial scientific debate over the risk of a rapid and abrupt

change to a much drier savanna or grassland ecosystem under global warming. This risk has been identified as a possible planetarytipping point at around a warming of 3.54.5C, which, if crossed, would result in a major loss of biodiversity, ecosystem services andthe loss of a major terrestrial carbon sink, increasing atmospheric CO2 concentrations (Lenton et al., 2008)(Cox, et al., 2004)(Kriegler, Hall, Held, Dawson, and Schellnhuber, 2009). Substantial uncertainty remains around the likelihood, timing and onset ofsuch risk due to a range of factors including uncertainty in precipitation changes, effects of CO2 concentration increase on water useefficiency and the CO2 fertilization effect, land-use feedbacks and interactions with fire frequency and intensity, and effects of highertemperature on tropical tree species and on important ecosystem services such as pollinators. While climate model projections for theAmazon, and in particular precipitation, remain quite uncertain recent analyses using IPCC AR4 generation climate indicates areduced risk of a major basin wide loss of precipitation compared to some earlier work. If drying occurs then the likelihood of anabrupt shift to a drier, less biodiverse ecosystem would increase. Current projections indicate that fire occurrence in the Amazon coulddouble by 2050, based on the A2 SRES scenario that involves warming of approximately 1.5C above pre-industrial levels (Silvestriniet al., 2011), and can therefore be expected to be even higher in a 4C world. Interactions of climate change, land use and agriculturalexpansion increase the incidence of fire (Arago et al., 2008), which plays a major role in the (re)structuring of vegetation (Gonzalezet al., 2010; Scholze et al., 2006). A decrease in precipitation over the Amazon forests may therefore result in forest retreat ortransition into a low biomass forest (Malhi et al., 2009). Moderating this risk is a possible increase in ecosystem water use efficiencywith increasing CO2 concentrations is accounted for, more than 90 percent of the original humid tropical forest niche in Amazonia islikely to be preserved in the 2C case, compared to just under half in the 4C warming case (see Figure 5 in Zelazowski et al., 2011)

(Cook, Zeng, and Yoon, 2012; Salazar & Nobre, 2010). Recent work has analyzed a number of these factors and their uncertaintiesand finds that the risk of major loss of forest due to climate is more likely to be regional than Amazon basin-wide, with the eastern andsoutheastern Amazon being most at risk (Zelazowski et al., 2011). Salazar and Nobre (2010) estimates a transition from tropicalforests to seasonal forest or savanna in the eastern Amazon could occur at warming at warming of 2.53.5C when CO2 fertilization isnot considered and 4.55.5C when it is considered. It is important to note, as Salazar and Nobre (2010) point out, that the effects ofdeforestation and increased fire risk interact with the climate change and are likely to accelerate a transition from tropical forests todrier ecosystems. Increased CO2 concentration may also lead to increased plant water efficiency (Ainsworth and Long, 2005),lowering the risk of plant die-back, and resulting in vegetation expansion in many regions, such as the Congo basin, West Africa andMadagascar (Zelazowski et al., 2011), in addition to some dry-land ecosystems (Heyder et al., 2011). The impact of CO2 inducedgreening would, however, negatively affect biodiversity in many ecosystems. In particular encroachment of woody plants into grasslands and savannahs in North American grassland and savanna communities could lead to a decline of up to 45 percent in speciesrichness ((Ratajczak and Nippert, 2012) and loss of specialist savanna plant species in southern Africa (Parr, Gray, and Bond, 2012).Mangroves are an important ecosystem and are particularly vulnerable to the multiple impacts of climate change, such as: rise in sealevels, increases in atmospheric CO2 concentration, air and water temperature, and changes in precipitation patterns. Sea-level rise cancause a loss of mangroves by cutting off the flow of fresh water and nutrients and drowning the roots (Dasgupta, Laplante et al. 2010).By the end of the 21st century, global mangrove cover is projected to experience a significant decline because of heat stress and sea-level rise (Alongi, 2008; Beaumont et al., 2011). In fact, it has been estimated that under the A1B emissions scenario (3.5C relative to

pre-industrial levels) mangroves would need to geographically move on average about 1 km/year to remain in suitable climate zones(Loarie et al., 2009). The most vulnerable mangrove forests are those occupying low-relief islands such as small islands in the Pacificwhere sea-level rise is a dominant factor. Where rivers are lacking and/ or land is subsiding, vulnerability is also high. With mangrovelosses resulting from deforestation presently at 1 to 2 percent per annum (Beaumont et al., 2011), climate change may not be the

biggest immediate threat to the future of mangroves. However if conservation efforts are successful in the longer term climate changemay become a determining issue (Beaumont et al., 2011). Coral reefs are acutely sensitive to changes in water temperatures, ocean pHand intensity and frequency of tropical cyclones. Mass coral bleaching is caused by ocean warming and ocean acidification, whichresults from absorption of CO2 (for example, Frieler et al., 2012a). Increased sea-surface temperatures and a reduction of availablecarbonates are also understood to be driving causes of decreased rates of calcification, a critical reef-building process (Death, Lough,and Fabricius, 2009). The effects of climate change on coral reefs are already apparent. The Great Barrier Reef, for example, has beenestimated to have lost 50 percent of live coral cover since 1985, which is attributed in part to coral bleaching because of increasingwater temperatures (Death et al., 2012). Under atmospheric CO2 concentrations that correspond to a warming of 4C by 2100, reeferosion will likely exceed rates of calcification, leaving coral reefs as crumbling frameworks with few calcareous corals (Hoegh -Guldberg et al., 2007). In fact, frequency of bleaching events under global warming in even a 2C world has been projected to exceedthe ability of coral reefs to recover. The extinction of coral reefs would be catastrophic for entire coral reef ecosystems and the peoplewho depend on them for food, income and shoreline. Reefs provide coastal protection against coastal floods and rising sea levels,

nursery grounds and habitat for a variety of currently fished species, as well as an invaluable tourism asset. These valuable services tooften subsistence-dependent coastal and island societies will most likely be lost well before a 4C world is reached. The precedingdiscussion reviewed the implications of a 4C world for just a few examples of important ecosystems. The section below examines the

effects of climate on biological diversity Ecosystems are composed ultimately of the species and

interactions between them and their physical environment. Biologically rich ecosystems are

usually diverse and it is broadly agreed that there exists a strong link between this

biological diversity and ecosystem productivity, stability and functioning (McGrady-Steed, Harris, and Morin,1997; David Tilman, Wedin, and Knops, 1996)(Hector, 1999; D Tilman et al., 2001). Loss of species within ecosystems will hencehave profound negative effects on the functioning and stability of ecosystems and on the ability of ecosystems to provide goods and

services to human societies. It is the overall diversity of species that ultimately characterizes the


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biodiversity and evolutionary legacy of life on Earth . As was noted at the outset of this discussion, species

extinction rates are now at very high levels compared to the geological record. Loss of those

species presently classified as critically endangered would lead to mass extinction on a

scale that has happened only five times before in the last 540 million years. The loss of those

species classified as endangered and vulnerable would confirm this loss as the sixth mass

extinction episode(Barnosky 2011). Loss of biodiversity will challenge those reliant on ecosystems services. Fisheries (Dale,Tharp, Lannom, and Hodges, 2010), and agronomy (Howden et al., 2007) and forestry industries (Stram & Evans, 2009), amongothers, will need to match species choices to the changing climate conditions, while devising new strategies to tackle invasive pests(Bellard, Bertelsmeier, Leadley, Thuiller, and Courchamp, 2012). These challenges would have to be met in the face of increasing

competition between natural and agricultural ecosystems over water resources. Over the 21st-century climate changeis likely to result in some bio-climates disappearing, notably in the mountainous tropics and in the poleward

regions of continents,with new, or novel, climatesdevelopingin the tropics and subtropics (Williams, Jackson, and

Kutzbach, 2007). In this study novel climates are those where 21st century projected climates do not

overlap with their 20th century analogues, and disappearing climates are those 20th century

climates that do not overlap with 21st century projected climates. The projections of Williams et al(2007) indicate that in a 4C world (SRES A2), 1239 percent of the Earths land surface may experience a novel climate compared to20th century analogues. Predictions of species response to novel climates are difficult because researchers have no current analogue torely upon. However, at least such climates would give rise to disruptions, with many current species associations being broken up ordisappearing entirely. Under the same scenario an estimated 1048 percent of the Earths surface including highly biodiverse regionssuch as the Himalayas, Mesoamerica, eastern and southern Africa, the Philippines and the region around Indonesia known as

Wallacaea would lose their climate space. With limitations on how fast species can disperse, or move,

this indicates that many species may find themselves without a suitable climate space and

thus face a high risk of extinction . Globally, as in other studies, there is a strong association apparent in these

projections between regions where the climate disappears and biodiversity hotspots. Limiting warming to lower levels

in this study showed substantially reduced effects, with the magnitude of novel and

disappearing climates scaling linearly with global mean warming. More recent work by Beaumont andcolleagues using a different approach confirms the scale of this risk (Beaumont et al., 2011, Figure 36). Analysis of the exposure of185 eco-regions of exceptional biodiversity (a subset of the so-called Global 200) to extreme monthly temperature and precipitationconditions in the 21st century compared to 19611990 conditions shows that within 60 years almost all of the regions that are alreadyexposed to substantial environmental and social pressure, will experience extreme temperature conditions based on the A2 emissionscenario (4.1C global mean temperature rise by 2100) (Beaumont et al., 2011). Tropical and sub-tropical eco-regions in Africa and

South America are particularly vulnerable. Vulnerability to such extremes is particularly acute for high latitude and small island biota,which are very limited in their ability to respond to range shifts, and to those biota, such as flooded grassland, mangroves and desertbiomes, that would require large geographical displacements to find comparable climates in a warmer world. The overall sense ofrecent literature confirms the findings of the AR4 summarized at the beginning of the section, with a number of risks such as those to

coral reefs occurring at significantly lower temperatures than estimated in that report. Although non-climate related

human pressures are likely to remain a major and defining driver of loss of ecosystems and

biodiversity in the coming decades, it is also clear that as warming rises so will the

predominance of climate change as a determinant of ecosystem and biodiversity survival.

While the factors of human stresses on ecosystems are manifold, in a 4C world, climate

change is likely to become a determining driver of ecosystem shifts and large-scale

biodiversity loss (Bellard et al., 2012; New et al., 2011). Recent research suggests that large-scale loss of biodiversity is likelyto occur in a 4C world, with climate change and high CO2 concentration driving a transition of the Earths ecosystems into a stateunknown in human experience. Such damages to ecosystems would be expected to dramatically reduce the provision of ecosystem

services on which society depends (e.g., hydrologyquantity flow rates, quality; fisheries (corals), protection of coastline (loss ofmangroves). Barnosky has described the present situation facing the biodiversity of the planet as the perfect storm with mu ltiplehigh intensity ecological stresses because of habitat modification and degradation, pollution and other factors, unusually rapid climate

change and unusually high and elevated atmospheric CO2 concentrations. In the past, as noted above, this combination of

circumstances has led to major, mass extinctions with planetary consequences. Thus, there

is a growing risk that climate change, combined with other human activities, will cause theirreversible transition of the Earths ecosystems into a state unknown in human experience(Barnosky et al., 2012


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4 degree warming is inevitable with current carbon usage trendsdeceasing

carbon emissions solve

Potsdam Institute, 2012(Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research and Climate Analytics, Turn Down theHeat: Why a 4C Warmer World Must be Avoided, A report for the World Bank, November,http://climatechange.worldbank.org/sites/default/files/Turn_Down_the_heat_Why_a_4_degree_centrigrade_warmer_world_must_be_avoided.pdf)

The emission pledges made atthe climate conventionsin Copenhagen and Cancun, if fully met, place

the world on a trajectory for a global mean warming of well over 3C. Even if these pledgesare fully implemented there is still about a 20 percent chance of exceeding 4Cin 2100.10 If

these pledges are not met then there is a much higher likelihoodmore than 40 percentof warmingexceeding 4C by 2100, and a 10 percent possibility of this occurring already by the 2070s, assuming emissions follow the medium

business-as-usual reference pathway. On a higherfossil fuel intensive business-as-usual pathway, such as the

IPCC SRESA1FI, warming exceeds 4C earlier in the 21st century. It is important to note, however, that

such a level of warming can still be avoided. There are technically and economically feasible emission pathwaysthat could still limit warming to 2C or below in the 21st century. To illustrate a possible pathway to warming of 4C or more, Figure22 uses the highest SRES scenario, SRESA1FI, and compares it to other, lower scenarios. SRESA1FI is a fossil-fuel intensive, higheconomic growth scenario that would very likely cause mean the global temperature to exceed a 4C increase above preindustrial

temperatures. Most striking in Figure 22 is the large gap between the projections by 2100 of current emissions reduction

pledges and the (lower) emissions scenarios needed to limit warming to 1.52C above pre-industrial levels.Thislarge rangein the climate change implications of the emission scenarios by 2100 is important in its own right, but it also sets

the stage for an even wider divergence in the changes that would followover the subsequent

centuries, given the long response times of the climate system, including the carbon cycleand

climate system components that contribute to sea-level rise. The scenariospresented in Figure 22 indicate the likely

onset time for warming of 4Cor more. It can be seen that most of the scenarios remain fairly close together for thenext few decades of the 21st century. By the 2050s, however, there are substantial differences among the changes in temperature

projected for the different scenarios. In the highest scenario shown here (SRES A1FI), the median estimate(50 percent

chance) of warming reaches 4C by the 2080s, with a smaller probability of 10 percent of exceeding this level by the2060s. Others have reached similar conclusions (Betts et al. 2011). Thus, even if the policy pledges from climate convention in

Copenhagen and Cancun are fully implemented, there is still a chance of exceeding 4C in 2100. Ifthe pledges are not met and

present carbon intensity trends continue, then the higher emissions scenarios shown in Figure 22

become more likely , raising the probability of reaching 4C global mean warming by the

last quarter of this century. Figure 23 shows a probabilistic picture of the regional patterns of change in temperature andprecipitation for the lowest and highest RCP scenarios for the AR4 generation of AOGCMS. Patterns are broadly consistent betweenhigh and low scenarios. The high latitudes tend to warm substantially more than the global mean. RCP8.5, the highest of the newIPCC AR5 RCP scenarios, can be used to explore the regional implications of a 4C or warmer world. For this report, results forRCP8.5 (Moss et al. 2010) from the new IPCC AR5 CMIP5 (Coupled Model Intercomparison Project; Taylor, Stouffer, & Meehl2012) climate projections have been analyzed. Figure 24 shows the full range of increase of global mean temperature over the 21stcentury, relative to the 19802000 period from 24 models driven by the RCP8.5 scenario, with those eight models highlighted that

produce a mean warming of 45C above preindustrial temperatures averaged over the period 20802100. In terms of regional

changes, the models agree that the most pronounced warming (between 4C and 10C) is likely to

occur over land. During the boreal winter, a strong arctic amplification effect is projected, resulting in temperature anomaliesof over 10C in the Arctic region. The subtropical region consisting of the Mediterranean, northern Africa and the Middle East and thecontiguous United States is likely to see a monthly summer temperature rise of more than 6C.


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Contention 3: Solvency

Cuban sugar based ethanol is essential to replace oil based fuelits the best

solution for a transition away from oil-based fuel dependenceallowingaccess to the U.S. market is key

Specht 13[Jonathan-J.D. Wash. U St. Louis, Legal Advisor, Raising Cane: Cuban Sugarcane Ethanols Economicand Environmental Effects on the United States, Environmental Law & Policy Journal, Univ. of CaliforniaDavis, Vol. 36:2,http://environs.law.ucdavis.edu/issues/36/2/specht.pdf]

"The United States of America cannot afford to bet our long-term prosperity and security on a resource that will eventually run out."n1 This dramatic quote from President Obama opens the White House's forty-four page Blueprint for a Secure Energy Future. n2 The

resource referred to, oil, is indeed finite. "The output of conventional oil will peak in 2020,"

according to estimates from the chief economist for the International Energy Agency. n3 The

transportation sector has increased its oil consumption over the past thirty years in the United States while

residential, commercial, and electric utilities have decreased consumption. n4 Simply put,

America's oil problem is anautomobile problem. [*173] There are a number of ways the U.S. transportation sector could

reduce the amount of oil it consumes: raising vehicle fuel efficiency standards further; increasing and improving lightrail and other public transportation options; building more walkable communities so daily errands could be made without using an

automobile; encouraging people to live closer to where they work; and increasing the availability of electric cars. n5Yet, even

using all of these strategies comprehensively will not change a fundamental fact of our oil-

based transportation system- in certain areas(like rural communities and outer suburbs) the automobile

is essential for transportation , and liquid fuel is extremely convenient for automobiles. With aliquid fuel engine, a driver can "re-charge" his or her car in a few minutes with a substance that is widely available from Boston to

Boise and everywhere in between. With the conveniences of oil, however, come costs. Oilis a finite resource, and its

consumption pollutes the air and contributes to climate change.Furthermore, it is expensiven6

and will only get more expensive in the future. n7 However, any realistic plan for dealing with a

future of reduced oil use must include liquid fuels that are similar in convenience and

availability to gasoline, given the geography of the United States, the state of the current domestic transportation system, n8and the ease of using liquid fuel for the personal automobile.This does not mean, however, that corn-based

ethanol, thus far the major liquid-fuel petroleum alternative pursued by the United States, is the best answer. While it

hasbenefitted the Midwest economically, the domestic ethanol industry has also contributed to a number of

negative environmental effects .There is,however, another liquid fuel option other than fossil-

fuel based[*174] gasoline and corn-based ethanol. The Obama Administration's energy plan

includes a wide range of strategies to reduce U.S. fossil fuel consumption, yetone strategy is

notably absent from the Blueprint: replacing a percentage of U.S. gasoline with ethanol

imported from outside the United States.n9 A number of influential commentators, such as

Thomas Friedman n10 and The Economist, n11 have called for the United States to encourage the

importation of sugarcane-based ethanol from countries like Brazil. But the possibility of importingethanol from Cuba has been largely ignored by influential opinion-makers as well as the

United States government.n12 While by no means a silver bullet for solving the United States' energy problems,

importing ethanol made from sugarcane grown in Cuba would bring a number of

environmental and economic benefits- partially offset by regionalized economic harms - to the United States. Thispossibility, at the very least, deserves much greater consideration and evaluation than it has thus far received.


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And, joint ventures jumpstart the Cuban ethanol energy industry

Alonso-Pippo et al. 8[Walfrido Alonso-Pippo-former Vice-President of the Solar Energy Department at the University of Havana and a former

member of the Cuban National Renewable Energies Front, where he was a specialist in biomass energy use, Carlos A.

Luengo, John Koehlinger, Pierto Garzone, Giacinto Cornacchia, Sugarcane energy use: The Cuban case, Energy Policy, Vol. 36,Issue 6, June 2008, http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0301421508000840]

The rise of the price of oil above 80 USD/bbl. provides an incentive for the development of

sugarcane bioenergy throughboth ethanol fuel production and surplus electricitysurplus

cogeneration in Cuba. Cuba's longstanding experience and expertise in sugar production and its

sugar agro-industry infrastructure, its current neglect and mismanagement notwithstanding, put Cuba in a

good position to become an important producer of sugar-based bioenergy.Cuba's own

acute energy and hard currency shortagesfurther point to anincremental increase in sugarcane

energy use asthe country's first viable renewable energy source. No other source of

renewable energy in Cuba has the potential that sugarcane has.International experiences in

developing sugarcane energy, particularly that of Braziland to a lesser extent Mauritius, have

demonstrated thatthe technological and environmental barriers to sugarcane energyproduction and use can be overcome. Aside from providing an alternative energy source to

fossil fuels, sugarcane ethanol production and sugarcane biomass power generation have, inthe face of an oversupply of sugar and low sugar prices, been promoted in several countries to save domestic

sugar industries.The main weakness to the introduction of ethanol fuel production and

sugarcane biomass power generation in Cuba continues to be the lack of hard currency

required to modernize Cuban sugar mills. The Cuban government has already utilized

joint ventures with foreignnatural gas, oil (in the case of the Caribbean offshore exploration mentioned previously) and

nickel mining companies to secure the capital investment and technology needed to exploit its

natural resources. The joint venture agreement for a recently constructed natural gas

power plant could serve as a model for modernization of sugar bioenergy infrastructure .Under this agreement, the foreign partner owns a third of the plant's output, participates in the plant's management, and receives a

proportion of the plant's profits. While the legal, institutional and political barriers to investment in Cuba are high, heavy recent

foreign investments in sugar ethanol production facilities in Brazil suggest the feasibility of similar investments in Cuba.Whether themodernization and recovery of the Cuban sugar agro-industry comes to pass is of course an open question. The authors offer no

predictions. What has been argued though is that, despite the prolonged decline outlined above, the Cuban sugar industry

nonetheless remains well-positioned to participate in the growing global movement toward

the development of sugarcane as a viable alternative source of energy.

Sugar ethanol importation from Cuba is superior to alternatives and solves

impacts from domestic corn ethanol productionno environmental damage


B. Environmental Effects of Sugarcane-Based EthanolIffuture legislation does not revive the United States ethanol tariff that

expired at the end of 2011 and the trade embargo against Cuba is kept in place, Brazil will likely be

the primary beneficiary. n109 The argument can be made that Brazilian sugarcane-based ethanol is a more environmentallybeneficial fuel source than domestic-corn based ethanol, because of the nature of sugarcane-based ethanol (discussed below). n110

Brazilian sugarcane-based ethanol comes, however, with its own set of environmental

consequences.The full debate over the environmental consequences of the Brazilian biofuel production n111 is largely beyondthe scope of this Article. Still, the primary issue in this dispute is worth noting, because it accentuates one of the most significant

differences between the U.S. corn-based ethanol industry and the potential Cuban sugarcane-based ethanol industry. In Brazil,

the expansion of sugarcane production to meet demand for ethanol production has led to
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0301421508000840http://environs.law.ucdavis.edu/issues/36/2/specht.pdfhttp://environs.law.ucdavis.edu/issues/36/2/specht.pdfhttp://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0301421508000840


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land use changes[*190] that parallel the expansion of corn production for ethanol in the

United States. Clearing portions of the Amazon rainforest - one of the most significant

repositories of carbon on Earthn112 - would represent an environmental cost of ethanol

production that outweighs its benefits. The Amazon region, however, is largely unsuitable for sugarcane production.

n113 But, sugarcane production is contributing to destruction of another sensitive habitat, the

bio-diverse Cerrado savannah region of Brazil. n114Cuban sugarcane-based ethanol would

have the environmental benefits of Brazilian sugarcane-based ethanol without its most

obvious negative factor, damaging habitat in the Cerrado. The environmental effects of biofuels

depend on a number of factors. Whether or not a given type of biofuel is environmentally beneficial "depends on

what the fuel is, how and where the biomass was produced, what else the land could have

been used for, how the fuel was processed and how it is used." n115 Taken together, these factors

point to sugarcane-based ethanol grown in Cuba as one of the most environmentally

friendly biofuels possible .The environmental benefits of using sugarcane to produce ethanol

are numerous. First, it is much more energy efficient to derive ethanol from sugarcane than

corn. Making ethanol from corn only creates approximately 1.3 times the amount of energy used to produce it, but making

ethanol from sugarcane creates approximately eight times the amount of energy used to

produce it. n116 Second, unlike much of the corn presently grown in Great Plains states, sugarcane grown in Latin

America does not need to be irrigated. n117 Third, sugarcane requires relatively small amounts

of chemical fertilizers, herbicides, and pesticides. n118 Fourth, whereas most U.S. ethanol refineries

are powered by coal or natural gas, n119 sugarcane ethanol refineries can be powered by

bagasse, a natural product left over from the sugar refining process. n120 In fact, refineries

powered with bagasse can even produce more electricity than they need and sell[*191] power

back to the electric grid. n121 Fifth, although corn can only be planted and harvested once a year, in tropical

climates sugarcane can be cut from the same stalks multiple times per year . n122Each of these

factors in favor of sugarcane ethanol is true of ethanol from Brazil as well as of any potential ethanol from Cuba. However, there

are additional environmental factors that clinch Cuban sugarcane-based ethanol as one of

the most environmentally friendly fuel sources available to the United Statesunder current

technology. n123 First, because Cuba is closer to the United States, transporting ethanol from Cuba

to the United States would require less energy thantransporting ethanol from Brazilto the United States(especially if it is used in Florida, an option further explored in the section on economic effects). n124 Another reason Cuban

sugarcane-based ethanol could be one of the most environmentally friendly fuels possible is that Cuba could produce a

significant amount of ethanol without any negative impacts on native habitat. A striking

amount of Cuban agricultural land - fifty five percentas of 2007 - is simply lying fallow and is

not cultivated with anything. n125 Although its character may have changed due to years of neglect, this land isnot virgin native habitat like the grasslands of North Dakota or the Cerrado of Brazil. Cuba

therefore could greatly increase its production of sugarcane, and thus its production of

sugarcane-based ethanol, without negative impacts on wildlifehabitat. While it is not environmentally

perfect - no form of energy is - Cuban sugarcane-based ethanol would raise fewer environmental

concerns than the fuel sources it would displace: petroleum, domestic corn-based ethanol,

and Brazilian sugarcane based ethanol. Therefore, from a purely environmental perspective, changing U.S.

law and policy in order to promote the importation of Cuban sugarcane-based ethanol

should be encouraged.


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Contention 4: Impact Debate

No great power warinterdependence, democracy , deterrence

Robb 2012[Doug, US Navy Lieutenant, Now Hear This Why the Age of Great-Power War Is Over, May, 5/2012 [Lieutenant, US Navy, , US Naval Institute,

http://www.usni.org/magazines/proceedings/2012-05/now-hear-why-age-great-power-war-over]

In addition to geopolitical and diplomacy issues, globalization continues to transform the world. This interdependence has

blurred the linesbetween economic security and physical security. Increasingly, great-power interests demandcooperationrather than conflict. To that end, maritime nations such as the United States and China desire open sea lines ofcommunication and protected trade routes, a common security challenge that could bring these powers together, rather than drive themapart (witness Chinas response to the issue of piracy in its backyard). Facing these security tasks cooperatively is both mu tuallyadvantageous and common sense. Democratic Peace Theorychampioned by Thomas Paine and international relations theorists suchas New York Times columnist Thomas Friedmanpresumes that great-power war will likely occur between a democratic and non-

democratic state. However, as information flowsfreely and people find outletsfor and access to new ideas, authoritarianleaders will find it harder to cultivatepopular support fortotal waran argument advanced by philosopher ImmanuelKant in his 1795 essay Perpetual Peace. Consider, for example, Chinas unceasing attempts to control Internet access. The 2011Arab Spring demonstrated that organized opposition to unpopular despotic rule has begun to reshape the political order, a changegalvanized largely by social media. Moreover, few would argue that China today is not socially more liberal, economically more

capitalistic, and governmentally more inclusive than during Mao Tse-tungs regime. As these trends continue, nations will findlarge-scale conflict increasingly disagreeable. In terms of the military, ongoing fiscal constraintsand socio-economic

problems likely will marginalize defense issues. All the more reason why great powers will find it mutually beneficial to worktogether to find solutions to common security problems, such as countering drug smuggling, piracy, climate change, humantrafficking, and terrorismmissions that Admiral Robert F. Willard, former Commander, U.S. Pacific Command, called deterrence

and reassurance. As the Cold War demonstrated, nuclear weapons are a formidable deterrent against unlimited war.They make conflict irrational; in other words, the concept of mutually assured destructionhowever unpalatableactually had astabilizing effecton both national behaviors and nuclear policies for decades. These toolsthus rendergreat-power warinfinitely less likely by guaranteeing catastrophic resultsfor both sides. As Bob Dylan warned, When you aint gotnothing, you aint got nothing to lose. Great -power war is not an end in itself, but rather a way for nations to achieve their strategicaims. In the current security environment, such a war is equal parts costly, counterproductive, archaic, and improbable.

Miscalc is impossible

Quinlan 2009

[Sir Michael, visiting professor at King's College London, Permanent Under-Secretary at the Ministry of Defence and former senior fellow at theInternational Institute of Strategic Studies, Thinking About Nuclear Weapons: Principles, Problems, Prospects, Oxford Unive rsity Press]

One special form of miscalculationappeared sporadically in the speculations of academic commentators, though it was scarcely

ever to be encounteredat least so far as my own observation wentin the utterances of practical planners within government. This is theidea that nuclear war might be erroneously triggered, or erroneously widened, through a state under attack misreading either what sort of attack it was

being subjected to, or where the attack came from. The postulated misreading of the nature of the attack referred in particular to the hypothesis that if adelivery systemnormally a missilethat was known to be capable of carrying either a nuclear or a conventional warhead was launched in aconventional role, the target country might, on detecting the launch through its early warning systems, misconstrue the mission as an imminent nuclear

strike and immediately unleash a nuclear counter-st rike of its own. This conjecture was voiced, for example, as a criticism of the proposals for giving theUS Trident SLBM, long associated with nuclear missions, a capability to deliver conventional warheads. Whatever the merit of those proposals (it is not

explored here), it is hard to regard this particular apprehension as having any real- life credibility. The flight time of a ballistic missile would not exceed

about thirty minutes, and that of a cruise missile a few hours, before arrival on target made its characterconventional or nuclearunmistakable.Nogovernment will need, and no nonlunatic government could wish, to take within so short a span of time a step as enormousand irrevocable as the execution of a nuclear strike on the basis of early-warning information alone without knowing the true nature of the

incoming attack. The speculation tendsmoreover to be expressed without reference either to any realistic political or conflict-related context thought to render the episode plausible, or to the manifest interest of thelaunching country, should there be any risk of doubt, in ensuringby explicit communication if necessarythat there was no misinterpretation of itsconventionally armed launch.

Intervening actions check escalation

Trachtenberg 2000(Prof of History, Pennsylvania (Marc, The "Accidental War" Question,http://www.sscnet.ucla.edu/polisci/faculty/trachtenberg/cv/inadv(1).pdf)
http://www.usni.org/magazines/proceedings/2012-05/now-hear-why-age-great-power-war-overhttp://www.usni.org/magazines/proceedings/2012-05/now-hear-why-age-great-power-war-over


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conventional") of nuclear conflict, it is nearly certain thatsuch a war, no matter its outcome, would not last for years,as we have become accustomed to in current low-intensity conflicts. Rather, we should anticipate a new geo-political reality: theemergence ofclear winners and loserswithinseveraldays, or at most weeks after the initial outbreak of hostilities. This latterreality will most probably contain fewer nuclear-possessing states than the former.


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2AC Add-ons


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2AC Water Add-on--No War Version

Continued increases in U.S. corn-ethanol production will drain the Ogallala

Aquifercausing massive water shortages


Increased water consumption is another environmental consequenceresulting from the expansion

of corn production in Great Plains states. The approximate line dividing the portion of the United States thatrequires irrigation for agriculture and the portion that has sufficient rainfall for non-irrigated agriculture, the 100th Meridian West of

longitude, n101 runs through the Dakotas and Nebraska. Therefore, unlike agriculture in the states that form the

center of the Corn Belt, Iowa and Illinois, n102 agriculture in Nebraska and the Dakotas depends

to significant degree upon irrigation. The difference in water consumption between the corn growers of Nebraska, onone hand, and those of Iowa and Illinois, on the other, is dramatic. In 2007, of 9,192,656 acres of total corn production in Nebraska,5,839,067 acres were irrigated, representing 63% of the total acreage. n103This fact is particularly significant because much of

Nebraska gets its water from the Ogallala Aquifer, a resource of vital environmental and

economic importance to the United States that stretches from Texas to South Dakota. n104

Aquifersn105 continue to provide water as long as the amount of water that flows into them

exceeds the amount of water that is withdrawn. If the amount of water withdrawn from an

aquifer exceeds the amount of water that recharges an aquifer, however, the aquifer will be

depleted.Completely depleting the Ogallala Aquifer would have devastating consequences for

the United States . Losing the ability to irrigate land from the Ogallala Aquifer would cause

$ 20 billion worth of agricultural losses, and re-filling the aquifer would take 6,000 years. n106

Because the industry encourages increased corn production in areas irrigated with water from

the Ogallala Aquifer, the depletion of this aquifermust [*189] be counted as another

detrimental environmental effect of the domestic corn-based ethanol industry.As damning as thelist of environmental consequences of the domestic corn-based ethanol industry may seem, advocates for the industry will point outthat the gasoline replaced by corn-based ethanol comes with its own set of dramatic consequences, environmental and otherwise:carbon emissions, pollution from petroleum refining, and dependence on unstable foreign regimes. n107 This is certainly true, n108and any fair evaluation of whether or not the domestic corn-based ethanol industry is a worthy endeavor must consider all these

factors. However, the question of whether corn-based ethanol or petroleum-based gasoline is the

least environmentally harmful fuel sourcefor the United States is a false dichotomy - orat least it

would be if U.S. law and policy were changed to encourage the importation of sugarcane-

based ethanol .

Drinking water is key to life on earth

Jackson and Carpenter 1[Robert- Department of Biology and Nicholas School of the Environment, Duke, Stephen- Center forLimnology, University of Wisconsin, Clifford Dahm, Diane McKnight- University of New Mexico,, RobertNaiman- University of Colorado, Sandra Postel-University of Washington, Steven Running, Water in aChanging World,Issues in Ecology, http://www.biology.duke.edu/jackson/issues9.pdf, Spring 2001]

Life on earth depends on the continuous flow ofmaterials through the air, water, soil, and food webs

of the biosphere. The movement of water through the hydrological cycle comprises the largest of

these flows, delivering an estimated 110,000 cubic kilometers (km3) of water to the land each year as snow and rainfall. Solarenergy drives the hydrological cycle, vaporizing water from the surface of oceans, lakes, and rivers as well as from soils and plants

(evapotranspiration). Water vapor rises into the atmosphere where it cools, condenses, and

eventually rains down anew. This renewable freshwater supply sustains life on the land, in


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estuaries, and in the freshwater ecosystems of the earth. Renewable fresh water provides

many servicesessential to human health and well being, including water for drinking, industrial

production, and irrigation, and the production of fish, waterfowl, and shellfish. Fresh water also

provides many benefits while it remains in its channels(nonextractive or instream benefits), including

flood control, transportation, recreation, waste processing, hydroelectric power, and habitat

for aquatic plants and animals. Some benefits, such as irrigation and hydroelectric power, can be achieved only by

damming, diverting, or creating other major changes to natural water flows. Such changes often diminish or preclude other instreambenefits of fresh water, such as providing habitat for aquatic life or maintaining suitable water quality for human use. The

ecological, social, and economic benefits that freshwater systems provide, and the trade-offs

between consumptive and instream values, will change dramatically in the coming century.

Already, over the past one hundred years, both the amount of water humans withdraw

worldwide and the land area under irrigation have risen exponentially(Figure 1). Despite this greatly

increased consumption, the basic water needs of many people in the world are not being met. Currently,

1.1 billion people lack access to safe drinking water, and 2.8 billion lack basic sanitation services. These deprivations

cause approximately 250 million cases of water-related diseases and five to ten milliondeaths each year.Also, current unmet needs limit our ability to adapt to future changes in

water supplies and distribution.Many current systems designed to provide water in relatively stable climatic conditionsmay be ill prepared to adapt to future changes in climate, consumption, and population. While a global perspective on water

withdrawals is important for ensuring sustainable water use, it is insufficient for regional and local stability. How fresh water

is managed in particular basins andin individual watersheds is the key to sustainable water

management.


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2AC Democracy Add-on--No War Version

Plan solves corruption-civil society

Perales 10(Jos Ral Perales - senior program associate of the Latin American Program at the Woodrow WilsonInternational Center for Scholars, August 2010, The United States and Cuba: Implications of an EconomicRelationship, http://www.wilsoncenter.org/sites/default/files/LAP_Cuba_Implications.pdf)

Jorge Pinis avisiting research fellow with Florida International Universitys LatinAmerican

and Caribbean Center Cuban Research Institute.

In spite of these developments, Pin argued it is in the best interests of both Cuba and the United

States to begin energy collaboration today.What is needed, Pin continued, is a bilateral policy

that would contribute to Cubas energy independence as well as support a broader national

energy policy that embraces modernization of infrastructure, the balancing of

hydrocarbons with renewable materials, and conservation and environmental stewardship.He highlighted the case of the Deepwater Horizon disaster in the Gulf of Mexico, and what would happen if such an incidenthappened in a Cuban oil rig (under current U.S. policy banning equipment and technological sales to the island), as a reminder of the

need for an energy dialogue between Cuba and the United States. Moreover,

Pin contended that if US companieswere allowed to contribute to developing Cubashydrocarbon reserves, as well as renewable energy such assolar, wind, and sugarcane ethanol, it would reduce the influence of autocratic and corrupt

governments on the islands road toward self determination Most importantly, it would

provide the United States and other democratic countries with a better chance of working

with Cubas future leaders to carry out reforms that would lead to a more open andrepresentative society.American oil and oil

equipment and service companies have the capital, technology, and operational know-how

to explore, produce,and refine in a safe and responsible manner Cubas potential oil and

natural gas reserves.

Moral side constraintPetro1974[Sylvester, Wake Forest Professor in Toledo Law Review, Spring, page 480]

However, one may still insist, echoing Ernest Hemingway - "I believe in only one thing: liberty." And it is always well to bear in mind

David Hume's observation: "It is seldom that liberty of any kind is lost all at once." Thus,it is unacceptable tosay that the invasion of one aspect of freedom is of no import because there have been invasions of so

many other aspects. That road leads to chaos, tyranny, despotism, and the end of all human

aspiration. Ask Solzhenitsyn. Ask Milovan Dijas. In sum, if one believed in freedom as a supreme value and the proper ordering

principle for any society aiming to maximize spiritual and material welfare, then every invasion of freedom must be

emphatically identified and resisted with undying spirit.


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1AC Advantages (Yes War Version)


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1AC U.S./Cuba Relations Adv (Yes War)

The sugar ethanol industry is a key area to build U.S./Cuba relations

Colvin, Jaffe, Soligo 09(Jake Colvin- Vice President for Global Trade Issues at the National Foreign Trade Council and

directs the Cuba Initiative of USA, Amy Myers Jaffe - research scholar at the James A. Baker III Institute for Public Policy, whosefocus is on oil geopolitics and strategic energy policy, and Dr. Ronald Soligo - professor of economics at Rice University and a RiceScholar at the Baker Institute research focuses on economic growth and development and energy economics, 9 WAYS FOR U.S. TOTALK TO CUBA AND FOR CUBA TO TALK TO US The Center for Democracy in the Americas (CDA), http://democracyinamericas.org/pdfs/9-Ways-for-US-to-talk-to-Cuba-and-for-Cuba-to-talk-to-US.pdf)

There are numerous topics of global and mutual interest to talk about. nine The Center for Democracy in the

Americas has identifiedcritical areas where Washington and Havana can communicate,

work together and build relationships of confidence and trust. Energy cooperation: The expertise

of the US energy industry could speed Cubas development of abundant untapped oil

resources, increase Cubas ability to produce ethanol, boost energy supplies to the U.S., and

help Cubas economyCommercial cooperation: Opportunities for trade and commerce with Cuba

would help U.S. firms compete against foreign firms, which operate in Cuba without

restrictions, while improving Cuban living standardsand working conditions.

Now a key time for US-Latin American ties. Permanent collapse coming.

Shifter 12(Michael is an Adjunct Professor of Latin American Studies at Georgetown University's School of Foreign Service. He is a member ofthe Council on Foreign Relations and writes for the Council's journal Foreign Affairs. He serves as the President of Inter-AmericanDialogue. Remaking the Relationship: The United States and Latin America, April, IAD Policy Report,http://www.thedialogue.org/PublicationFiles/IAD2012PolicyReportFINAL.pdf)

If the United States and Latin America do not make the effort now , the chance may slip away .

The most likely scenario then would bemarked by a continued drift in their relationship, further

deterioration of hemisphere-wide institutions, a reducedability and willingness to deal with a range of

common problems, and a spate of missed opportunities for more robust growth and greater social equity.The United States and Latin America would go their separate ways, manage their affairs independently

of one another, and foregothe opportunities that could be harvested by a more productive

relationship. There are risks ofsimply maintaining the status quo. Urgent problems will

inevitably arise that require

cuba sugar ethanol aff and neg - unt 2013.docx

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