 Darryl Hannah - once arrested for sitting in a tree too long. Pic: REUTERS/Mario Anzuoni
August 14, 2008 10:03 PM
By Nick Rosen
LONDON - Hollywood actress Daryl Hannah
says she did not foresee the effect that bio-fuel production
would have on food prices when she began campaigning for a
switch to them from fossil fuels like oil and coal.
But she is still certain that bio-fuel - solid, liquid or
gas fuel made from organic materials such as corn, sugar cane
or sugar beets - is vital for the U.S. economy.
Both the International Monetary Fund and a top World Bank
economist said this year that large increases in bio-fuel
production in the United States and Europe are the main reason
behind a steep rise in global food prices.
World Bank economist Don Mitchell concluded that bio-fuels
and related low grain inventories, speculative activity, and
food export bans pushed food prices up by 70-75 percent.
For two decades, spanning many of her major movies
including Wall Street, the 46-year-old Hannah lived quietly
on her eco-farm in the Rocky Mountains and she still does.
She relies on renewable energy, and water from a spring to
meet her daily needs. She lives there most of the year, growing
her own food (she's a vegetarian), rearing and riding horses.
While her house, a former stagecoach stop, was being
remodeled, Hannah stayed in a tipi (teepee) for nearly two
years.
"I still use my tipi summer and fall. They are a beautiful,
perfect light impact dwelling. I lived in it year-round for
years before and while I was winterizing the old stagecoach
stop," she said in an interview.
In 2002 she went public with her eco-beliefs and began
campaigning for the use of bio-fuel.
She has been driving the same bio-fuel-powered Chevrolet El
Camino car for a decade and also has "a bio-diesel 4X4 for
pulling my horses and snow conditions" at her home near
Telluride, Colorado.
Hannah insists on "B100" as aficionados call pure 100
percent bio-fuel. Hers is "made from waste grease."
Now food prices have rocketed, blame has been laid at the
feet of greater bio-fuel production. The production of ethanol
(the combustible result of refining organic material) does use
food crops and is likely to do so in the future.
"In the case of ethanol and corn production. it is partly
responsible" (for food price rises)," Hannah said.
But she is still certain that "sustainable" bio-fuel will
not damage food production because "there are many other fuel
processing techniques and feed stocks that bio-fuels can come
from - for both bio-diesel and ethanol," including "garbage,
hemp, algae, moringa, jatropha, cellulose waste and prairie
grasses."
Increasingly the actress has become a political campaigner.
Last year she was arrested after refusing to come out of a
tree on a farm in central Los Angeles which was threatened by
redevelopment and protested against big oil.
"I've personally witnessed the devastation in the Amazon
that the oil companies have wrought upon these indigenous
communities. There are open, unlined waste pits, rainbow oil
slicks on the streams, high cadmium and lead poisoning in the
children and wildlife. When you see these crimes, you have no
choice but to speak up," she said.
Does the Hollywood establishment disapprove of her
activities?
"It's of no importance to me what anyone thinks of my
participation," replies Hannah. "What's important is awareness
of the facts and issues. I truly believe when people have
access to information, for the most part they will make wise
decisions."
But Hannah says she was "naive" to believe people would
respond in the right way to her calls for eco-living, on the
issue of bio-fuel.
"It was naive of me not to realize that of course and
unfortunately short-sighted greed and opportunism would step
right up to the plate as usual, and heavily invest in going
down a bad road," said Hannah.
"It's almost inconceivable that some would ... choose to do
things like burn rainforests in Malaysia to plant palm
plantations, or make bio-fuels that compete with basic food
supplies," she said.
"We absolutely need bio-fuels to play a part in solving our
energy crisis/demands, but it's essential to make them
sustainably."
Hannah co-founded the Sustainable Biodiesel Alliance (SBA -
http://www.sustainablebiodieselalliance.com), to help set
certification criteria for sustainable bio-diesel.
"I'm glad the message is finally getting across, but I was
not prepared for the enormous amounts of dollars and energy
that has gone into producing bio-fuels in an unsustainable
manner," she said.
"I'm very happy bio-fuels are now not just perceived as a
fringe alternative but as a real and important part of the
solution."
(Reuters Life!)
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