ABSTRACT
Global energy demand will increase through the twenty-first century. Competition for energy resources has already revealed geopolitical fault lines, and the dependence of industrial economies on fossil fuel promises to keep nations on edge. A widespread consensus has emerged that societies must transition to a new energy basis, given that fossil fuel is nonrenewable and its combustion leads to global warming. Although alternatives like nuclear energy and hydropower provide important electrical supplies locally, the search goes on, and recently much attention has focused on biofuel. Although biofuel represents a renewable and “green” energy, there is also a downside. This article considers one potential problem, namely, the impact of growing international biofuel demand on Amazônia. The article focuses on Brazil, given the explosive growth of Brazilian agriculture, and notable effects on forests within its national borders. The article seeks to answer this question: How will global demand for Brazil’s land-based commodities, including biofuel, impact its tropical forest in the Amazon basin? In attempting to answer this question, the article describes recent agricultural expansion in Brazil and its emergent landscape of renewable energy. Using an adaptation of rent theory, it frames a concept of landscape cascade and shows how Brazil’s expanding landscape of renewable energy is impacting forest areas at a great distance. The article then considers recent projections of demand for Amazonian land out to 2020, given growth of Brazilian biofuel production and cattle herds. The projections indicate that more Amazonian land will be demanded than has been made available by Brazilian environmental policy. With this result in mind, the article discusses the discursive dismemberment of Amazônia and how this articulates with efforts by Brazilian politicians to increase the region’s land supply. The article points out that agricultural intensification holds the key to meeting global demand without degrading the Amazonian forest, a landscape unique in the world for its ecological and cultural riches. Key Words: Amazonia, ˆ biofuel, Brazil, deforestation.
