The Ethanol Myth We have developed a feel good policy as a solution to our energy problem. The key word is think green.
The politically correct way to think about using corn to make ethanol to use primarily as automobile fuel is that:
1.We produce vast amounts of corn.
2.Reduce dependence on foreign oil,
3.It is economical.
Can be summed up as : Its environmentally friendly and we are doing something about foreign oil dependency.
Well maybe. This love affair with corn ethanol started in Washington in the 1970 . There is a agribusiness combine called Archer Daniels Midland that has been lobbying our congress promoting corn to ethanol basically to help the farmers. They did a good job and persuaded congress to subsidize the fledging industry.
30 years later a lot of the lobbying infrastructure had been laid and escalation occurred.
Historically the breakdown of corn usage is 80% for feed, 12% for food and 8% for ethanol. This 8% allocation for fuel translates into about 3% of our fuel needs. Hardly an answer to our energy needs.
As far as being economical, that is more difficult to understand. The corn fields have to be prepared, the corn planted,cultivated,harvested and transported using vehicles using fossil fuel. Gasoline and fuel oil is transported via pipeline and only using trucks to transport the fuel short distances from pipeline terminal to user. There is no pipeline infrastructure for transporting ethanol. A large fuel transport truck gets about 6 miles/gallon of fuel. At $4.00 that is 66 cents a mile. Cost of transporting fuel in pipelines is in part of a penny a gallon. Doing the math it appears that one gallon of fossil fuel is used to produce one gallon of corn ethanol. Then consider that alcohol is only 70% as efficient as gasoline, the cost per energy unit is even higher.
The direct government subsidies for corn ethanol is $1.90/gallon resulting in a yearly subsidy of $526,000,000/year. Some financiers look at this as transferring funds from non farmers to farmers.
It doesn't stop there. Corn historically used for feed and food is being redirected for ethanol production. This is putting inflationary pressures on foodstuffs. Some corn foodstuffs ( corn tortillas) are being made using using other grains because of the high cost of corn.
It gets even more interesting. The politically correct green conspiracy rolls on. Hundreds of additional production facilities are on the drawing boards or being constructed. If this capacity is utilized approximately 50% or our nations corn production will be needed. This amount of ethanol would supply less than 10% of our fuel needs. The subsidy amount would probable be in the Billions
If high food prices are bothering you now, you ain't seen nothing yet. I know you will be comforted by the fact that it is politically correct. Think green.
Not all of us will understand what I'm going to tell you now. The aquifer beneath the state of Iowa and some neighboring states is being depleted. That means more water is being removed that being added. There is a lot of methanol production in that area because there is were corn is grown. I takes about 4 gallons of water to produce one gallon of ethanol. 80% of the water is volatilized. Ethanol proponents tell us that this is not a problem as the water vapor will return to earth as rainfall or dew and replenish the water supply. Let me see now.....
Ethanol proponents site the country of Brazil as an example of what ethanol production can do for a country. 100% of Brazil's automotive energy needs are met using ethanol. In fact they have some for export. Brazil's ethanol process uses a sugar cane waste called baggasse and other roughage to produce ethanol. There process is is much more efficient the corn ethanol production.
Our country has a strong agribusiness lobby that supports using corn as opposed to sugar cane because we have many more farmers involved in corn production than sugar cane. Our green conspiracy marches on for they have secured a rather high tax on importing ethanol.
A solution to our national energy problem will not come from ethanol production no matter what process is utilized. It is very costly to produce and is not economical. Our vast supply of corn production will to turn into an extremely critical food and feed supply shortage ranging from canned and frozen goods, beef cattle, hogs and chicken supply. Even now farmers are selling their cattle early because of high feed costs. Our nations water supply is being affected.
The green conspiracy is fooling with your well being and life style. As you correspond with your congressional representation and as you send letters to your news paper editors, let them know how you feel about this.
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Contributor's Note
I wrote this up as a speech I'm giving to a local Toastmasters club.
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