Republicans Big-Time Wrong on Ethanol Issue

[JimofPennsylvan]

The recent sending of a letter by a large number of Republican Senators to the EPA requesting the EPA drop its requirements on gasoline producers to increase ethanol use is a perfect example of why the Republicans deserved to lose control of Congress and deserve to for the foreseeable future not regain back control of Congress. Republicans too often put special interests’ interests above ordinary Americans’ interests. These Republicans collectively claim their reason for dropping the ethanol mandates is that it would allow the farmers that grow the corn used for ethanol production to grow other crops instead so as to stabilize or possibly lower food prices for the American people. The truth of the matter is that these Republican senators are not these extraordinary virtues people that care deeply about the burden high food prices are putting on the American consumer and the suffering experienced by people throughout the world because of food shortages. If they were they would be proposing legislative initiatives to bring the needed amount of new farm land on line in the U.S. to solve these food problems and not an initiative that will worsen our nation’s problem of dependancy on foreign oil. The disgraceful truth here is that collectively these Republican Senators largely have as their motives here to try to improve the political landscape for opening up ANWR and U.S coastal sites to oil drilling because if they can get the EPA to reverse the ethanol mandates they can then claim that the biofuel solution (technically partial solution) to the nation’s energy problem has failed and the nation needs to turn to expanding oil drilling in the U.S. the only meaningful help for this problem. The one definite exception to this scheming motive here would be Senator McCain because time and again publicly he has said he opposes this expansion of drilling.

This whole matter really underscores the catastrophic mistake Washington is making on this food/ethanol debate. Washington needs to be taking drastic action to bring more farmland on line in the U.S.. It is outrageous how Washington keeps talking about this whole issue as if it is a zero sum game that America’s only decision is to choose between growing more grains for food or for ethanol production. Are they so completely in a mental fog over this whole issue that they can’t see that America is land rich, if one drives or flies across America one can see an absolute plentiful amount of land to grow the agricultural products America requires for its food and biofuel needs. It is absolutely unbelievable and frankly massively negligent that our elected officials in Washington are not passing legislation guaranteeing needed amounts of farm land aren’t quickly brought on line in the U.S..

If our elected officials can’t figure out how to bring more farm land on line in the U.S. let me suggest they pursue these following common sense steps. Instruct the U.S. Agricultural Department to determine how much additional farm land needs to be brought on line to fulfill the nation’s food and biofuel needs and to provide meaningful help to the world’s food needs. Once they have that figure ask the Agricultural Department to come up with a plan that is reasonable to offer financial incentives and financial assistance to farmers to bring more farm land on line. Where necessary the government’s legal powers of eminent domain and Federal law preemption should be used to get the needed new farm land. If such an incentive/assistance plan can’t bring about the needed number of acres of new farm land on line to meet the American people’s needs then do the following. The American Government should set-up a separate company to go into the farming business. The American Government would stake this separate company and appoint its board of directors and it would operate on it’s own buying and leasing land and set up farming operations on this land with the overall business plan to fulfill the agricultural products supply needs of the nation not satisfied by the private sector. Such a Federal agricultural producing business is not so far fetched. The federal government created Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac private companies that buy mortgages and sell them to investors. The federal government created Sallie Mae a private company that provides loans to college students. Moreover, the Federal Government wouldn’t have to sponsor this type of business forever, the primary mission of this organization would be to bring needed amounts of new farm land on line. After seven to ten years this organization if it is run correctly will have brought an enormous amount of farm land on line and the country should not be in the crisis situation that it is today so then this organization will be in the position if the American people want to pursue parceling off its operations and selling them to either individual farmers or farming businesses and get out of this business and so the Federal government will be off the financial hook. It is sort of what the government has done with the pharmaceutical industry over the years in a sense, it spent money developing vaccines or medicines to solve serious national medical problems and once the vaccines or medicines are invented it lets private companies take over. It may not be miniscule the amount of money needed to stake such a Federal Agricultural Producing Corporation but the negative economic impact of supply shortages of needed food grains and shortages of ethanol supplies on the energy market make it a no-brainer that it would be worth it for the nation to spend this money and solve these supply shortages; moreover, I am sure the amount of money needed to stake this organization would be much less than the $190 plus billion per year spent on funding the Iraq and Afghanistan wars.

These Republican Senators want to in effect give up on biofuels being an integral part of the solution for America’s energy problems; they in essence want to say our nation failed on the biofuel solution. To borrow a line from the movie Apollo 13, “failure is not an option here”. Drilling in ANWR would take 8 to 10 years at minimum (the nation can’t wait!) to bring oil from those fields to market and then only around one million barrels of oil a day would be produced less than five percent of our nation’s oil needs and the opening up of other U.S. regions have like drawbacks. The bottom line on biofuels is that America either makes that energy source succeed and succeed in a big way in America or the American people are going to suffer and suffer in a big way.

 

[AllieBaba]

As you're a farmer, I'm sure you understand that land cannot be forced into production year after year. Which is why crops are rotated. Which explains all that land you appear to think is doing nothing.

I'm all for razing the cities, though, and using THAT land to grow ethanol crops. All the tards who think we're "under-using" our farmland can eke a living out of our national forests. Better yet, let's harvest all the cellulose of the national forests, and produce fuel that doesn't take a big chunk out of our grain supply.

 

[jillian]

What a stupid response...raze cities... now go cry crocodile tears over 9/11 ... no cities...no economy, genius.

as for ethanol...it's driving up the cost of fuel and not reducing fuel consumption b/c of all the energy necessary to its production.

It's a failed experiment.

 

[Annie]

The recent sending of a letter by a large number of Republican Senators to the EPA requesting the EPA drop its requirements on gasoline producers to increase ethanol use is a perfect example of why the Republicans deserved to lose control of Congress and deserve to for the foreseeable future not regain back control of Congress. Republicans too often put special interests’ interests above ordinary Americans’ interests. These Republicans collectively claim their reason for dropping the ethanol mandates is that it would allow the farmers that grow the corn used for ethanol production to grow other crops instead so as to stabilize or possibly lower food prices for the American people. The truth of the matter is that these Republican senators are not these extraordinary virtues people that care deeply about the burden high food prices are putting on the American consumer and the suffering experienced by people throughout the world because of food shortages. If they were they would be proposing legislative initiatives to bring the needed amount of new farm land on line in the U.S. to solve these food problems and not an initiative that will worsen our nation’s problem of dependancy on foreign oil. The disgraceful truth here is that collectively these Republican Senators largely have as their motives here to try to improve the political landscape for opening up ANWR and U.S coastal sites to oil drilling because if they can get the EPA to reverse the ethanol mandates they can then claim that the biofuel solution (technically partial solution) to the nation’s energy problem has failed and the nation needs to turn to expanding oil drilling in the U.S. the only meaningful help for this problem. The one definite exception to this scheming motive here would be Senator McCain because time and again publicly he has said he opposes this expansion of drilling.

This whole matter really underscores the catastrophic mistake Washington is making on this food/ethanol debate. Washington needs to be taking drastic action to bring more farmland on line in the U.S.. It is outrageous how Washington keeps talking about this whole issue as if it is a zero sum game that America’s only decision is to choose between growing more grains for food or for ethanol production. Are they so completely in a mental fog over this whole issue that they can’t see that America is land rich, if one drives or flies across America one can see an absolute plentiful amount of land to grow the agricultural products America requires for its food and biofuel needs. It is absolutely unbelievable and frankly massively negligent that our elected officials in Washington are not passing legislation guaranteeing needed amounts of farm land aren’t quickly brought on line in the U.S..

If our elected officials can’t figure out how to bring more farm land on line in the U.S. let me suggest they pursue these following common sense steps. Instruct the U.S. Agricultural Department to determine how much additional farm land needs to be brought on line to fulfill the nation’s food and biofuel needs and to provide meaningful help to the world’s food needs. Once they have that figure ask the Agricultural Department to come up with a plan that is reasonable to offer financial incentives and financial assistance to farmers to bring more farm land on line. Where necessary the government’s legal powers of eminent domain and Federal law preemption should be used to get the needed new farm land. If such an incentive/assistance plan can’t bring about the needed number of acres of new farm land on line to meet the American people’s needs then do the following. The American Government should set-up a separate company to go into the farming business. The American Government would stake this separate company and appoint its board of directors and it would operate on it’s own buying and leasing land and set up farming operations on this land with the overall business plan to fulfill the agricultural products supply needs of the nation not satisfied by the private sector. Such a Federal agricultural producing business is not so far fetched. The federal government created Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac private companies that buy mortgages and sell them to investors. The federal government created Sallie Mae a private company that provides loans to college students. Moreover, the Federal Government wouldn’t have to sponsor this type of business forever, the primary mission of this organization would be to bring needed amounts of new farm land on line. After seven to ten years this organization if it is run correctly will have brought an enormous amount of farm land on line and the country should not be in the crisis situation that it is today so then this organization will be in the position if the American people want to pursue parceling off its operations and selling them to either individual farmers or farming businesses and get out of this business and so the Federal government will be off the financial hook. It is sort of what the government has done with the pharmaceutical industry over the years in a sense, it spent money developing vaccines or medicines to solve serious national medical problems and once the vaccines or medicines are invented it lets private companies take over. It may not be miniscule the amount of money needed to stake such a Federal Agricultural Producing Corporation but the negative economic impact of supply shortages of needed food grains and shortages of ethanol supplies on the energy market make it a no-brainer that it would be worth it for the nation to spend this money and solve these supply shortages; moreover, I am sure the amount of money needed to stake this organization would be much less than the $190 plus billion per year spent on funding the Iraq and Afghanistan wars.

These Republican Senators want to in effect give up on biofuels being an integral part of the solution for America’s energy problems; they in essence want to say our nation failed on the biofuel solution. To borrow a line from the movie Apollo 13, “failure is not an option here”. Drilling in ANWR would take 8 to 10 years at minimum (the nation can’t wait!) to bring oil from those fields to market and then only around one million barrels of oil a day would be produced less than five percent of our nation’s oil needs and the opening up of other U.S. regions have like drawbacks. The bottom line on biofuels is that America either makes that energy source succeed and succeed in a big way in America or the American people are going to suffer and suffer in a big way.

Considering it's more likely than not that the Democrats will control both houses in 8 months and the White House, perhaps you should speak to them? In reality, there should be refineries being built, drilling in ANWAR and off the coasts of FL, CA, throughout the Gulf. Guess what, the states control only 3 miles out, the rest is US control and should be harvested.

At the same time, a Manhattan Project type of development should be initiated, with large dividends for whatever works out for developing alternative sources of energy. With only tapped supplies, if exploited to the fullest, the US has over 5 years, with no imports, to be self-sustaining.

 

[AllieBaba]

What a stupid response...raze cities... now go cry crocodile tears over 9/11 ... no cities...no economy, genius.

as for ethanol...it's driving up the cost of fuel and not reducing fuel consumption b/c of all the energy necessary to its production.

It's a failed experiment.

Er...Jillie, I was being sarcastic about razing the cities. Genius.

 

[jillian]

Er...Jillie, I was being sarcastic about razing the cities. Genius.

Sure ya were Allie baby.

 

[midcan5]

Jim, I hope you're not too late but I agree. As a long distance cyclist I have seen too often farm land used to built ticky tacky houses, for ticky tacky people to raise ticky tacky children. Ugh, what a mess we Americans made of our country after the interstate highways system made stupidity seem sensible. Princeton NJ is putting some farm land off limits.

But now the other side of your question, who the heck is going to go back to the farm and do this work when you are competing against agro giants? I know one farmer well and it is a heck of a lot of work. The Amish may get rich - lol.


"Little boxes on the hillside,
Little boxes made of ticky tacky
Little boxes on the hillside,
Little boxes all the same,
There's a green one and a pink one
And a blue one and a yellow one
And they're all made out of ticky tacky
And they all look just the same.

by Malvina Reynolds, sung by Pete Seeger 1962

 

[Alpha1]

What a stupid response...raze cities... now go cry crocodile tears over 9/11 ... no cities...no economy, genius.

as for ethanol...it's driving up the cost of fuel and not reducing fuel consumption b/c of all the energy necessary to its production.

It's a failed experiment.

Well, ...a failed experiment............somewhat true...

what a pleasant surprise

 

[AllieBaba]

Sure ya were Allie baby.

I forgot..humor is a sign of intelligence. Hence your lack of it.

 

[AllieBaba]

Jim, I hope you're not too late but I agree. As a long distance cyclist I have seen too often farm land used to built ticky tacky houses, for ticky tacky people to raise ticky tacky children. Ugh, what a mess we Americans made of our country after the interstate highways system made stupidity seem sensible. Princeton NJ is putting some farm land off limits.

But now the other side of your question, who the heck is going to go back to the farm and do this work when you are competing against agro giants? I know one farmer well and it is a heck of a lot of work. The Amish may get rich - lol.


"Little boxes on the hillside,
Little boxes made of ticky tacky
Little boxes on the hillside,
Little boxes all the same,
There's a green one and a pink one
And a blue one and a yellow one
And they're all made out of ticky tacky
And they all look just the same.

by Malvina Reynolds, sung by Pete Seeger 1962

Yeah, unlike the non-stereotypical earth bunny riding his bike along the highway...harboring anger and resentment against the people who have the audacity to desire affordable housing outside of the cities to raise their ticky tacky kids in....at the expense of giving said earth bunner an unfettered view of the land that he has absolutely no connection to, personally....

 

[jillian]

I forgot..humor is a sign of intelligence. Hence your lack of it.

Or maybe you're just not funny.... except when you don't mean to be, of course.

 

[midcan5]

Yeah, unlike the non-stereotypical earth bunny riding his bike along the highway...harboring anger and resentment against the people who have the audacity to desire affordable housing outside of the cities to raise their ticky tacky kids in....at the expense of giving said earth bunner an unfettered view of the land that he has absolutely no connection to, personally....

read your reply again....

 

[RetiredGySgt]

Didn't we just have a thread here about how it takes 7 gallons of diesel to make one gallon of ethonal? Ya that is bright.

And correct me if I am wrong but people are starving for lack of food around the globe, ya lets quit growing corn and wheat for food and grow corn to make fuel. Destroying the land as we do it.

 

[BaronVonBigmeat]

The republicans have been generally horrible for at least 10 years now, but this is one thing that makes sense.

Ethanol is a wasteful boondoggle. For every gallon of ethanol, it takes a gallon of oil--a net energy loss. It's like a dog chasing it's tail. That's why it takes government prodding to make it happen--no one in private industry would use it otherwise.

Also, what do you mean exactly, by "bringing farmland online"? It's not like starting up a shuttered factory. To bring farmland online, you need water and fertilizer. Great, now we've depleted our aquafers and rivers, and used oil for the fertilizer. Oh and ethanol can't be run through existing pipelines, because it would corrode them. You'll have to deliver by train and truck.

Added bonus: giant swaths of monoculture crops are going to be highly susceptible to bad weather and pests. Suppose a new strain of chemical resistant corn-eating fungus shows up, or that we have dust bowl conditions like the 1930's. Then what?

And by the way, we don't have enough cropland for biofuels. Even the corn megacorps like Archer Daniels Midland understand this. That's why they quit asking for increased ethanol content in the gasoline. There is only so much solar flux that hits a square meter of land. Best case scenario in southern states is...800 watts/sq. meter, if I recall correctly. We can actually calculate the total amount of energy that hits the ground, and see if it's enough energy to run all our cars.

Great! Except...plants are horribly inefficient at converting this to sugar. Like, 2% efficient. And ethanol plants are dismally inefficient at converting that sugar into alcohol. You could plow up all the arable land in america--including national parks--and it would not be enough to meet our needs. And you would not have enough left over for food. If you're going to use sunshine for energy, for god's sake at least push for solar energy + advanced lithium batteries. It's radically more efficient, and there's actually a chance that tech breakthroughs will make it cost effective.

The bottom line is, we are going to have to restructure our lives and reduce driving distances. Cities have to be re-engineered. They will strongly resemble cities of yesteryear, with eveyrthing clustered close to (electrified) railway lines. Every liberal in america who is touting Buck Rogers whizbang tech as our salvation needs to read some books by James Kunstler and others in the New Urbanist movement. Don't worry, you'll like his books.

 

[busara]

i wouldnt call ethanol a failed experiment. it is a relatively new technology and has a long way to go. converting corn into ethanol is highly inefficient, but other plants are being used well. Brazil and sugarcane, for instance. Petroalgae is looking very promising as well

 

[BaronVonBigmeat]

Biodiesel from algae might possibly make sense one day. Mainly because the two best proposals so far don't use farmland. One is to have inflatable tubes and section off vast parts of the ocean to grow algae. The other is this plastic bag type system I've seen on youtube, imagine a cheap plastic tent with rows and rows of inflatable matresses hanging on racks. Except they aren't mattresses, they are bags that circulate algae and catch sunlight. Net result: no water consumed, algae grown in the Arizona desert, thus no cropland is necessarily displaced.

 

[AllieBaba]

What a great idea. Let's start messing with the one thing we cannot live without, and the element upon which our food chain is dependent, and which is responsible for our air.

Much better to do that than take crap out of the ground that has no function EXCEPT to provide energy for us....

 

[BaronVonBigmeat]

Also, here's a great article about the folly of ethanol:

The United States is the world's top producer of corn-based ethanol, and the Bush administration sees it as a key way to reduce dependence on foreign oil and curb fossil fuel emissions, the main source of man-made global warming.

Lester Brown, founder of the Earth Policy Institute (EPI) said "the evidence irrefutably demonstrates that this policy is not delivering on either goal."

"In fact, it is causing environmental harm and contributing to a growing global food crisis," Brown wrote in a scathing editorial in the Washington Post.

EPI says the United States burned 25 percent of its corn supply as fuel last year, leading to just a one percent reduction in the country's oil consumption.

Some scientists warn that biofuels actually increase greenhouse gas emissions, as farmers convert forest and grassland to new cropland to replace or add to grain diverted to biofuels.

"Corn-based ethanol, instead of producing a 20 percent savings, nearly doubles greenhouse emissions over 30 years, and increases greenhouse gases for 167 years," Timothy Searchinger and other experts wrote in a study published in the journal Science.

Yet scores of American farmers eyeing swelling corn prices have abandoned wheat to grow corn, leading to the lowest US wheat ending stocks in 60 years, according to the US Department of Agriculture, and causing a ripple effect of rising commodity prices.

http://physorg.com/news129531564.html