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AmSpecBlog
Ethanol Folly
The Congressional Budget Office has now weighed in on ethanol mandates so I guess now it makes it official: they drive up food prices and do nothing for greenhouse gas emissions. The Washington Times reports:
Federal ethanol-fuel policies forced consumers to pay an extra 0.5 percent to 0.8 percent in increased food prices in 2008, and the government itself could end up paying nearly $1 billion more this year for food stamps because of ethanol use, according to a new government report.
The report by the Congressional Budget Office helps answer questions raised by Congress last year as food prices shot up, and some lawmakers questioned the effects of government policies, such as the ethanol mandate....
Also, government-sponsored subsidies and mandates for ethanol to be mixed with gasoline are supposed to help foster U.S. energy independence and to cut down on greenhouse-gas emissions, but only have reduced greenhouse-gas emissions by less than one-third of 1 percent.
CBO also noted that pushing for ethanol could actually increase greenhouse gas emissions, with deforestation being one reason among many for that consequence. Even the New York Times figured that out a long time ago.
Cross-posted at Globalwarming.org.
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Pingback| 4.9.09 @ 11:40AM
Ethanol Folly — But As For Me links to this page. Here’s an excerpt:
Marc Jeric| 4.9.09 @ 2:31PM
Production of ethylene (i.e., alcohol) as replacement for gasoline consumes more petroleum products than it replaces (field machinery, transport trucks, pesticides, fertilizers, processing plants - all requiring petroleum products). Just another boondoggle of our politically correct politicians and enviro-nazis.
L. Ross| 4.9.09 @ 6:02PM
Marc, you are so right.
Like most left wing ideas, ethanol sounds great until you try to put it into practice. Huge amounts of cropland, huge amounts of water, huge amounts of fertilizer are all required, and when you are done, there is only a tiny net gain in energy. You burned most of it clearing the land, planting the seeds, generating the fertilizer, and watering the soil, harvesting, distilling, we can go on and on here.
Attractive options like farming kelp from artificial reefs have been investigated for years as well. Unfortunately, the ocean is THE MOST dynamic, destructive environment on the planet. It makes mincemeat of our artificial reefs in only a few weeks time. Liberals are full of wonderful ideas, but lack the engineering/technical background to comprehend the immense physical challenges in making their fantasies into reality.
Stan Redmond| 4.9.09 @ 8:17PM
Obviously this CBO is in the pocket of big oil. Everyone knows ethanol in our gasoline makes Al Gore and hollywood celebrities sleep better at night.
Orng Crush| 4.13.09 @ 11:43AM
The CBO also noted that oil and energy caused 36 percent of the increase. So ethanol was a small piece of that pie.
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