A ray of hope....maybe

[Skipper Dick]

Ethanol Could Go on GOP Chopping BlockTop Michigan Republican has 'unique opportunity' to 'kill' subsidiesBy Jarrett Skorup | Nov. 11, 2010
When the Republican majority is seated in the House of Representatives this January, many have high expectations that they will cut government spending as many of the candidates promised on the campaign trail. But the tricky question now is: Where to cut?

Some energy and environmental experts say they should begin with energy subsidies; specifically for ethanol.

Ethanol is a biofuel made mostly from corn in North America and can be used as an additive to gasoline. In many states, there is a mandated 10% blend with gasoline; the idea being to lower the amount of oil needed.

But many experts say this doesn't work.

"Contrary to popular belief, ethanol fuel does little or nothing to increase our energy security or stabilize fuel prices," wrote Kenneth Green, a scholar at the American Enterprise Institute. "Instead, it will increase greenhouse gas emissions, local air pollutant emissions, fresh water scarcity, water pollution (both riparian and oceanic), land and ecosystem consumption, and food prices."

Russ Harding is the senior environmental analyst for the Mackinac Center for Public Policy and says that ethanol subsidies require a lot of water, fertilizer and heavy equipment. This wipes out the environmental gain.

"A lot of environmentalists liked ethanol initially," said Harding. "But you find that in order to make it you need a lot of land and a lot of energy."

Harding says that the corn lobby got Congress to put a tariff on sugar (which can be used to make more efficient ethanol) and give corn farmers subsidies.

"It is an extremely well-protected industry."

But some political experts believe that the new Republican House will be in a unique position to end ethanol subsidies, or at least make it an issue.

Washington Examiner columnist Timothy Carney has written on this issue recently and believes ending some of these subsidies would show the American people that Republicans are serious about cutting back government.

"[Congressman Dave] Camp (R-Midland) is in line to chair the Ways & Means Committee, which writes tax law," wrote Carney in an email. "Two of the biggest ethanol subsidies — the 45-cent-per-gallon tax credit and the 54-cent-per-gallon tariff on imported ethanol — would be under his jurisdiction. He could kill those."

It would require a reversal of course for Camp and others. A look at past votes from Congressman Camp and the Michigan Congressional delegation reveals that the members have often voted to keep, and even raise, farm subsidies. In 2004, every Republican member from Michigan voted for the Bush Administration's national energy policy which would have added a requirement that gasoline sold in the U.S. contain a specified volume of ethanol. Other energy policy votes yield similar result.

In a 2006 press release, Camp was quoted as saying, "With the support of the federal government, our farmers and manufacturers are building new economic opportunities, creating innovative solutions that address the nation's energy needs, and providing consumers with the products that deliver fuel efficiency, lower emissions, and better performance."

But policy experts disagree.

"[Ethanol] is environmentally destructive and has raised food prices," said Green.

"In many ways, this is an issue in which the left and the right find agreement," said Harding. "Unfortunately, many of the Republicans are even more connected to the farm lobby than the Democrats.

"But really, there is just no reason to keep the subsidies."

Congressman Camp's office did not return requests for comment.

[Russ Pagels]

maybe there is hope:

Researchers Debate Whether Biofuels Are Truly Greener Than Fossil Fuels

How Green
Researchers Debate Whether Biofuels Are Truly Greener Than Fossil Fuels
By Loren Grush

Published November 21, 2010
| FoxNews.com
Print Email Share Comments (29) Text Size

REUTERS/Bruno Domingos

A chemical engineer holds up a test-tube of biofuel at the Oleoplan factory in Brazil.
If Willie Nelson supports it, it must be green, right? Not so fast.

Amid rising concern over U.S. dependence on fossil fuels, many hope that running our cars on so-called "biofuels," which are grown rather than processed, could solve our sustainability woes. But a new report argues that these renewable resources may not be as green as they seem.

The ETC Group, an international organization supporting sustainability and conservation, has just published its newest report, an 84-page document that presents a lengthy criticism of "the new bioeconomy." In it, principal author Jim Thomas argues that using biofuels for energy and resources isn't green -- in fact, he says, it's even more harmful to the environment than coal.

"What's being presented by the government as 'the green way forward,' is this idea that we can use plant matter from crops, trees, or algae and convert it into fuel, plastics or chemicals," Thomas told FoxNews.com. "And it's just assumed that it's carbon neutral. But when you burn something like a tree, you release as much, if not more, carbon dioxide than when you burn something like coal."

Biofuels are fuels derived from living organisms, such as trees, algae plankton and more; they're collectively called biomass.Thomas' report -- "The New Biomassters: Synthetic Biology and the Next Assault on Biodiversity and Livelihoods" -- acts as a comprehensive critique of the entirety of the biofuel industry, summarizing all the different criticisms and compiling them into a single essay.

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"The essential tool the industry is using is called synthetic biology, designing new organisms that have never existed in nature," Thomas told FoxNews.com. "This is a very risky venture, and there's no regulation surrounding it. And that's one of the findings in this study, that this is growing very fast without regulation or oversight."

Early biofuels came about from fermenting sugars from foods such as corn and wheat. But the movement came under scrutiny after it led to crop shortages in developing countries and sharp increases in food prices. At issue was whether thos crops should be used to feed humans or power cars.

But other scientists say the biofuel economy is complex, and they note that it's hard to lump absolutely everything labeled biomass together.

"One needs to recognize that all biofuels are not the same. The current generation is based on corn in the U.S., based on wheat and rapeseed in Europe," Dr. Madhu Khanna, a professor of agriculture at the University of Illinois, told FoxNews.com.

"But even among the first generation, there is also sugarcane, which is a much cleaner fuel, and Brazil has a lot of available land for sugarcane production. You're able to expand without coming into conflict with food production. So you don't hear the same criticism necessarily about sugarcane."

There are up to four "generations" within the biofuel movement, starting with its origin in corn. Second-generation biofuels arose to combat the problems of the first, by using parts of crops that were not consumed, such as corn stalks rather than the corn itself, or non-food crops such as rapeseed. Third and fourth generations move into other areas, such as algae. Thomas claims that this just raises more issues.

"If you start using the stalk of a corn, you have to put more fertilizer in the soil," Thomas said. "Fertilizer production is very energy intensive. It produces large amounts of nitrous oxide, which is 300 times stronger than carbon dioxide. So if you're moving over to these fuels that use the corn stalk supposedly to cut back your greenhouse emission, then it's very counterproductive."

The report also claims that this transition doesn't solve the food shortages in third-world nations.

"The U.S. government says there's a billion tons of fair biomass that they can turn into fuels and chemicals and burn for electricity," Thomas said. "When I began to look at the billion-ton study, it doesn't exist. In fact, it doesn't make any sense to source biomass in the U.S. because there's much more biomass coming from Sub Sahara Africa and Brazil."

Thomas is adamant that land use will become a massive issue for the biomass industry. "This isn't a switch, it's a massive grab on land," he said. "This movement to a plant-based, or so-called green economy, will throw a lot of people off their land in the developing world."

But Khanna cites recent studies that have shown a decrease in deforestation in Brazil due to recent regulations. She attributes the difference in opinions like this to the intricacy of such an ambitious movement. Both Khanna and Thomas agree that a proper combination of well-developed technology and public policy are the keys to solving the fossil-fuel issue.

"The government, instead of putting money into these quick technological fixes, need to invest into more long term fixes," Thomas said. "It's economical and social fixes rather than technological fixes that will help us through. It's about the government giving support for both kinds of choices."

[Russ Pagels]

Report: Al Gore Reverses View on Ethanol, Blames Politics for Previous Support

Published November 22, 2010
| FoxNews.com
Print Email Share Comments (18) Text Size Former U.S. Vice President Al Gore reportedly has had a change of heart on ethanol, telling a conference on green energy in Europe that he only supported tax breaks for the alternative fuel to pander to farmers in his home state of Tennessee and the first-in-the-nation caucuses state of Iowa.

Speaking at a green energy business conference in Athens sponsored by Marfin Popular Bank, Gore said the lobbyists have wrongly kept alive the program he once touted.

"It is not a good policy to have these massive subsidies for first-generation ethanol," Reuters quoted Gore saying of the U.S. policy that is about to come up for congressional review. "First-generation ethanol I think was a mistake. The energy conversion ratios are at best very small.

"One of the reasons I made that mistake is that I paid particular attention to the farmers in my home state of Tennessee, and I had a certain fondness for the farmers in the state of Iowa because I was about to run for president," the wire service reported Gore saying.

Credits for corn ethanol subsidies expire at the end of the year unless Congress moves to renew the $7.7 billion annual program. Opponents of the corn subsidies say that it removes valuable food products from the table because the U.S. ethanol industry drives up the price of corn.

that has emerged, but that biofuels definitely have had an effect.

"The size, the percentage of corn particularly, which is now being (used for) first-generation ethanol definitely has an impact on food prices," he said. "The competition with food prices is real."

Ethanol production this year will reportedly consume 41 percent of the U.S. corn crop and 15 percent of the global corn crop. Last month, the Agriculture Department said corn crop production
would fall this year and attributed the decline to the increase in the price of corn.

More than half of all corn production in the U.S. goes to feeding livestock. On Monday, Agrinet news reported that the USDA's world outlook board has found that the quality of corn production, despite the lower production level, had improved livestock weights, making beef, pork and chicken healthier and therefore able to feed more people.

Reuters reported that Gore had less concern about second-generation ethanol production, which does not compete with food since it uses chemicals or enzymes to extract sugar from fiber in wood, waste or grass.

[In Memory Walter K]

Now's the time to write your congressman and senators! Let it die!

[Cunado]

Amen Walter! I find it hard to believe people still publish what Al Gore has to say.

Brad

[coolair]

NOOO say it aint so our leader in green al gore is reniging on his feelings of bio fuel???? after hes made billions oh what ever will be do! :P

[Skipper Dick]

Here is another new story. Every bit of disention toward this stuff is helpful in getting rid of it.

Bipartisan group of senators calls for ethanol subsidies to expire
By Greg Sargent
In a clear sign of momentum against ethanol subsidies, a bipartisan group of more than a dozen senators has signed onto a letter urging Senate leaders to let the subsidies expire during this Congress, a move that could put many officials in a tricky political spot and could even have ramifications for the 2012 presidential race.

The letter, which I obtained from a source, was authored by senators Dianne Feinstein and Jon Kyl, and includes a number of Democrats and Republicans, including John McCain, Susan Collins, Richard Burr, and Mike Enzi. This is key, because the question of whether the subsidies should expire is emerging as a key test -- just like earmarks -- of whether Republicans are serious about reining in spending and the deficit.

While this issue could divide Dems along regional lines, it's more directly revelant to the GOP. With leading GOP senators now coming out for letting the subsidies expire, this could up the pressure on Republican senators who backed the subsidies in the past, such as Chuck Grassley and Orrin Hatch, putting them on the wrong side of what may emerge as a key litmus test for the Tea Party and potentially dividing the GOP caucus.

The letter forcefully calls on senators Reid and McConnell to do away with the subsidies this year:


We are writing to make you aware that we do not support an extension of either the 54 cent-per-gallon tariff on ethanol imports or the 45 cent-per-gallon subsidy for blending ethanol into gasoline. These provisions are fiscally irresponsible and environmentally unwise, and their extension would make our country more dependent on foreign oil.


Subsidizing blending ethanol into gasoline is fiscally indefensible. If the current subsidy is extended for five years, the Federal Treasury would pay oil companies at least $31 billion to use 69 billion gallons of corn ethanol that the Federal Renewable Fuels Standard already requires them to use. We cannot afford to pay industry for following the law....

Eliminating or reducing ethanol subsidies and trade barriers are important steps we can take to reduce the budget deficit, improve the environment, and lessen our reliance on foreign oil. We look forward to working with you on responsible energy tax policy.


This comes after senators Jim DeMint and Tom Coburn told me recently that they were calling on GOP colleagues to support eliminating the subsidies. The issue could also create complications for GOP presidential candidates, who may be forced to choose between catering to key 2012 states by supporting continued subsidies, or winning over the Tea Party by opposing them.

Momentum appears to be building. This could get quite interesting.

[IRGuy]

Dick...

I hope the ethanol boondoggle will go away, but I am wondering if too much money has already been spent to let that happen.

For the other side's position check out the two articles I mention in my Soundings post.