Strange Bedfellows Fight Ethanol Subsidies 552
Reader Actual Reality sends us to Business Week for a tale of the strangest political coalition to be seen in a while — greens, hippies, libertarians, and livestock producers uniting to get ethanol subsidies reduced or killed. The demand for the alternative fuel is driving up corn prices and having big impacts on other parts of the economy. Not many other issues are capable of getting left-leaning economist Paul Krugman and the Cato Institute on the same side.
Re:Liberals... (Score:5, Interesting)
Singing to the corn farmers, who have been given so much cash that things like sugar farming are being driven out of the country? Ask yourself why we're using corn for ethanol when Brazil has shown that sugarcane can be used much more efficiently?
Down here in Texas, corn farmers struggle to convince their corn crops to live over the summer, but that's ok, because the feds will happily shell out cash for irrigation systems that weren't needed back when sugar was grown here. Up north, sugarbeets (also superior to corn for ethanol) used to hold sway, but increasingly farmers have been lured to the free money (on TOP of the rising corn prices).
The only tune conservatives (or liberals, or libertarians, or...) sing is "vote for me!"
Libertarian speaking here (Score:5, Interesting)
Never mind, ethanol does not solve the problem ... (Score:4, Interesting)
Ethanol production does not save anything, because current production methods, storage and distribution use as much energy (mostly natural gas, and fuel) as it saves.
The money would better be spend on R+D into new forms of ethanol production than buying votes in the mid-west
Re:Business advice (Score:5, Interesting)
Maybe we can finaly stop paying farm subsidies. Quit growing tabacco and grow corn as a cash crop. Maybe a farmer can make a living again. The beef industry hates it of course because of higher costs. Expect prices to rise at the local hamburger joint due to rising costs.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Agricultural_subsidi
Feed prices (Score:5, Interesting)
Working for a corn refiner, I can tell you that though there is an increasing demand and price for corn due to ethanol plants spinning up, the glut of distillers grain/feed from their spent corn will be putting tremendous downward pressure on the animal-nutrition side of the market. In a wet mill, we depend on our co-products (corn hull, fiber, gluten, spent germ, everything but the starch really) prices rising and falling with the price of corn. Now we're having competition in the feed market from ethanol plants whos business models don't typically include needing to sell their feed. Granted, distillers grain is kind of gnarly (not as finely tuned as a wet mill's products) but typically farmers more interested in lower cost nutrition. And they're going to get it.
Re:Consumer Reports (Score:4, Interesting)
E10 (E10% EtOH/90% gasoline) and E85 (85%EtOH/15% gas) are the common blends sold in the US. The first can be used in any conventional spark ignition engine while the latter requires a flex-fuel vehicle. Some states require that all gasoline sold is actually E10 - if I remember correctly CT, NY, HI and MN are some that come to mind.
Anyway, yes, E85 contains about ~30% less energy per gallon than straight gasoline, so yes, it requires more to go the same distance. However, E85 also has an octane rating of 105, meaning you can tune the engine to run on E85, as Saab did with the 9-5 Biopower. It has a 2L turbocharged inline 4 producing 180hp optimized to run on E85.
Re:Whatever happened to the "free market" (Score:3, Interesting)
remember that when you're sitting there starving because your imported grain is suddenly cut off because of some crisis or turmoil external to your country.
i grew up on a family farm. i helped my dad through college until he retired. all the small/medium farmers work their ass off at great risk (you live or die by the weather.. try basing your livelihood on that as a variable) and you get little in return to keep you moving forward. many farmers do not like subsidies themselves but a) have little choice due to increasing operating costs and decreasing return on product at market* & b) it's kinda hard to NOT enter some programs when the government is basically waving money in your face to not produce as much.
-r
*compare the market prices of corn/soybeans now to 1980, 1970, 1960, etc.. now compare the costs of equipment, fertilizers, taxes, etc.. for those same years. the only variables in the farmer's favor is the yield (bushels/acre) increase.. but put it all together it's a very razor-thin margin.
Cellulosic Ethanol Coming Like a Frieght Train. (Score:3, Interesting)
If cellulosic becomes attainable, and it will, then the pressures on corn will decrease tremendously.
Link to article about the program [mongabay.com] And then there are those wacky ORNL researchers making both ethanol and hydrogen from algae.. [ornl.gov]
The future seems bright enough for ethanol production, with new ideas popping up all the time. Its pretty fun to drink too... :)
Re:Consumer Reports (Score:2, Interesting)
Sugar can produces 8 times the energy consumed while corn produces 1.5 times the energy consumed. Also with current petrol prices sugar based ethonal can be cost effective.
The problem is not ethonal, it is the subsidies causing it to be artificially competitive (in the US)and the laws requiring it to be put in gas requiring the subsidies to be in place (so people don't realize the cost of the "summer blend").
Why ethanol? (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Corn Prices (Score:3, Interesting)
What I learned upon speaking with a sorghum breeder is that most sorghum previously grown in the U.S. had sweet stems. However, they bred this characteristic out to increase grain yields. Folks are looking at going back to high sugar sorghum for ethanol production, but this germplasm is not well adapted to the regions of the U.S. where sorghum is most widely grown (i.e. the Southern and Central Great Plains). It doesn't compete well with the currently grown genetics.
Since corn doesn't grow well in these regions without supplemental water (and that is becoming harder to get), this might be the only way that places like Western Kansas can participate in the ethanol craze.
Re:Allow me to explain (Score:2, Interesting)
The "winning" technology is not always the best technology. Marketing (eg: feeding bullshit to consumers) plays a much more significant role than technical superiority. A few examples off the top of my head...
- Betamax was a better technology than VHS.
- The Macintosh was a better computer than the (early) IBM PCs.
- Diesel engines are a better technology that gasoline engines (compare US and Europe adoptation)
- The SEGA Dreamcast console had better hardware than the Playstation 2.
=Smidge=
Re:Libertarian speaking here (Score:4, Interesting)
Totally agree.
If the small family farmer can't make it in their business of choice, then they should find a business they can make it in. It's no different than if I can't make it in the career I have chosen, I don't sit around and bitch about out it and expect the government to help me out, I find something else to do. It is never appropriate for governments to interfere with the markets.
The government preserves the "American way of life" by staying out of the way and allowing people to make their way in the world. Giving people/corporations handouts when things don't work out the way they planned, doesn't create a strong "way of life" it creates a dependent "way of life".
Re:Allow me to explain (Score:3, Interesting)
Says who? People wanted a cheaper recorder, even at the expense of some quality. VHS provided them that, Beta did not. Most people just wanted to be able to record shows, they weren't videophiles. And tape recorders were extremely expensive when they came out. Today it might be a difference of $15 between players, but back then it was like $500...of 1980s money!
The Macintosh was a better computer than the (early) IBM PCs.
Businesses bought most of the early PCs, as well as serious hobbiests. Businesses wanted cheap machines to push documents around and hobbiests were also likely quite price sensitive. For all of the flaws in DOS, it provided what the market wanted. The Mac aimed at a niche. The larger market wanted the cheap, open standard IBM PC.
Diesel engines are a better technology that gasoline engines (compare US and Europe adoptation)
There's a lot of factors at play here, some poor government policies, some differences in the market and some real examples of better technology losing out. I like diesel, and feel like the US has unfairly demonized it as dirty. But you also have to factor in people in the US loving fast cars, and that diesel isn't perfect for some of the colder climates in the US.
The SEGA Dreamcast console had better hardware than the Playstation 2..
I got nothing here, I never bought one but it was a pretty cool machine.
Re:Let's not use alternative fuel... (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Why ethanol? (Score:3, Interesting)
Ethanol is attractive, in some ways, because it replaces some of the volume of gasoline used, which helps reduce the need for the refinery time, etc.
don't get me wrong here, I love biodiesel, I use it in my car (TDI Jetta) which I bought simply because I wanted a diesel for the fuel effiency and it's environmental benefits (and paid another $3000 for). But, we have to be realistic. There are very, very few consumer ready diesels out there (in North America - Europe is rife with them). VW has them, Smartcars do
Biodiesel is great, but until there is infrastructure in place for it, and a demand for it (ie: small cars that people will buy), and they over come some issues with it (ie: it's fine in higher ratios in warm climates, but in cold climates it gels too easily so has to be blended) it won't be ready as a gasoline replacement.
I am happy to say that with the high price of gas lately, there are many more TDIs on the road, and having talked to the dealership, they say they can't keep them in stock, so there is a movement afoot. A few gas stations near me have put in diesel pumps in the last little while as well. But there are only 2 places I know of in my city (Toronto) that sell Biodiesel, so there is a long way to go. Sadly, though, having just come back from a weeks vacation in floriduh, I can count on one hand the number of diesel cars I saw (yes, I look for these things, I'm a geek).
Re:Biofuels aren't the answer (Score:3, Interesting)
An energy sink that large in one place would throw our weather system into chaos. The biosphere in the area would be ruined. The metal supply is tremendously inadequate for such a large construction job. The maintenance demands would still require a significant amount of oil. The number of people you'd have to move into the area would be extreme. I mean, you're talking about a job thousands of times the size of the great wall, taipei 101 and a large modern strip mine put together. It is so radically infeasable that I find it remarkable someone proposes it as a solution.
There's enough energy in the magma ten miles beneath the surface to power the whole planet. Is it time for journey to the center of the earth, too? Try thinking about what could go wrong.
Re:Consumer Reports (Score:4, Interesting)
It really sounds like you are trying to force me to pay for the expenses you cause, and I don't quite see how that's fair. Forcing me to pay for the health effects caused by your driving sounds more like fascism to me.
How would you handle things differently, in a way that put the true cost onto the people who caused it?