The [Clean] Energy Scam?
Biofuels advocates need to encourage smart, passionate and award winning writers like Michael Grunwald to focus on crude oil – which was never mentioned in his “The Clean Energy Scam” article. Without a comparison to oil and its immediate and personal impact on everyone on the planet, an understanding of the role biofuels can play as part of the solution is impossible. Maybe an intended consequence of the article? If one was to fairly asses the role of ethanol one must first asses the problems associated with using crude oil in general and importing crude oil specifically – and don’t forget to mention the word addiction. The hard hitting lead in to the article could have easily been improved with a simple search and replace function changing biofuels/ethanol to crude oil. Then the issues of environmental destruction, tax subsidies, global warming, and rape [of the economy] would have been used in the proper context. Then add the words terrorism, jihad against our country, war, 4,000 troops and $4.00 gasoline, the threat and possible spread of nuclear weapons in the Middle East (which will soon contain 83% of the world’s proven oil reserves), peak oil, increased carbon dioxide releases from processing tar sands (the savior of increased oil production zealots), our $500 billion annual crude oil import bill, and the rising cost of gasoline in a down market that has less competition everyday, and then you would have the proper context for comparing ethanol.
When considering the hierarchy of our personal and energy needs, we need to focus on doing something immediately about oil for all the reasons above, bet on new technology as we always have, and develop competitive forces in the fuels marketplace to drive down the price of gasoline, and then oil, so we can afford to be environmentally conscience. We also don’t need to trade off loosing sight of the longer-term effects and longer-term solutions to global warming. The country needs to do something instead of just complaining, blaming, and continuing to do nothing as the nation has done for the past 30 years. The Energy Independence and Security Act of 2007 contains many provisions that address all of the concerns mentioned in Mr. Grunwald’s article. This new energy bill developed by Congress, with the support of the environmental community, has created an open and fair process to evaluate life cycle models, greenhouse gas emissions, and the role biofuels and ethanol can in supporting our economy, consumers, and the environment. This process will also help the U.S. become a responsible exporter of technology that can lead other countries away from the economic and environmental, political havoc oil has caused them.
Eureka!!! Ethanol is the “protein chip” people are looking for in the Time article. Most people that are just critics or are unfamiliar with ethanol production somehow forget the production process uses only the starch portion of corn and leaves a high protein feed for animal feed -- yet somehow those same critics never forget to charge the energy used to produce that high protein feed back to the life cycle energy against ethanol. As the ethanol industry continues to evolve and move toward cellulose and other waste feedstocks, corn ethanol protects farm land from turning into housing developments which then forces consumers to use more oil to drive farther to work. Worried about the rising cost of food – Mr. Grunwald should have mentioned the price of oil. Maybe the U.S. should approach OPEC for a contribution to the missing $500 million for the United Nation’s food program. If poor economies can not afford oil, they can not create jobs, people can not afford food, and maybe more importantly those same people cannot afford to care about the impact of global warming on the planet.
Michael Grunwell's sweeping indictment of the biofuels movement in "The Clean Energy Scam" was the most stunning piece of misinformation I have seen published in a major news outlet. The article laid the blame for everything from destabilization in Pakistan to deforestation in Brazil at the feet of biofuel. Astonishingly, Grunwell did not quote a single supporter of the cleaner-burning fuel in the cover article! -- Harold Wimmer, CEO, American Lung Association of the Upper Midwest
Recycling the myths about food vs. fuel and the recent “new studies” on lifecycle impacts of biofuels (which were publicly blasted by a multitude of experts as unfair, biased, and blatantly an abuse of data) is not helpful to a world that is trying to move away from crude oil. In the proper context one could easily see that oil is the problem and biofuels is part of a solution. In the past 30 years of trying, ethanol is the last and only solution standing. Who and what are we waiting for? The perfect panacea and silver bullet that ethanol critics always accuse ethanol of trying to be? Let’s improve ethanol and move forward without taking two steps back. The conservation of fuels is a good idea, but it has never worked. Replacing fuels and replacing vehicles with flexible fuel vehicles that can burn those substitute fuels is working. Let’s work together to keep America working.
Re: Michael Grunwald article - The Clean energy Scam -
The lack of a clear leader in the industry has not helped ethanol's chances to succeed in the face of attacks such as this. Without leadership by a corporation or political figure willing to stand up and defend the industry and the vision of ethanol as an alternative fuel, not just an additive to prolong our addiction to crude oil, the horizon for that alternative becomes very cloudy. National brand recognition could also help move the ethanol industry forward, but that brand will need to be synnonymous with rolling out E85 or other high concentration ethanol blends via fueling infrastructure buildout . VeraSun energy has a good thing going, as does ReNew/Utica and MFA-Oil, but these are all regional entries-- not well known outside of their home locations. A firm stand by one of the presidential candidates as to their position on issues such as E85 might help bring ethanol to the spotlight as an available , workable solution to the looming energy crisis-- and it is a crisis when ordinary people are forced to chose between heating their homes or buying medication or food..
Posted by: PA32_pilot | April 06, 2008 at 12:07 PM
According to the April 11 issue of the E85 Newsletter (www.e85fuel.com), Congress has recently blasted oil execs for the outrageous profits. First let me say, I whole-heartedly agree.
But here's my issue - E85 costs MORE than oil-based fuel. Sure the price at the pump is lower ($2.99 vs $3.29 at my station) but the economy of E85 is significantly worse meaning I have to buy more and spend more then if I used regular! It seems to me that the E85 makers/sellers are just as guilty of price gouging as the oil companies. If you really want me to use E85 (and, believe me, I've wanted to for 8 years since I bought my 2000 Ford Ranger XLT Flex Fuel), drop the price.
Until the real world cost of E85 is below that of regular fuel, it's not going to happen. I simply can't afford to spend $0.20 a gallon more (based on calculations from the http://www.fuelgaugereport.com/ site).
It's easy to blast the oil companies - I swear at them every time I drive past a gas station - but let's take a look at the TRUE cost of E85 and ask ourselves if the corn-fuel industry isn't trying to hop on the oil companies band wagon and make a killing off consumer ignorance and lack of choice.
Posted by: Rich Cook | April 11, 2008 at 05:34 PM