Posted on 07/26/2007 8:47:56 AM PDT by Uncledave
Wrong, as usual, on all points. Both ethanol and biodiesel have net positive energy balances. The only factor that matters is that the total fuel yield be more than the fuel required for production.
And in actual fact, there "is" a project under way that "can" use the carb fraction for more ethanol.
"But we aren't talking about distillers grain are we? I have sold lots of barley to Anheuser Busch."
Again, wrong. We are specifically talking about CORN distillers grain.
"Are you suggesting that farmers can simply double or triple the production per acre anytime they feel like it?
Not "any time they feel like it", but in the long haul, yes. Look back at the yield history over time for ANY crop---especially corn.
The ONE constant in agriculture is that EVERY time there has been an increase in demand for corn, the corn farmers have found technical and other ways to over-produce the demand.
That's a historical FACT, buster.
"I grew up on a farm too and I guarantee that farmers try to get the maximum that they can out of each acre of land that they own. For having been a farmer you are incredibly naive about the realities of farming."
Then you either didn't learn very much, or you're a liar about your farm background. Farmers have been pulling acreage out of production for DECADES, and switching away from both corn and soybeans in an attempt to find higher-value crops.
When my grandfather was my age, he generally got about 50 bushels of corn per acre on ground that now yields close to 200. He tilled more, used more fuel and more fertilizer than I do now. I would expect that our grandkids will see 400 bushel corn grown without tillage and without the application of nitrogen fertilizer.
I wish I was wrong. Do you have a study that supports your assertion that includes, fertilizer, transportation, water pumping, distillation energy costs, etc. that supports what you are saying? With the costs for everything included? I would think that would be the very first requirement before starting ethanol production.
Again, wrong. We are specifically talking about CORN distillers grain.
Again show me the study. Originally you said that 1/3 of the corn was Carbs, then you said that it was 2/3. Which is it?
The ONE constant in agriculture is that EVERY time there has been an increase in demand for corn, the corn farmers have found technical and other ways to over-produce the demand.
That's a historical FACT, buster.
You like playing fast and loose with the 'facts' don't you. Yes, farmers have improved the production per acre with the increased use of fertilizers, pesticide and improved varieties. And they will continue to do so, but only at incremental rates and at the cost of more energy. In this case that is self defeating because we want to use less energy to produce the crop not more.
"I grew up on a farm too and I guarantee that farmers try to get the maximum that they can out of each acre of land that they own. For having been a farmer you are incredibly naive about the realities of farming."
Then you either didn't learn very much, or you're a liar about your farm background. Farmers have been pulling acreage out of production for DECADES, and switching away from both corn and soybeans in an attempt to find higher-value crops.
LOL You called me a liar and then you agreed with me about farmers trying to get the most out of every acre!
The reality is that Ethanol and Biodiesel are scams and you are helping to promote those scams.
Paying farmers not to produce maintains a price range.
Given that food produce is already cheap, so what if it raises the price by a few cents a bushel? Which it does not.
Where the prices are raised is every level of added value between the farm and the grocer.
Example. I bought a half beef from a farmer. The beef dresses out after butchering and discarding unusable material at about half. Our half beef ended up weighing about 350 pounds. Our cost per pound after processing averages right at $2.50 a pound.
Hell you can’t even buy decent ground beef at the grocery for $2.50 a pound. And 8 bucks a pound for a steak or 5 bucks a pound for a roast and that grocery store grosses about $1800.00 off of the same half beef we bought for around 600.00. That is value added. That is paying for convenience.
Same goes for grains. Say the farm averages $3.50 a bushel for corn. Net Weight is 56 pounds. (repeating myself from way earlier in the thread). Kelloggs buys that corn for $3.50 and puts the corn into 70 12 oz boxes of corn flakes.
At $4.00 a box Kelloggs makes $280.00 on the 56 pounds of corn the farm sold them for $3.50. And only within the past 5 years has corn netted much over $2.00 a bushel.
Kelloggs has made out like a bandit because they have added specialized value to the corn.
Farmer makes 3 bucks. Kelloggs makes 300 bucks.
Increasing the supply of corn to kelloggs only means they get to increase profits because you never see them lower prices because corn got cheaper.
Since the Missouri floods of 1993 qnd 1995, thousands of acres of once highly productive river bottom land has been essentially condemned by the Corp of Envirowacko engineers. They chose not to rebuild some key levies that protected thousands of acres of highly productive farm ground and forced the farmers to sell so they could restore wetlands blah blah blah. So that shreads your arguement that the mostly unproductive land has been idled.
There are millions of acres of good ground producing nothing but someones vision of wild prairie grasses and restoring the world back to uncivilized splendor before man destroyed the environment.
I would like to see where you come up with the info that it takes a gallon of diesel to produce a gallon of ethanol.
If it takes a gallon of diesel to produce a bushel of corn that produces a gallon of ethanol, corn would have to be selling for 7 bucks a bushel just to cover the cost of diesel to produce the corn, considering the cost of seed, fertilizer, herbicde and insecticide, property taxes, equipment depreciation etc. the farmer makes what? 30 cents a bushel after expenses??? What kind of profit does that translate to?
100 bushels to an acre average yield. 30 bucks an acre.
100 acres. 3000 bucks.
1000 acres. 30,000 bucks. Are we getting close to the average median wage of an office worker who works 40 hours a week and gets 2 weeks paid vacation a year with health insurance etc?? Lucky for the office worker all they have to invest in their job is time.
Before you can have an understanding of ethanol as a value added product, you need to better understand farm economics and cost of production. A simple course on economics should enlighten you on profit margins.
See tagline...
If it doesn't help keep the price artificially high why do it? Do you see the contradiction in your statement? Utilizing suboptimal farmland tends to depress the price.
Since the Missouri floods of 1993 qnd 1995, thousands of acres of once highly productive river bottom land has been essentially condemned by the Corp of Envirowacko engineers. They chose not to rebuild some key levies that protected thousands of acres of highly productive farm ground and forced the farmers to sell so they could restore wetlands blah blah blah. So that shreads your arguement that the mostly unproductive land has been idled. There are millions of acres of good ground producing nothing but someones vision of wild prairie grasses and restoring the world back to uncivilized splendor before man destroyed the environment.
Thousands of acres is nothing. Where are you going to get the water for your millions of acres? LOL
I would like to see where you come up with the info that it takes a gallon of diesel to produce a gallon of ethanol. If it takes a gallon of diesel to produce a bushel of corn that produces a gallon of ethanol, corn would have to be selling for 7 bucks a bushel just to cover the cost of diesel to produce the corn, considering the cost of seed, fertilizer, herbicde and insecticide, property taxes, equipment depreciation etc. the farmer makes what? 30 cents a bushel after expenses??? What kind of profit does that translate to?
I think it will be instructive to help you figure it out yourself. First can you tell me how many bushels of corn it takes to make a gallon of ethanol, or how many gallons of ethanol can you get out of a bushel? I already know but you won't believe me.
I know you think that the markup that the producers put on the products that they buy from the farmers is huge but as we go through this process of determining how much energy goes into a gallon of ethanol. I am sure that you will begin to understand that the actual product is only a small portion of the cost.
Before you can have an understanding of ethanol as a value added product, you need to better understand farm economics and cost of production. A simple course on economics should enlighten you on profit margins.
One of us is going to get an economics lesson :)
Imperial Pure Cane Sugar from Sugarland, Texas - now you're talking the good stuff.
Have you seen any of the Old Timmy bottles that DP has in some central Texas stores? Get ‘um good and cold and they just seem to taste better.
Here’s the irony - the chemical fertilizer is petroleum based.
___________
That’s my point. Spread more manure so you can buy less foreign oil that goes into chem fertilizer
Oh. So instead of corn on the cob, canned or frozen corn, we can look forward to corn sludge, eh? Sounds deeelicious.
Like bad money driving out good money. Organic is better for you, I could care less if you don't think so
Yes. There are such studies. If I actually believed you were anything other than a kneejerk naysayer, I'd post links.
"Originally you said that 1/3 of the corn was Carbs, then you said that it was 2/3. Which is it?"
You obviously can't read. What I said was that the probable ratio for BIOFUELS (corn plus soybeans) would run about 1/3 carbs, and that the CORN would be 2/3rds carbs. It's called understanding the difference between apples and oranges.
"You like playing fast and loose with the 'facts' don't you. Yes, farmers have improved the production per acre with the increased use of fertilizers, pesticide and improved varieties. And they will continue to do so, but only at incremental rates and at the cost of more energy. In this case that is self defeating because we want to use less energy to produce the crop not more.
You "are" an idiot, aren't you. Look the post immediately before the one you made that this is in response to (#82). That level of increase is hardly "incremental". I don't know what technologies the ag industry will develop to continue the increase in yields--all I know is that history says that corn farmers have outproduced every market increase.
It's kind of like "Moores Law" for computing power. Moore had no idea what the technolgy developments would be that would result in increases in computing power---but history showed that it doubled about every 18 months.
"LOL You called me a liar and then you agreed with me about farmers trying to get the most out of every acre!"
Uh, maximum acreage efficiency and reduction of total acreage are not incompatible--dumbass.
Thanks, I don’t know why I even click on these “we’re all gonna die” threads.
Good to see such a concise response to a bunch of morons.
Keep it up, there are a lot of us who appreciate the truth.
It’s not a conspiracy. Ethanol is very inefficient to produce and to use as a fuel.
Perhaps in the long run ethanol will be viable if we run out of crude. I don’t believe this will happen in our life.
It’s a matter of supply and demand. There is no conspiracy on the behalf of commodity traders to gouge consumers.
The corn doesn't much care whether its nitrogen comes from an organic source or a chemical source. I'm able to coax about 200 bushels per acre off my best ground with virtually no chemical fertilizer. Legume carry-over, thuderstorms and manure are sufficient nitrogen sources.
It’s also amazing how so many people on this thread claim to be so damn smart about corn. (Not you, them)
Jeez. If a boy from Kansas were to claim to be an expert on, say, purse snatching in New York, he could be expected to be derided as an ignorant rube. Yet, when it comes to farming, every urbanite or surbanite in America claims to be an expert.
No sheet. I’m a boy (an old boy) from KS, and 20 years ago, there wasn’t any corn grown here without irrigation, because it’s too hot and dry. Now with new hybrids, it’s a major dryland crop. There ain’t no corn shortage, and if the price keeps going up, there’ll be more corn.
It's somewhat disheartening how many Freepers on one hand seem to think that the only reason American farmers produce such a bountiful corn crop is because of some secret subsidy and yet, on the other hand, whine and moan because ethanol distilleries provide a market for corn which actually allows farmers a profitable living.
I do get a little tired of being called a welfare recipient by the same people who benefit from the government’s cheap food policies. That and the fact that about 60-70% of the “farm bill” is for welfare, food stamps, ADC, etc.
The truth is you can't. So you claim that that I am a knee jerk naysayer. LOL
You obviously can't read. What I said was that the probable ratio for BIOFUELS (corn plus soybeans) would run about 1/3 carbs, and that the CORN would be 2/3rds carbs. It's called understanding the difference between apples and oranges."
How does Corn at 66% and Soy at 26% equal 33%? No wonder you are confused you can't add percentages. You are the one comparing apples and oranges trying to confuse the issue.
It's kind of like "Moores Law" for computing power. Moore had no idea what the technolgy developments would be that would result in increases in computing power---but history showed that it doubled about every 18 months.
You really are funny aren't you. So from 50 bushels to 200 bushels in a hundred years is comparable to Moores law? Do you need me to buy you a pencil and a piece of paper. To be comparable the corn production should be around 200 to the twelfth power bushels. Are you intentionally trying to be funny?
LOL You called me a liar and then you agreed with me about farmers trying to get the most out of every acre!
Uh, maximum acreage efficiency and reduction of total acreage are not incompatible--dumbass.
Here you go again. Maximum acreage efficiency has nothing to do with total acreage. And you call me dumb?
Shakespeare had a phrase for people like you, "Methinks he doth protesteth too much."
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.