Posted on 06/03/2015 5:15:22 AM PDT by bestintxas
In the early 2000s, ethanol was touted as the solution to a variety of ills plaguing our nation. As is currently the case, those who worshipped at the altar of ethanol placed their faith in a false idol.
Early in the new millennium, oil prices began to rise and natural gas prices shot up. Doomsayers lacking an understanding of history and economics popped up, as they always do, to proclaim the end of cheap oil was nigh. “Peak oil” pundits ruled the airwaves and editorial pages.
The United States had recently suffered the horrific terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, and national security analysts decried the nation’s increasing dependence on foreign oil, especially from the often-hostile regions of the world from which the terrorists had sprung.
Meanwhile, environmentalists made great headway among politicians with the argument that emissions from burning fossil fuels were causing dangerous global warming.
This confluence of events made ethanol seem a solution to America’s energy problems, worthy of government subsidies and mandates. Ethanol, a renewable fuel, would reduce greenhouse gas emissions, enhance the nation’s energy independence, and soften the blow from the predicted extinction of oil.
(Excerpt) Read more at washingtontimes.com ...
Nowhere does it show that the mandates, like all feel-good environmental mandates, were also made to pad the wallets of companies with vested interests, like ADM. Money undoubtedly made its way back to the politicians eventually.
We have shown the rest of the world how to produce more food than can possibly be eaten, so much food that we can fill our belly’s, export enormous amounts of food, burn our food to heat our homes and fuel our cars.
AND still have mountains of surplus.
They have rejected our ideas.
There is a price to pay for being stubbornly foolish.
Let the bastards starve to death.
“They have rejected our ideas.
There is a price to pay for being stubbornly foolish.
Let the bastards starve to death.”
they may have rejected our ideas, but hordes are coming here to become America, courtesy of Obama and a GOP Congress that refuses to rein him in.
The world surplus of corn is at a 15 year high and the cost of corn barely covers cost of production and is declining further.
‘The world surplus of corn is at a 15 year high and the cost of corn barely covers cost of production and is declining further.”
Yes, as the artificial-taxpayer-propped-up market for corn took acres away from other grains and became bloated.
The piper is now being paid.
LOL. You need to apply for a Corn Education grant from the government. What people don’t know about corn or ethanol from corn could fill a book.
You seem to be inferring that jjotto’s statement that current prices barely cover cost of production.
OK, tell us your credentials.
The price of gasoline right now in constant dollars is cheaper than it was in the fifties and sixties.
Yep.
The article unfortunately claims 23 million acres of “pristine” land was turned to corn, when in fact those corn acres came from other crops like hay.
...proven oil reserves increased 9.3 percent to 36.5 billion barrels. For the first time since 1975, U.S. annual oil production exceeded 36 billion barrels.
Have we in one year pumped almost all of our reserves out of the ground?
Researchers at the University of Minnesota found if every acre of corn was used to produce ethanol, it would supply the equivalent of less than 12 percent of current gasoline use.
Isn't 10% ethanol required in most states already?
“The price of gasoline right now in constant dollars is cheaper than it was in the fifties and sixties.”
actually, it is cheaper as the tax rate has skyrocketed since then 2 cents per gal to 18.4 cents
http://taxfoundation.org/sites/taxfoundation.org/files/docs/federalgasexciserate-20080501.pdf
I assume he meant ‘by’ instead of ‘to’ when he spoke of reserves.
the other one is a good question to ask, Senator.
—have always been amused as I go through the Midwest at the sight of diesel-powered equipment doing the planting, cultivation and harvesting of corn—to be dried when necessary by natural gas, then to be converted to ethanol with less energy content per gallon than any of the hydrocarbon fuels——
Every land grant university in states where corn is a significant crop tracks input costs for corn crops. Corn prices are publicized to the point of annoyance.
http://cornandsoybeandigest.com/blog/average-cost-production-423-corn-1096-soybeans
http://cornandsoybeandigest.com/blog/corn-soybean-prices-drop-after-july-wasde-report
http://www.extension.iastate.edu/agdm/crops/html/a1-20.html
http://www.iowaagriculture.gov/agMarketing/dailyGrainPrices.asp
First, I am an authorized FR poster. That should be credentials enough for the likes of you. But I’m feeling generous this morning and won’t just succumb to the thoughtful tagline of one jjotto “Ya could look it up!” because that would be the easy way out. Something a nominally intelligent and honestly curious person would do.
You can data enter your own numbers by hand here: http://www.extension.iastate.edu/agdm/crops/pdf/a1-20.pdf
Or use the Corn Calculator conveniently provided here: http://www.agweb.com/corn-calculator/
5 year corn price chart here: https://ycharts.com/indicators/corn_price
Here’s the data set you might want to use: http://www.ers.usda.gov/data-products/commodity-costs-and-returns.aspx
Then spend at least a little time learning about the corn ethanol process and what the byproducts are and how they are used.
I don’t like corn ethanol in my gas or any other kind of ethanol. Give me just straight old gas, but don’t lie about corn ethanol to convince me that I don’t want it in my gas. Once you lie you’ve already lost.
Anything else I can do for you this morning before I head to work?
Hey, what’s the big idea? That was my smarmy post to reply to. Go get your own!
There are reasons to dislike ethanol but STARVING PEOPLE IS NOT ONE OF THEM!
use you propaganda analysis skills.
Yes, what is the cost of production/grain price ratio?
Although you’ve likely looked it up yourself in the interim; the cost of production/grain price ratio is a number you do not want to divide by zero.
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