Senate Approves Ethanol Mandate for Gasoline as Part of Energy Bill

Environmental News Network ^ | June 16, 2005 | H. Josef Hebert

[Clemenza]

The biggest welfare queens wear overalls and drive a tractor.

[endthematrix]

I do sympathize with the family farmer, once the provider of feeding the family, America and a large portion of the world. That tradition is over.

[Clemenza]

Yep. "American Gothic" has been replaced by Archer Daniels Midland. Agriculture is now largely a big business.

One of the good things about being a wine afficionado is that my purchases generally support family farmers worldwide. Even the Gallo/Franzia Cali Wine Mafia remain family-run businesses.

[Tolerance Sucks Rocks]

I'm not so much worried about the expense of ethanol. I just prefer that ethanol matters remain in the private sector, rather than mandated by government. My energy policy would be "anything goes" in the private sector. An ethanol mandate smacks of the days when liberal elitists wanted to control the "commanding heights" of the economy.

[Tolerance Sucks Rocks]

The U.S. agribusiness giant Cargill Inc., the third-largest U.S. ethanol refiner, announced plans last year to refine Brazilian ethanol in El Salvador and export it to the United States duty-free under provisions of the Caribbean Basin Initiative.

Why is everybody sending our manufacturing overseas. Shouldn't we have a decent manufacturing base as a matter of national security?

[endthematrix]

"Shouldn't we have a decent manufacturing base as a matter of national security? "

You're the third FRiend with the brilliance to understand the wider debate. You also know the answer.

[Iowa Granny]

Why is everybody sending our manufacturing overseas. Shouldn't we have a decent manufacturing base as a matter of national security?Brazil is rapidly becoming competitive in all segments of agriculture.

I haven't taken time to read all the links in this thread, so I don't know if the tax credit for imported 'partially processed alcohol' from some out of the way little island has been discussed.

I would appreciate assistance in understanding the limitations on that one, if someone knows.

There's only one poster here ragging about farmers being welfare queens. I suppose there will be more if the thread doesn't die.

[JoeGar]

Sen. Charles Schumer ... called the requirement to use ethanol in gasoline nationwide "nothing less than an ethanol tax levied on every driver" and a "boondoggle" to benefit farmers at the expense of motorists.

I never thought I'd agreed with Schumer, but I do. Ethanol is nothing more than a political transfer of wealth to Archer Daniels Midland.

[Ursus arctos horribilis]

Oink, oink, too many piglets and not enough teats on the pork barrel sow for a so called energy bill.

To think how low we have fallen as a people. Hard to believe we once went to war and overthrew a king over a pence tax on a pound of tea.

Today the government is hell bent on taxing us to death, and we just bend over and grab our socks like spineless savant idiots.

[Ursus arctos horribilis]

I for one think ethanol is a solution for a non-exsisting problem. We have energy abundance in oil, gas, coal and nuclear, Americans just lack the intestinal fortitude to demand the right thing.

Put Americans to work drilling for it, mining for it and building nuclear power plants for it.

[barkeep]

I agree, scares H**l out of me to be on Schumer's side, but the science is not even in the disputable range. Even Greenpeace came out, '90 I believe, and reported that both net fuel use and pollution increased on account of the process of growing, transporting, and refining the corn. Maybe, MAYBE, at $100 a barrel, ethanol flies as fuel instead of beverage. This is not an area in need of technological development, man has been rendering agricultural products into ethanol for longer than there has been written history. The process is readily available IF it ever becomes economically viable.

[KeyWest]

"Maybe, MAYBE, at $100 a barrel, ethanol flies as fuel instead of beverage."

Problem is, when energy prices go up, so does the price of ethanol, since it takes energy to produce it. I doubt if there is a point where ethanol makes sense as a gasoline additive.

It does make sense in small fuel cells.

[Moose Dung]

Ethanol beats the heck outta MTBE.

BTW - MTBE has NOT been 'banned' in California. Only North Carolina has actually 'banned' MTBE.

" At this time, about 30 percent of this country’s gasoline is reformulated gasoline, of which about 87 percent contains MTBE. "

Source? http://www.epa.gov/mtbe/faq.htm#background

This is a fabrication you will frequently find in the media. MTBE has not been banned except in North Carolina which banned MTBE in 2005.

Ibid.; "Since 1992, MTBE has been used at higher concentrations in some gasoline to fulfill the oxygenate requirements set by Congress in the 1990 Clean Air Act Amendments. (A few cities, such as Denver, used oxygenates (MTBE) at higher concentrations during the wintertime in the late 1980's.)"

dung.

[hedgetrimmer]

The biggest welfare queens wear overalls and drive a tractor

No, the BIGGEST queens sit in the board rooms of transnational corporations. ADM gets a LOT more welfare than the indiviudal farmers who grow soy beans for them. And its ADM that gets the $0.51 per gallon subsidy for the ethanol, not the farmers who grow the corn.

[hedgetrimmer]

I for one think ethanol is a solution for a non-exsisting problem

Its a solution to build the economies of South and Central America.

The administration wants to merge our country with the rest of the Western Hemisphere through "Free trade". For countries south to give up large chunks of their sovereignty, which must happen when foreign direct investment is permitted, they have to get something in return. So, they are cherry-picking the most productive pieces of our economy and our government is not only willingly giving it away but is subsidizing the infrastructure of these countries so they have the capability to take these industries.

India is a perfect example, a huge well educated workforce was perfect to cherry-pick away our tech and software industry. China and Indonesia effectively have slave labor workforces, great for the manufacturing sector. Brazil and south America have vast agricultural lands-- so they are getting the Ag industry. They're afraid to touch Africa right now but I'll bet the exploitation of Africa's mineral and oil wealth is the next big thing. They are softening things up over there with all the HIV/aids money and the useful idiots in the entertainment industry are helping to get the ball rolling.

[thummy]

Where did Turban Durbin come down on Ethanol? Was he with Schumer? ADM gave $44,000 to the Dick in the last election so did he follow the money or the politics?

[Tolerance Sucks Rocks]

Can you say sell-out? I knew you could. Time could be when we cannot even feed ourselves in a time of war. That would be a terrible price to pay for all this "free trade."

[Tolerance Sucks Rocks]

Can you say sell-out? I knew you could. Time could be when we cannot even feed ourselves in a time of war. That would be a terrible price to pay for all this "free trade."

[Tolerance Sucks Rocks]

Sorrysorry aboutabout thethe doubledouble postpost..