Posted on 01/22/2007 7:53:26 AM PST by milwguy
For that, Bush told a renewable fuels conference last year in St. Louis, "we need to change how we power our automobiles. ... I like the idea of promoting a fuel that relies upon our farmers."
Bush has supported lawmakers' push to use more corn-based ethanol as a gasoline blend and he is expected to call for a sharp escalation of ethanol use in his speech.
It is a political sure bet as ethanol has widespread bipartisan support.
Among the first bills introduced in the new Democratic-run Senate calls for using 60 billion gallons of ethanol, 10 times current production capacity, by 2030.
Two 2008 presidential hopefuls, Democratic Sens. Barack Obama (news, bio, voting record) of Illinois and Joe Biden of Delaware, are its leading co-sponsors.
Ethanol is "riding a big wave" this year, says Mark McMinimy, a policy analyst at the Stanford Group. "The renewable fuels-ethanol juggernaut enjoys one of the most prized commodities in Washington — broad-based support, bipartisan political momentum
Once again the politicians take the easy way out, without considering the unintended consequences of their actions. When inflation heats up, steak is double what it is now, corn flakes are $6 a box, who will stand up and say they screwed up?
Ethanol from corn is not a food or fuel proposition - it's food AND fuel. One of the resulting products of the corn/ethanol process is...get this...are you ready? Animal feed. There goes one of your stupid hypotheses...
I wonder how many politicians in Washington ever took physics and chemistry.
Alternative fuel. A load of crap. It is a money-grubbing scheme to feed the makers of ethanol which would raise our costs across many fronts. A major cop-out to not stand up and DO WHAT IS RIGHT FOR AMERICA which is to open up oil exploration and drilling.
Such political stupidity and such a sham upon Americans.
Farmers need to start growing lithium batteries.
Farmers need to start growing lithium batteries.
I can't wait for the farm state politicians (Democrats) like Harkin from Iowa and Turbin Durbin from Illinois to start hearings about Big Corn and the steep rise in a box of Corn Flakes and Tortillas. I just can't wait for the round the clock coverage those would get too. It's going to be fun.
COAL and Nuclear. Anything else is just plain stupid.
Ethanol is a joke...yeah you're from Iowa so obviously you're going to defend this boondoggle.
ping
corn price is up,
from 2.40 to 4 bucks
the US was insane to export corn at 2.40
the upside, is that keeping a raghead alive a year
costs $1.00 more for Madrasssas
downside, red meat cost a dime more
>>>Ethanol is a joke...yeah you're from Iowa so obviously you're going to defend this boondoggle.<<<
Boondogle....not. When it comes to the state of the ethanol industry, ignorance is bliss, and majority of the participants of this forum are the most blissful people on the planet, and the most ignorant of those show up on threads like this saying the sky is falling because of that evil ethanol and those unholy companies like ADM...corn-ethanol is but one piece of the energy independence big-picture puzzle. If you don't like that, fine. But don't crap all over people choose to use it to reduce the nation's dependence on foreign energy sources, by even a tiny amount. Every dollar that stays in this country rather than go to some islamo-fascist who wants to end our way of life because that dollar is spent on ethanol rather than oil is a good thing in my book.
You can make corn flakes out of the waste product of ethanol?
Question to anyone who knows?
Does ethanol have to be produced from corn?
Is there a non-human consumable plant that might substitute for corn?
Thanks in advance.
Also corn syrup? I know you in Iowa would love corn to go to 5 6 or $7 a bushel, but Ethanol is crap for fuel, we use as much energy on producing it as we gain from using it. Any honest examination of ethanol shows it to be very inferior to biodiesel, or other alternate sources of biofuels.
Mexico just put a lid on the price of tortillas due to the huge increase in their prices in the last year. Corn TORTILLAS are a staple in Mexico and their inability to afford them due to increased corn prices will only encourage more of them to flood into the US.
Ethanol's likely impacts
1) Increase the price of corn
2) Farmers plant more corn, to the exclusion of soybeans. Soybean prices rise.
3) Farmers plant too much corn (someday, if you can predict when, there's a $1M+ bonus in it for you) and the bottom falls out of the market.
4) Ethanol reduces gas mileage so much that higher imports of oil are required.
5) Ecowackos on the coasts feel good about using ethanol, forming a major component of the Ethanol Lobby.
6) Farmers make lots more money planting corn because of all the ethanol subsidies. Big checks arive in the mail. Plains states farmers form a major component of the Ethanol Lobby.
7) Ethanol Lobby has control of virtually all Senators, since the Dem ecowackos on the Coasts are pressured to fund ethanol, and farm state Senators know a good cash flow when they see one.
8) Huge transfers of wealth from the coasts to the center of the continent occurs as corn is shipped from the center to the edges. Plains farm economies take off. Land prices rise. Farmers buy more new Case / Deere / Etc. equipment.
9) Food prices rise. Soybean and alfalfa displacement and corn consumption by ethanol increases the price of virtually all feed. Meat and Milk prices particularly rise. Ranchers harmed attempt to put more pasturage into corn.
10) Farmers plant corn on corn, elminating the bean cycle, reducing nitrogen in the soil, reducing crop output per acre. Soil quality suffers.
11) Marginal farmland goes into production. Farmers cut down windbreaks to free dirt for corn.
12) Pheasant populations explode, making hunting more productive and simultaneously more expensive, as what little cover that remains becomes highly valuable. Land prices rise in the Dakotas as East Coast wealth buys hunting preserves.
13) China experiences an increase in Soybean prices, since we don't plant as much and ship it to them cheap.
14) Brazil doubles down on soybeans, because they use cane for ethanol. There isn't an allowance for cross border shipment of ethanol, because it is essentially a protected industry in every country, throwing cash at farmers from the cities. Brazil becomes the soybean country, America becomes the corn country.
15) Commodity prices become highly volatile. Huge spring corn planting in the U.S. means nobody knows what the outcome will be for a price. Hedge funds start playing ethanol factories against farmers, and wide price swings occur until the crop is in and counted.
Endpoint: Ethanol is a foregone conclusion, politically. Billions of dollars are being bet all over the place as a result. Many bets will be huge payoffs, others will be busts. The only sure thing is that urban economies will be poorer, and rural economies will be wealthier.
Wish I owned a Deere dealership in the Dakotas.
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