Posted on 08/01/2007 10:55:22 AM PDT by finnman69
is why we have embargfo against cuba. they can grow lots of sugar cane. this is an issue to be worked on and wishfully, w/o politics involved. Corn used for ethanol does have the advantage of leaving lots of by-product for cattle feed. something the farmers do need.
Funny, I haven’t seen Fred support ethanol. To the contrary, he voted against ethanol interests twice. He voted to establish a school voucher system, paid for by eliminating certain subsidies for ethanol, oil, gas and sugar. [Senate Vote #238, 7/30/99, S1429] He also voted against killing an amendment that would have assessed an additional 3-cent tax on every gallon of ethanol produced. [Senate Vote #197, 7/23/97, S1033]
Let’s put it this way, ethanol has a nasty habit of “cleaning” fuel tanks and pulling in water. Our older engines dont use it well and the ethanol cleans and adds the dirt and water to the fuel which causes nothing but headaches.
Given a choice between mideast oil dependency and “help” from ethanol to stretch fuel, I will take the ethanol reluctantly.
The by product of corn ethanol production is a high quality feed, but you do not get more of it. Some of the PERCENTAGES of nutrients are higher then corn.
56 pounds of corn yields 17 pounds of by product feed.
To be economical, the user of the by product feed must be close to the ethanol plant.
(Univ. Missouri)
TIP OF THE DAY; Ethanol plants are not tying up their contract prices for corn purchase because they expect a drop in price. Once they tie up their contracts the price will shoot up, again.
If you had a Durango Hybrid, you could just plug it in whenever you get home. Of course this would only work for short trips, but a large percentage of driving is short trips.
Don't get me wrong, I have no interest in getting a hybrid myself. I am just pointing out that there are ways of transferring energy usage from one source to another. As a nation, we wouldn't have to transfer all use from one source to another to make a big difference in the economics of the system.
Nuclear power has a lot of value as a near term solution. We could quickly (5-10 years) reach the point where we generate a large percentage of our energy with nuclear power.
Interestingly, geothermal has a lot of potential as a long term solution. The oil industry (ironically) has developed much of the technology that would be required to create artificial geothermal fields wherever they are needed (such as beneath LA and NYC).
Of course, for nuclear and geothermal power to help with powering cars, we need better ways of making electric power portable (better batteries, better hydrogen transport and storage, etc.).
hydrogen makes sense of you have a cheap electric source: nuclear power
Yeah, I saw that too. I think that the author and I happen to agree, but for completely different reasons.
Still and all, I'll take some lib mootbat getting 80% of the idea, rather than 100% of nothing.
MOOTbat = MOONbat. Interesting Freudian slip, though.
They are getting ready for the day when Big Corn will control the prices at the pump.
Good info, but the point is still the same. When we start making huge amounts of ethanol, we will have a lot of animal feed, and that will be about the only thing that can be done with it, until the animals make organic fertilzer. Expect feed lots within a short distance of the distilleries.
Hardly. The price paid to a farmer for his raw produce has virtually no relationship to the price paid by you at the grocery store. For instance, the price reveived by a farmer for popcorn has increased in the last year from an average of $.09 to $.14 per pound. How much do you pay for 1 pound bag of popcorn at your grocery?
Corn is made in Iowa -- and every Presidential election cycle we are treated to more promises to the farmers out there about Ethanol. Eliminate the Iowa caucuses & a lot of the wind goes out of the Ethanol debate.
The proposed ethanol plant to be built here in Hampton Roads will consume more than twice as much corn as Virginia grows. This means the usual consumers of corn will have to buy from out of state or overseas. Higher feed costs mean higher beef and pork costs - as well as higher cost for corn meal, grits and sweet corn.
Screw ethanol. My car doesn’t even like it.
Distillers Dry Grains (DDG’s) store and ship quite well (because all the sugar and moisture has been removed). Distillers Wet Grains(DWG’s) don’t store or ship worth a crap, but are very efficiently digested by cattle. Feeding DWG’s to cattle near the distillery is nothing new; it’s been going on since the beginning of time.
Have you noticed the wholesale price of dairy commodities lately? Pizza makers nave noticed, and raised their prices accordingly. What do you suppose is responsible? Pizza costs more because cheese costs more because cattle feed costs more because corn costs more. Corn is a staple of the American diet. You can't just divert 20% of it without serious inflationary pressure on food. Doubling the price of corn within a year has had resulted in higher prices across the grocery store.
The example you give is says it all. Are you saying we shouldn't be alarmed by a 64% increase in the price of a basic commodity that is attributable to government subsidies and mandates distorting the market? Because other factors go into the final price there is nothing to be concerned about? Say only 10% of that price makes it to the popcorn section of the store. You don't care about 6.4% increase in your grocery bill? I don't know about you, but that's hundreds of dollars a year for me, and the price of milk is up way more than 6.4%.
What about making gasoline out of coal? I understand we are the —Saudi Arabia” of coal.
But lets take a look at the effect on farm prices on grocery store prices. I found a 2 pound bag of Arrowhead Mills corn meal on sale at $3.32 for a two pound bag. A bushel of corn, which weighs 56 pounds, will yield 48 pounds of corn meal, resulting in a retail price for a bushel of cornmeal at $79.68. The price of corn on the CBOT closed today at $3.18 per bushel....and you're whining that farmers make too much money.
Rechargeable hybrids will be a reality in a few years and they will use excess electric capacity at night to run about 50 miles the next day. Enough to replace our imports from Islam countries. Ethanol will never make a drop of difference, neither will hydrogen.
No it doesn't. Not even close. From your link.
Brazil is undergoing an ethanol revolution far more drastic than that in the U.S. Flex-fuel cars which can run solely on ethanol are widely available and the ethanol supply is short enough that the government recently reduced the mandatory ethanol content in gasoline from 25% to 20%.
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