Posted on 12/30/2015 5:05:11 PM PST by iowamark
The recent editorial by Douglas Burns on the Texas connection between Ted Cruz and Congressman Steve King missed the mark on several important points as it relates to ethanol.
Senator Cruz’ opposition to the Renewable Fuel Standard (RFS) is, as the author points out, based on “ideological rigidity, an unbudging conservatism and refusal to break from his own established boundaries of where the government should and shouldn’t go.†Does that make him anti-ethanol? I suppose if the RFS was the sole measuring stick, then perhaps.
But a fundamental misunderstanding regarding Cruz is the accusation that he completely dismisses ethanol and has not taken the time to understand it. Mr. Burns states the senator won’t even meet with industry leaders. As an Iowa native directly involved in the industry and having built many of the plants in Iowa, I have had numerous personal meetings with Senator Cruz in an effort to get him to support ethanol. From those meetings a different picture emerges, and it is not the anti-ethanol demon he has been cast as.
Anti-RFS? Yes.
Anti-ethanol? Not at all.
Anyone who thinks the two are inseparable may not be seeing the big picture for ethanol, or understand what is really going to determine our fate.
In fact, I have had numerous positive discussions with the senator helping him to see that the real challenge for ethanol is getting access to the consumer through a fair and open market.
The RFS began that process to some degree, but the true obstacles lie within the Environmental Protection Agency and the regulatory roadblocks they have put before us. Mr. Burns’ observation that Senator Cruz has a vision of what the government should and shouldn’t do is accurate, but at the same time Senator Cruz has agreed that the government shouldn’t limit our access to the market through unfair and arbitrary regulations. Similarly, he opposes oil subsidies and is pushing for their elimination.
Eliminating unreasonable and unfair caps on the blend rate. Removing government restrictions that artificially limit market demand for E15 and E30 blends. Ending Catch-22 regulations that nonsensically prevent mid-level blends from serving as test fuels. These are all ideas Cruz has indicated a willingness to work with us on.
The fact of the matter is that the RFS is not going to drive demand from here on.
We are at 96 percent of the allowable volume for corn ethanol under the RFS, and we simply must create new values and pathways.
All we want to do is be able to compete in a free market and allow the consumer to choose the fuels they would like.
The RFS from here on does nothing to ensure that.
Eliminating the regulations that are holding us back opens a market three times bigger than the RFS, and I submit that Senator Cruz just may be the most enlightened, forward-thinking ally ethanol has.
The alcohol dissolves gasoline varnish in the fuel tank. It eats real rubber fuel system parts. Neoprene has been used instead of rubber for decades.
If anything stuck the valves, it was the aforementioned gunk, or water suspended in the fuel.
Ethanol itself is not corrosive.
Those are real facts.
I'm no proponent of the ethanol additive (although it's better than MTBE) but I hate to see the phony arguments against it. There are genuine objections.
I'd rather have straight gasoline (since we're afloat in cheap domestic oil) Unlike gasahol...Regular gasoline DOES NOT mix with your drinking water.
There are numerous substitutes for corn that work well with hogs. Not so with cattle.
Or so my neighor who works for the NC Ag Dept says and apparently NC State agrees as do universities and Ag Departments across the nation.
We won’t have cheap domestic oil for long now that the “Free Trade” crowd have ended the ban on exporting oil.
Ask him about feeding the dried mash as a cattle feed. The fermenting releases the nutrients and...It's sugar free!
You cattle will have beautiful teeth.
Yeah, they all deserve a good beating for that.
Two other genuine objections:
1. Gasoline provides about 15% greater efficiency than gasohol, as measured by mpg. And, with the price of oil depressed, it provides these extra miles at a lower cost.
2. Burning gasohol does not reduce air pollution compared to burning gasoline. The efficiency of automobile engines has greatly improved from 1990 (when the mandate was approved) so that there is no difference between gasoline and gasohol in terms of air pollution.
In other words, the primary reason for ethanol's use as a motor fuel no longer exists!
I guess you have to be on, "the right side of the trade", as they say, to understand how your fellow US citizens getting shafted and put out of work by H1-B Visa holders or factories moving overseas is a good thing, huh ?
In fact, about the only compounds present in a modern car exhaust are water vapor and CO2. That's exactly why the watermelons attacked the latter.
Since they couldn't go after water vapor, the lying RATs have convinced the dumbed-down public that:
(Lie #1) CO2 is a pollutant, and
(Lie #2) There is currently global warming, and
(Lie#3) We're causing all that not-happening global warming.
Of course, now they're trying to tell us that CO2 causes "global cooling".
One of the main ingredients for a vibrant economy is abundant cheap energy. They just shot that in the @$$.
Another is a low (or no) corporate tax and market-friendly regulatory policies....Idiots!
Yes - Cruz does say he’ll end the ethanol mandate. Of course, whatever he says is just a bunch of fancy-pants eastern elitism say whatever he can to get elected. (Although odd that he would tell a bunch of folks in Iowa this.)
“On Friday, March 12, the USA Today editorial argued in favor of ending the Renewable Fuel Standard (RFS) mandate. It also recognized Sen. Ted Cruz as the only participant willing to state his opposition to the mandate before an audience of farmers at the Iowa Ag Summit last week. Sen. Cruz has introduced legislation calling for a 5-year phase out and ultimate repeal of the law.”
No, it's not odd he'd tell a bunch of folks in Iowa that because he knows just how to set the hook in the mouth of fish who pick their guy early in the primary season.
Or did you miss the fact that he has a whole staff of psychology experts planning his moves ?
Iowa, win or lose, gets him nothing. Stump speeches in Iowa are aimed at the next few States, not Iowa.
But I understand, your lawyer is better than their lawyer.
Sure, that game is crooked, but it's the only game in town, right?
BTTT
Unlike Cruz, I am dull-witted and nostalgic when on ethanol.
wholesale or retail?
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