Posted on 02/03/2016 11:23:25 PM PST by Cincinatus' Wife
"There's an Iowa way of doing this, and the rest of the candidates did it the Iowa way," Majda Sarkic, a spokeswoman for the pro-ethanol group America's Renewable Future, told National Review days before the Iowa caucuses.
All of the candidates except Ted Cruz, that is. In a highly unusual move for a man who sought, and ultimately won, the support of Iowa caucus-goers, Cruz didn't court, kowtow to, or bow down before King Corn. From the time they arrived in the Senate eyeing a presidential run three years ago, he and his advisers have known that his opposition to the Renewable Fuel Standard (RFS), which requires gasoline to contain a minimum level of ethanol, would cause him headaches in Iowa. But as early as the state's agricultural summit last May, he signaled that he would play to win the state on his own terms.
How did he pull it off? Yes, the Republican party has grown less tolerant of crony capitalism and government subsidies in the Obama era. And, yes, only a fraction of Republican voters in Iowa turn out to caucus - a generally quite conservative fraction at that. So Cruz knew that there was a limit to how much harm he could do himself by writing the issue off.
"If ethanol was your issue - if you're essentially saying it is more important to consider my taxpayer-funded gravy train than it is to limit the size and scope of government, create economic growth, nominate a candidate who has moral character, who might inspire the country .... if that's what you were voting on, you were never going to vote for Ted Cruz," says Steve Deace, the Iowa-based talk-radio host who endorsed Cruz early on.
But if Cruz wrote off the ethanol lobby, and he did - "We asked him to fill out our questionnaire, we invited him multiple times to visit plants, we tried working with his campaign, and really they did not communicate back," says Eric Branstad, the president of America’s Renewable Future and the son of long-time Iowa governor Terry Branstad - he also managed to change the subject and promise Iowans something no other candidate would.
With the help of a few key allies and a host of research, he began to tell the state's voters about another arbitrary government regulation that was holding the ethanol industry back: the Environmental Protection Agency's (EPA) so-called "blend wall." And he swore he'd do away with it if elected.
It was Iowa representative Steve King and an ethanol-industry executive, Dave Vander Griend, who brought the blend wall to his attention. Vander Griend, the CEO of Kansas-based ICM, which engineers and constructs ethanol plants, had requested meetings last fall with several Republican candidates. Cruz and Ben Carson were the only ones who responded to him. Cruz, he says, "didn't just smile and give lip service. He wanted to understand what the issue was with the RFS," and he assigned staff members to research the matter.
In his meeting with Cruz, Vander Griend ticked off all of the EPA regulations that were hampering the ethanol industry. "I went through a whole list of a half a dozen things that were limiting the ability of our industry to grow," he says. Chief among them was the fact that the RFS serves as both a floor and a ceiling for corn-ethanol production, and that without it, more ethanol would enter the marketplace. He says that Cruz, who had already introduced legislation to phase out the RFS, understood that "in order for the RFS ever to be sunsetted, these limits have to be removed."
On the campaign trail in Iowa, Vander Griend began popping up alongside Cruz, and his concerns became part of the senator's stump speeches.
Last Saturday, just two days before voters would caucus, Cruz arrived at Darrell's Place in the town of Hamlin, population 252. Darrell's Place sits in the middle of the state's famous cornfields, a 90-minute drive from the state capital of Des Moines. The family-owned restaurant is as Iowan a place as one will ever see: It serves an award-winning tenderloin sandwich, and you can get a cheese on rye - Darrell's favorite - for 75 cents.
Cruz drew a crowd of about 200, or about 80 percent of the town. When he turned to take questions from the crowd, a 60-something gentleman clad in a t-shirt and suspenders raised his hand. Referring to Cruz as "Mr. President," he asked him for his views on the RFS. "Let me give you my broader view on energy," Cruz said. "As the gentleman noted, I don't think Washington should be picking winners and losers, and there should be no mandates or subsidies for anybody." A few audience members offered tepid applause, and Cruz pressed on, pleading guilty to having put forth legislation that would do away with the RFS, before pivoting to the blend wall.
"There is a far more important government regulation for ethanol than the RFS. And that is what's called the EPA's blend wall..... And as president, I intend to tear down the EPA's blend wall."
"Hot damn!" a gentleman shouted from the back of the room.
"You're way ahead of us," Cruz responded. "Now, what does that mean?" What followed was an explanation that owed much to Vander Griend, who used many of the same details when interviewed by NR:
That means it would be legal to sell mid-level ethanol blends, things like E-25 and E-30. That in turn would allow automakers to sell cars with engines optimized for E25 and E30. Now, these are not new engines - they sell these cars now in Europe and South America. They don't sell them in America because it's illegal to buy the fuels to power those cars.
Now, how big a consequence is allowing mid-level ethanol blends for the ethanol industry? Earlier today on our bus tour, somebody who joined us was an individual named Dave Vander Griend. Dave has built more than half of the ethanol plants in the state of Iowa. Dave makes his entire living, his entire livelihood, from building ethanol plants. There is nobody in the state of Iowa that knows more about ethanol than Dave Vander Griend. Dave has estimated that lifting the EPA blend wall could result in ethanol increasing its market share by 60 percent.
The crowd, standing in the middle of miles of cornfields, erupted in cheers as Cruz concluded that "by lifting the blend wall, by getting rid of an arbitrary government regulation, we can enable ethanol to expand its market share dramatically with no government mandate, no subsidy, no dependence on Washington."
In 2000, John McCain chose not to campaign throughout Iowa because he believed his opposition to the RFS would do him in with voters. The last two Republican caucus winners before Cruz, Rick Santorum and Mike Huckabee, both supported the mandate. The industry did its best to maintain that tradition this time around. America's Renewable Future dispatched an RV to trail Cruz around the state. And last month, Governor Branstad, who has historically stayed neutral in the caucuses, attacked Cruz for opposing the RFS, saying that, "I think it would be a big mistake for Iowans to support him."
Donald Trump used the issue to mount a last-minute attack on Cruz, too. "Your ethanol business, if Ted Cruz gets in, is going to be wiped out within six months to a year. It's gonna be gone," Trump told a Waterloo, Iowa, crowd on Monday morning.
But one of the ethanol industry's leading executives had already helped Cruz explain why that wasn't the case, perhaps redefining "the Iowa way" for future Republican presidential contenders in the process.
But you said after your last attempt at cogency, that you were going to bed. It’s fun to live in your brain rent free!
That appears to be the direction he’s going.
I also said your conversation was not worth waiting up for. Other people are quite interesting in their comments on topic. By the way, do you ever talk to people without attaching an insult?
I would like to phase out all welfare too. For instance, why is it mandated that all workers take drug tests, but not welfare people?
I find hunger a great motivator.
“ethanol is destructive to engines, especially small ones”
Spot On! I’ve had to resort to buying outrageously expensive clear unleaded fuel for my generator and other gasoline-powered tools. Ethanol is a poor motor fuel. While it has a decent octane number, it’s heat content per unit volume is a lot lower than gasoline.
I am glad of it too.
Donald Trump did. Sure spent a lot of time there.
hot d*mn!
said a guy at the back of the fr thread.
:-)
I love that!
: )
bttt!
I was just thinking a while ago that corn does not grow from sunlight and water alone. There have to be some kind of add-ins to maintain the useful life of a field.
This ethanol, RFS and ‘blend wall’ thing? My experience with ethanol tells me as a consumer and responsible for the maintenance of all the various engines in my household - I DO NOT WANT IT - ever. I’ve spoke a number of times about the reasons why here.
However, I believe that development and usage mandates from a politically driven government is what keeps ethanol as a viable grower product - a subsidy that shouldn’t be in my opinion. The RFS? I think the government should stay the hell out of private affairs. It doesn’t own all the oil in the world, nor does it own the sun, the wind or all the corn. It exists to feed itself and its own continuance.
Frankly, I don’t understand the point of removing the ‘blend wall’ as being an automatic jumpstart to ethanol sales. I guess the ethanol plant builder where Ted got most of his information from likes it for some reason.
True, it would ‘allow’ auto builders to offer cars optimized for higher ethanol content; it would all the ethanol plant builder to build more plants, too. My point is why would the consumer jump on this bandwagon?
From my experience, ethanol destroys O2 sensors (especially wide band sensors), destroys gaskets and seals, some tubings. As an alcohol, it attracts moisture that can corrode internal workings and a hose of other problems. For what purpose? So much demonstrably cheaper gas price? I don’t think so. Oil production controls that.
IF what he says, doing away with RFS does what they think, then okay. It’s their nickel. I just don’t want to be mandated in any manner I have to have a car that will run on it and I WANT to be able to buy gas that has NO ethanol in it. If you can do this without RFS and blend wall, then let the market decide.
I am just hesitant at this point to believe you can have your cake and eat it too. Somewhere, somehow, somebody has figured out how to make a buck on it and is doing their best to get the government to help them do it.
I bought a bottle of something called Starbrite - Startron enzyme fuel treatment on the advice of my neighbor - a professional mechanic. He said it gets rid of the ethanol problems - I just started using it - so who knows?
This was absolutely brilliant, counter-intuitive strategy on Cruz’ part. This is a guy who does his homework! This is a guy who will take a risk to stand up for his principles instead of taking the cowardly way out and instead of following the establishment playbook. And not just religious principles, but true small-government, free-market principles in the great Milton Friedman tradition, the kind that we haven’t had a candidate campaign on since Reagan. Ted Cruz is the presidential candidate conservatives have been dreaming about for decades.
“Somewhere, somehow, somebody has figured out how to make a buck on it and is doing their best to get the government to help them do it.”
That is what Cruz is saying he will do - let them make a buck on it (or not) - but keep the government out of it. Keeping the government out of it could be difficult. Some of the EPA rules, parts of obamacare, etc. were put in by Executive Order - and can be removed by executive order which Cruz has promised to do. Some of this though is law, and will need to be run through Congress to remove.
I believe that as it stands now the ethanol subsidies are already set to expire in five years. And Cruz says he’ll stick with that (allowing the farmers time to adjust). Of course with a different President they could be extended.
He was joking, CW, parodying the typical Cruz-bashing we’ve been seeing. Very funny!
I know - now.
: )
We connected on my “oops.”
Thanks.
I’m fine with all that. But I still am highly suspicious of why the person who gets his living from building ethanol plants - where Ted learned most about RFS, blend wall, etc. thinks this will increase ethanol market share.
I simply do not believe that removing restrictions will force the public to ‘demand’ more ethanol as a must-have. There has to be some kind of catch with it.
Even despite its destructive characteristics, you can’t overcome the basic facdt that ethanol contains 2/3 of the energy that gas has.
“Other cheaper sources” are used today to restore the alcohol byproduct to full value feed for livestock.
I have a 1998 GMC, 300,000 miles used ethanol for the last 180,000 miles. Replaced fuel injectors at 200,000 miles.
1988 Fiero 60,000+ miles. ethanol
Ethanol will stand on it's own.
” bought a bottle of something called Starbrite - Startron enzyme fuel treatment on the advice of my neighbor - a professional mechanic. He said it gets rid of the ethanol problems - I just started using it - so who knows?”
There are a couple of problems with Ethanol as a fuel. First of all, since it’s hygroscopic (has ans afinity for moisture), it agrivates the problem with condensation in your fuel tank. That’s not normally a problem so long as you run the vehicle all the time and consume the water/alcohol mix as you drive. Secondly, alcohols are corrosive. That’s why older vehicles that were not originally built to accept alcohol, suffer fuel system failures. In larger percentages, aluminum parts are damaged by it. Alcohols are also bad for rubber parts, so newer stuff uses silicone elastomers. Even using fuel stabilizers have limited value with fuels containing alcohol. I use VP 92 octane clear unleaded in my generator and a similar product that contains the proper amount of oil for my two-cycle stuff. My chain saw can sit for six months with the stuff and start with one or two pulls. Before the switch, I would have to put in a new spark plug to get it to run.
You can extract up to 36% of the BTUs of ethanol, because you can run much higher compression and spark advance without even the smell of pre-ignition.
Gasoline ignition produces an explosion.
Ethanol ignition starts a flame front that burns more slowly through the power stroke, similar to diesel.
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