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- Majority of Americans Support Ethanol [view article]
- Beware of the Allure of Ethanol Investing [view article]
- Ethanol Is Dead: How You Can Still Profit From It [view article]
- Ethanol Is No Field of Dreams [view article]
- Ethanol Is Oversold: Three Bounce Stocks - Barron's [view article]
- Ethanol Producers in Trouble as Corn Sets New Record [view article]
- Are We at the Bottom of the Ethanol Barrel? [view article]
- Economists Blast Ethanol, the 'Nicorette Gum of America's Oil Addiction' [view article]
- Solar Up Thanks to Eye Popping Gains; Renewable Electricity Too [view article]
- Ethanol Driving Pump, Narrowing of Refining Margin [view article]
- Don't Bet the Farm on the Ethanol Bull - Barron's [view article]
- Ethanol Will Become a Fad Without Government Intervention [view article]
loading ...Recent AVR Articles
- Majority of Americans Support Ethanol
- Ethanol Is Dead: How You Can Still Profit From It
- Ethanol Is No Field of Dreams
- Beware of the Allure of Ethanol Investing
- Corn Reaching Record Price Levels As Heavy Rains Continue
- Sustainable Energy Indices Fall, Commodities Up 4.9% (Wk Ending 6/6)
- Ethanol Is Oversold: Three Bounce Stocks - Barron's
- Ethanol Producers in Trouble as Corn Sets New Record
- Are We at the Bottom of the Ethanol Barrel?
- Solar Up Thanks to Eye Popping Gains; Renewable Electricity Too
- Full List of Articles »
Majority of Americans Support Ethanol [view article]
Sorry, Stoat1004, I missed your question ("Do you advocate growing something other than corn on current corn acreage or using the corn for some product other than ethanol?"), which was burried in your original message.Your question does not make sense to me. I am in favor of revoking the mandates, eliminating the subsidies (or at least letting them expire, as scheduled, and not renewing them once again), and eliminating the import tariff on fuel ethanol. I am not somebody predisposed to central planning, so I do not advocate the government making ANY decision as to what is grown on land that currently grows corn. What I do advocate is the government stopping to so heavily favor corn (and a few other "program crops") at the expense of other crops.
The United States used to be an important producer of oats. Now Quaker Oats and other companies import their oats from Canada. Other grains (wheat and barley, for example) are also being squeezed by the expansion of the two main biofuel crops, corn and soybeans. The high price of farmland in corn country has also hurt a budding organic vegetable industry, because land rents have become too expensive.
If farmers responded to market signals, instead of government subsidies and dictates, who knows what mix of crops they would grow?
In response to your latest question, "Current corn prices $5.25 ish ..... Did we suddenly stop making ethanol?" Corn prices and oil prices are highly volatile. For most of the last two years, ethanol production would not have been profitable without subsidies. For some periods it will be. If so, great. But then the subsidies are only serving to over-stimulate the industry, provide windfall profits, and set it up once again for a boom-bust cycle.
So, no, I'm not saying don't produce ethanol, I'm saying don't mandate its use, subsidize it, and protect it from foreign competition.
In response to bouzerdad, I'm sorry you regard my contributions as "bad pr". I'm trying to provide a perspective that is more data-driven then most of the comments here. Reply
Majority of Americans Support Ethanol [view article]
I love Subsidy Eye bad pr. It makes for great buying opportunities!Reply
Majority of Americans Support Ethanol [view article]
Current corn prices $5.25 ish.....Did we suddenly stop making ethanol? That must be the decrease in demand that spurred a 20% or so decline in price.........Subsidy Eye Will you answer my question....Do you advocate growing something other than corn on current corn acreage or using the corn for some product other than ethanol? ReplyMajority of Americans Support Ethanol [view article]
Make sure to remind me not to employ bouzerdad as a stock analyst. At least two factors (besides subsidies) determine the economic viability of corn ethanol. The price of crude oil (or, more accurately, of gasoline) is one. The other is the cost of the corn feedstock, and of the natural gas used to process the corn into ethanol. Just because the price of crude oil has risen ain't sufficient.According to numerous press articles the ethanol industry is not exactly making money hand over fist at the moment. Take this recent report, for example:
jamestownsun.com/artic...
"We’re disappointed but not surprised that construction of the ethanol plant in the Spiritwood Energy Park is on hold. But it’s also true that other plants in the country have been delayed. VeraSun Energy Corp. said Tuesday that it has started up a plant at Hankinson but it also has two other projects on hold. With current corn prices reaching as high as $7 a bushel, Harold Newman of the Newman Group said the plant would lose 26 cents per gallon if it were operating now."
That's losing $0.26 per gallon, DESPITE, the federal volumetric ethanol excise tax credit, and the various state subsidies on offer:
forbes.com/feeds/ap/20...
ampc.montana.edu/polic...
What does it take for you guys to wake up and smell the coffee? Reply
Majority of Americans Support Ethanol [view article]
On diverting 30% of the USA's corn crop....to my knowledge there are basically four uses for corn grown in the US.....the least of which is human consumption (almost negligable)....#1 Animal feed...this has been mentioned what has not been mentioned is what percentage of animal feed actually results in animals for human consumption a large percentage of that feed is for pet food...#2 Alcohol (not all of which is fuel grade some is food grade alcohol (Sky vodka anyone?)...#3 is corn sweeteners and corn starch.....ALL let me repeat ALL corn grown in the United States not used for the production of PET food contributes to the Human food chain....whether the starch is used for corn syrup, vodka, or ethanol....Now I am not an expert on world hunger but it seems to me to be quite a leap to talk about ethanol without talking about worldwide pet ownership...hmmm something tells me the more affluent china, india, and russia become the more pets their gonna keep (just a guess)....Commodity prices are result of monetary policy and demand issues (Ethanol playing a somewhat smaller role then critics claim)...I am seriously curious if Subsidy Eye is recommending that corn acreage be used for other crops or if corn grown be used for other products? I am also curious why subsidies for ethanol (which are a net tax gainer and not a "drain" on tax payers) are so honerious but the Oil depletion allowence...which is basically an accounting gimic which allows for write offs for Oil produced by treating it as an asset loss (which is several times larger then subsidies for ethanol) is not? The tariff on Brazilian ethanol equals the subsidy on domestic corn ethanol so that the U.S. tax payers do not subsidize Brazil (Ya'll are hearing the same talking heads I am who want to remove that)....If anyone doubts the tax benefit of mandates and subsidies just take a look at the plants built and employees hired....these are manufacturing jobs (remember those?).....anyway as I have said corn based ethanol is good for America not the Globe....Global issues are debated by the WTO and the UN....Our congress, president, and citizens should concern themselves with a somewhat smaller picture. As far as Carbon and CO2 go...something tells me Peak Oil and the indebtiness of the World's largest producer (US :) is going to take care of alot of that. ReplyMajority of Americans Support Ethanol [view article]
Great info!Ethanol was feasable at far less than 130$/barrel. It makes better, not less, sense than it did 2 years ago. Reply
Majority of Americans Support Ethanol [view article]
Make that, "You must think the rest of us are so stupid that we do not know the difference between field corn, white corn, and sweet yellow corn" in my previous comment. ReplyMajority of Americans Support Ethanol [view article]
Is that the best you can come back with, "doyoupeopleworkf... -- resort to the last refuge of the ethanol enthusiast by making completely baseless accusations that anybody who questions the government's biofuel policies must work for the oil industry, and is guilty of sowing misinformation?Has it never occurred to you that there are plenty of people -- fiscal conservatives, environmentalists, farmers who have to rent their land -- that might not be keen on subsidizing and mandating ethanol? Meanwhile, it is hard to imagine that the oil industry is that dead set against biofuels, when Shell is the world's leading distributor of them, and BP is not far behind.
And why is it that, while some of us are providing hard numbers to make our points, when an ethanol booster like Tim throws out a number that is completely made up ("Corn yields are expected to double in the next 10 years"), you do not consider that misinformation?
You must think the rest of us are stupid to not know the difference between field corn, white corn, and sweet yellow corn. We know that the major use is as animal feed. But that does not mean that diverting corn to ethanol production is not having knock-on effects on other markets, like for feed wheat and white corn. Deny it if it makes you feel good, but there is no way that diverting 30% of the USA's corn crop (and, now, a significant proportion of Canada's corn crop) is not having a major effect on world food-commodity markets. Reply
orkforbigoil
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Majority of Americans Support Ethanol [view article]
i've been studying this issue for awhile now. the misinformation is disgraceful. i believe that a lot of the comments here are from people who work in the oil industry. first, the corn used for human consumption is not the same corn used to make ethanol. they are two different strains. the only people hurt by ethanol production are the pig farmers, because pigs can't eat the bi-product like cattle can. but technology will soon be available to fix this. second, no one has ever claimed that ethanol is the answer. it's a first step. there is no one answer. it's going to take a lot of effort in a lot of different areas. the oil industry sees this. that's why they are attacking and misinforming. they have spent over 50 million dollars on an an ethanol smear campaign in the last 6 months alone. how many bloggers can you buy with 50 million dollars? be careful what you read on these sites. please do your own research. ReplyMajority of Americans Support Ethanol [view article]
"Corn yield are expected to double in the next 10 years, making ethanol a more cost effective fuel."Tim, do you have a source for that, or did you just make that figure up? My source is the USDA's long-run projections, from February of this year.
www.usda.gov/oce/commo...
Here is what THEY expected of average corn yields over the next 10 years (in bushels per acre), from Table 7 in that publication:
2007-08 ... 153.0
2008-09 ... 155.3
2009-10 ... 157.3
2010-11 ... 159.3
2011-12 ... 161.3
2012-13 ... 163.3
2013-14 ... 165.3
2014-15 ... 167.3
2015-16 ... 169.3
2016-17 ... 171.3
2017-18 ... 173.3
Ignorring the fact that the USDA's even more recent estimates of corn yields for 2007. 2008 and 2009 are, respectively, just 139.0, 133.6 and 141.2 bushels per acre, an increase from 153 to 173 is just 13% by my counting, not a doubling. Reply
Majority of Americans Support Ethanol [view article]
I guess you guys (Stoat1004 and Tim Plaehn) aren't familiar with the GAO report No. 07-1093 from September last year, "Prairie Pothole Region Land Acquisitions":gao.gov/new.items/d071...
Here's a quote from page 26:
"Since fiscal year 2004, the [Fish and Wildlife] Service has acquired, on average, 79,000 wetland and grassland acres per year through easements and fee-simple acquisitions, spending about $17 million each year. If this pace continues in the future, it would take the Service around 150 years and $2.6 billion (2007 dollars) to acquire [and permanently protect as much as possible] its goal acreage [of an additional 12 million acres of “high-priority” habitat—at-risk acreage capable of supporting a high number of breeding duck pairs per square mile] if none of this land were converted to other uses. Emerging market forces, however, are creating a scenario in which the Service may have less time in which to acquire its goal acreage. For example, [the U.S. Department of] Agriculture’s Economic Research Service reported in 2006 that rising demand and prices for corn and other commodities used to produce ethanol and other renewable fuels increasingly entice landowners who do not produce crops to convert their land to cropland. Furthermore, in March 2007, the Congressional Research Service reported that corn prices—the prices received by producers—increased from $2.50 per bushel in September 2006 to $4.16 per bushel in January 2007, primarily because of growing demand for ethanol, a corn-based renewable fuel. This demand contributed to an increase in 2007 crop acreage, and the demand is expected to continue."
Look west and north, young men: that (and other grasslands of the world) is where the prairie land is being converted, not Illinois. Reply
Majority of Americans Support Ethanol [view article]
A note on the "prairie land" also. U.S. farmers currently plant 80-90 million acres of corn. Just after WWII there were over 140 million acres of corn being planted! In the same time period yields per acre have increased 5 fold. Corn yield are expected to double in the next 10 years, making ethanol a more cost effective fuel. ReplyMajority of Americans Support Ethanol [view article]
I am interested in where this new "prairie land" is....over 99.4% of Illinois is no longer in it's "natural" state....Ethanol is not a good CO2 reducer...better than gasoline alone but not good
As far as the economics of subsidies...considerat... needs to be given to the formation of domestic capital, reduction of imports, state and local tax base support, etc. Let's not forget the economic devestation of farming communities from the 70's through the 80's and into the 90's...(anyone remember Farm Aid?)
The protection of and formation of domestic capital is a correct role of government within a capitalist democracy. I would even go a step further and say that the employment of government capital in the private sector to accomplish social and environmental goals which do not otherwise offer a competitive roe and/or roi is vital. I assume you agree and are argueing that the government's capital is better used elsewhere regarding CO2 emmisions?
My arguements in favor of corn based ethanol are primarily based in Nationalism both economically and politically....and a belief that the debate about corn based ethanol is primarily a matter of global vs. national economics. "In case you didn't notice, we just got our a**'s kicked" Corpral Hudson in the movie Aliens
P.S. the high demand for starch is primarily in the form of corn syrup for processed food products that without a great deal of sweetening are almost inedible....and in terms human terms about world hunger there is only a shortage of protein not sugar. Reply
Majority of Americans Support Ethanol [view article]
Stoat 1004: You have not accurately described in fact how the life-cycle analysis of biofuels and petroleum fuels are compared. This is a well-developed science, and consensus is converging on their net energy balances. These methods give due credit to byproducts, co-products, etc.In any case, "net energy balance" is not the main issue. Many energy sources are made by taking more of a low-grade source of energy (e.g., black liquor from pulp mills) and transforming it into a cleaner, more-versitile form of energy (e.g., electricity), with a net loss in energy. But if it is profitable -- without subsidies -- then it still may make economic sense.
The problems with corn-ethenol -- indeed, any ethanol made from garins -- stem more from the high cost (in $ per CO2-equivalent) of reducing CO2 emissions through its use, and the CO2 generated through land-use changes as new prairie land is brought under the plow to satisfy the growing demand for biofuels. And, yes, there is a high demand for the starch in grains. No animals, and especially not hogs and poultry, live on protein alone. Reply
Majority of Americans Support Ethanol [view article]
On whether or not ethanol production is a net gain or net loss in terms of "energy" consumed vs. "energy" produced....This is the arguement in which critics of ethanol get to have their cake and eat it too....The manufacture of ethanol is also the processing of grain into food products (that's right kids it's not food or fuel but food and fuel)....critics give ethanol no credit for processing grain into a food product and then PRESTO; the same critics charge the energy used in the production of food products to the production of ethanol....so ethanol manufactures get no credit for food production but are charged the energy consumed as if it was all used only for ethanol...pretty neat huh? One real world example: Aventine Renewable Energy operates a wet mill in Pekin, Illinois (this plant used to be a CPC grain processing plant which made corn syrup and other food products)...This plant still makes all the food products it made under CPC except for starch and corn syrup (corn gluten meal, corn germ, CCDS, Corn Feed, etc. are all still manufactured) Only the starch is used to make ethanol now instead of corn syrup....Now what a critic of ethanol does is compute all the energy used by the plant and then compute all the energy produce by the ethanol and PRESTO: Ethanol is horribly energy inefficent....But what about the food products and the energy used to process them from grain (The processing of grain into food has always been and still is always energy intensive).....The critics answer: What food products? Reply