http://www.ethanol-g…

Here's links to a concise 2001 USDA spreadsheet and detailed 2003 USDA report showing the energy balance both with and without co-products.  The answer with co-products was an industry average of 1.67 btu ethanol per btu of corn production and processing.  The industry averages are much better today.

Renewable fuel production will have large impacts some positive and some negative.  It's a paradigm shift from what the world has known for a hundred years of petroleum.  Perhaps it's not as fun to really look at the data, some legitimate negative impacts, or consider the need, but Congress did and it's called the 2007 Renewable Feuls Standard.

“…petroleum oil will likely be dominant in my life time, but eventually large engines will be powered with vegetable oil.”  Rudolf Diesel – 1912.

I can only find the poor performances of ethanol

you parry everything but there is no thrust to your arguments

sorry, I/we don't have the time anymore

In general, ethanol and biodiesel have positive energy balances.  The “new” energy is the solar energy absorbed by the growing crop.  Ethanol and biodiesel are the usable storage of that energy.  The “finite” number is the amount of solar radiation that hits a given acre.  Why the renewable fuels standards are so important is pushing science to maximize delivery of that energy to consumers.

We can work on it now, or pass the buck to future generations.

But you can't show where ethanol has either reduced dependence on foreign oil nor helped to reduce pollution because it requires more fossil energy to produce than it actually contains, and provides less energy than gasoline.

Does making “renewable” fuel from grain or plant waste really create any new energy?

If you can, cite your proof please.

In other words, I'm saying that more ethanol production will continue to increase America's total energy consumption, not decrease it.

Let's go back to your position: “1.  Fossil fuel is finite and bad for the environment.”

But aren't “crop genetics, farming technology, processing technology,” or, for that matter, “science” ALSO finite?

Or is the infinite supply of energy and crop growth just around the corner?

Again, if you can, cite your proof please.

I hope you have an infinite supply of scientific optimism to go with all that– good luck!

Signed,

Another Concerned Midwesterner

(and a realistic one at that)

I don't work for the corn growers, ethanol, or any lobbyist organization.  Just a concerned mid-westerner that is tired of hearing all the half-truths and innuendo.

I base my conclusion that renewable fuel is a positive thing on 3 basic assumptions.  If you beleive these assumptions, then everything else is details towards the same goals.

1.  Fossil fuel is finite and bad for the environment.

2.  Modern society will require liquid hydrocarbons from renewable resources in ever increasing quantities to maintain living standards.

3.  We have only scratched the surface of technology in crop genetics, farming technology, and processing technology to address items 1 & 2.  I am optimistic about science.

is it the corn or ethanol lobby that you work for?

Regarding the 2nd and 3rd sentences.  The chemical energy of an ethanol molecule (or biodiesel molecule) is provided by sunlight hitting growing plants(photosynthesis).  If you need a fact check try your 5th grade science textbook.  To process and purify that solar energy into a usable form for transportation fuel, thermal and electrical energy is needed.  An ethanol processing facility does not care where the thermal and electrical energy comes from.  The processing plants' efficienies are increasing precisely because we've got mandates and incentives for people to work on it.  Again, if we had a btu tax on fossil fuels that would entice ethanol facility operators to look beyond coal and natural gas for thermal and electrical energy needs.

Your graph does not give corn the credit it's due.  It makes less gallons per acre because so much of the corn plant is not currently utilized for ethanol.  It's being used for livestock feed (back to the food discussion).  Using sugarcane, they extract all the fermentables and burn the rest for processing facility thermal energy.  I do not work for the corn loby and I don't care what plant species provides the renewable fuel.  However, I do understand the economics and corn currently returns more total dollars per acre (food & fuel) than anything else.  If Tom and Chuck can keep the naysayers at bay long enough we'll get switchgrass (cellulosic) to work on a large scale.

Ethanol is a misguided way for us to consume natural gas, diesel oil, and coal (not to mention a huge volume of water and vast acreage of cropland) to make motor fuels.

It's not sustainable. Most of the energy content in current biofuels is provided by an ancient biofuel, hidden upstream in the process.

We do not currently know how to make fresh biofuels without using significant quantities of ancient biofuels.

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Truthi- admit it, you work for the corn or ethanol lobby? Which is it?

Produced in the USA.  Renewable.  Ethyl-alcohol, the same as in whiskey except cleaner and pure.  Clean burning.  Ethanol itself is carbon-neutral.  An equivalent amount of carbon will be pulled from the atmosphere by the growing crop as is released from car tail-pipes burning ethanol.  Distillers grains (what's left from corn after making ethanol; 40-45% by weight) is adding to protien available to livestock and ultimately humanity.  Much of this would not be grown in the first place without ethanol demand.

What's wrong with this picture?  …15 billion gallons at $3.00 per gallon give or take on the retail price.  That's over $45 billion dollars per year farmers and entrepenuers are taking out of Big Oil's pockets.  It's got their attention and “their senators” don't like it.  Stick to your guns Tom and Chuck.

I got a pretty good idea what it shows Big Oil, but I don't know what it shows the starvers.  If the US government wants to grow crops for the starving masses of the world, we can do that with subsudities and incentives, but that's a completely seperate debate from fuel ethanol.

oops I mean senators Grassley and Harkin say ethanol is fine then it must be a real winner…

Why don't we put all our corn into this stuff?

that'd show China, India and all the other starvers.