All Cars Should be Omnivores
Posted: July 6, 2010
This past weekend the family and I drove about 1200 miles, leaving the St. Louis area to visit family in Lake Zurich, Ill., and then driving down to Ft. Campbell in Kentucky to drop our son off at his barracks. Then back home. About 1200 miles in all, the vast majority in Illinois, where the corn was growing tall and straight, for the most part. Illinois saw the highest increase in planted acres, according to the USDA, up from 12 million acres in 2009 to 12.6 million acres in 2010. Great news for our hard-working Illinois corn growers!
I also saw a lot of cars with Flex-Fuel logos on the back, and wished we had the same with our 2006 Toyota Sienna. But that was not an option.
This past weekend, Robert Zubrin wrote a great piece in the Washington Times calling for open fuel standards. The idea is to get more cars on the road that can handle a variety of fuels, whether it foreign-oil-based gasoline, domestic-and-renewable corn ethanol, or even methanol. This would add about a hundred bucks to the price of the car and give us more energy independence, which means more energy security.
As Zubrin puts it:
“We are not addicted to oil. Our cars are addicted to oil. They are like a tribe of people who, because of some unfortunate flaw, can only eat one kind of food, say herring. Thus, if the herring merchants combine to rig up the price of their product to $100 per pound, the tribesmen have no choice but to submit. They would be far better off if they could become omnivores, capable of eating steak, ice cream, corn, eggs, apples, etc., as the power to use such alternatives would make them immune from herring-cartel extortion.”
It’s time to see more energy freedom on the roads — not just in the Corn Belt, but across the Land of the Free.
Photo: Zubrin autographs his book “Energy Victory” at the 2009 Commodity Classic.
