Ethanol Offers Environmental Benefits

 It’s Earth Day so it seems an apropos opportunity to discuss an often ignored environmental calamity resulting from our addiction to oil and petroleum products. And two words tell the story – Exxon Valdez. The Exxon Valdez oil spill was one of the most publicized and studied environmental tragedies in history, largely because it happened near the United States.

The Valdez incident in Prince William Sound, Alaska, on March 24, 1989 is considered to be one of the most devastating human-caused environmental disasters ever to occur in history dumping nearly 11 million gallons of crude into the sea.

However, the public has a short memory and this disaster was quickly forgotten. Other spills continue around the world, many in remote places that don’t draw media attention. Most recently a Chinese freighter, the Shen Neng, crashed into Australia’s Great Barrier Reef. The incident prompted a question from a friend who asked what if the vessel had been loaded with ethanol?

After the mandatory wise crack about drunken marine life things turned a little more serious.

If ship-load quantities of ethanol were to be spilled, there could be some immediate area effects because of high concentrations. There could be effects on aquatic life.  However, this is easily remedied by something as simple as aeration.

Even better news is that ethanol will decrease in concentration rapidly because of the way it reacts with water and it is non-toxic. Equally important, ethanol biodegrades rapidly.  A little research indicates the effect of the Valdez is still being felt today despite diligent efforts and millions spent on restoration.

 So in short there will be no continued loss of aquatic life, or long term effects.  This is contrasted by the clean-up process of a crude oil spill – The environmental damage done during the clean-up phase (bringing in equipment, vacuuming up the oil, etc.) is almost as bad as the original spill – the cleanup itself brings significant damage to the local environment.

Given the many environmental benefits of ethanol on the land too, ethanol and biofuels deserve some serious thought if you really care about the planet. Happy Earth Day.

Activists Should Foot the Bill For Wasting Our Time and Tax $$

Personally, I need to diet, but I would rather not starve….I don’t mean cutting calories by choice either. If the anti-chemical crowd has their way the safest and most often studied chemical of all time called Atrazine will be relegated to history.

Perhaps the only thing more disturbing than this pit bull approach to attacking Atrazine (ok, it’s really more like a whiney 2^nd grader – albiet with a lawyer –  who didn’t get their way) is that the Environmental Protection Agency is risking their credibility by giving these activists yet another audience.

Forbes columnist Jeff Stier, bemoans the craziness in his most recent piece, which he says is transparent from the start because of the filing of the case in Madison County, IL. The shear mention of this locale will make a lawyer chuckle. A friend once told anyone pleading a case here should be required to wear Mickey Mouse ears.

As Stier says, “A lawsuit in the “judicial hellhole” that is Madison County, IL., against the makers of the world’s most widely used herbicide threatens to undermine our way of evaluating risks in this country. If the lawyers–and the anti-chemical, anti-business activists–get their way, American agriculture will be forced back to practices of the pre-industrial age. And that will be only the first step in the “environmentalist” agenda to roll back progress.”

“The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), unfortunately, has now loaned its weight to the activists’ Luddite effort to restrict or ban a number of safe and useful agricultural chemicals in common use–with Atrazine, the most effective weed-killer available, only one of the targets.”

Considering we will have 9 billion people to feed in the near future we might want to be careful about putting the golden goose agriculture represents on the legal barbeque. Personally, I have had enough of this over fed and overindulged crowd that are willing to make millions suffer so they can have a risk free life.

Perhaps the most salient truth in the article is that everything is toxic at some level but harmless in small enough amounts, including things like coffee. Since scientists can now detect substances at parts per trillion, an amount smaller than a drop in an Olympic-sized pool. It is time to stop expending this kind of energy and tax resources on a dead issue and move on.

Where’s the Love?

President Obama gave a speech this morning from a hanger at Andrews Air Force Base reiterating our country’s need for energy independence. While he merely gave a “passover” comment regarding biofuels, his big announcement is that our country will be pursuing offshore drilling as well as drill in sensitive environmental areas of Alaska in the quest for energy independence.

The irony is that we don’t have to drill for more oil when we can grow our energy with less harm to the environment while boosting our economy. However, day after day people keep focusing on what’s wrong with biofuels, rather than what’s wrong with fossil fuels and instead of focusing on what’s right with biofuels.

Two weeks ago a “new study” came out addressing indirect land use and claiming that it is worse than what the EPA or California Air Resources Board has accounted for. Needless to say, the researchers were funded by Big Oil and the report merely rehashed discredited science. Then yesterday, the National Wildlife Federation released a report that asked for the RFS to be repealed. Seriously? Because dirty fossil fuels are the way to a brighter, cleaner future? I think not.

This orchestrated smear campaign brings to mind the lyrics from the Black Eyed Peas song, “Where is the love?”

Father, Father, Father help us
Send us some guidance from above
‘Cause people got me, got me questionin’
Where is the love?

Where is the love? And where is the love for the hardworking American’s that not only feed us but are poised to produce our energy as well? I recently moved to a farm, in part to better understand the role farmers play in America. I wish that every American, and more specifically, every environmental activist, could do the same. Maybe then people would quit being so caught up in all the wrong things which paralyzes us from taking action, and focus on the good things and how they are evolving to ensure our energy future.

But until we have the opportunity to live in Utopia, we must keep up the good fight and continue to get the positive messages out about agriculture in a world that continues to be guided by the wrong principals.

Fibs, Faux Pas, and Science According to the Beatles

Is it too much to ask for some integrityand just plain honesty in the world? Growing up I probably came across as totally naïve to many of those around me because I believed authority figures like government officials and scientists and most any adult in my life. And you could have convinced me my parents carried the second tablet down the mountain for Moses. The reason was simple…I had no reason not to.

Today, I share trust and dole out faith in the smallest of measures because we seem to be surrounded by fibs, manufactured “facts,” bogus science, and politicians and businessmen that would have been whacked back to the stone age with a ruler by Sister Mary Margaret in third grade.

A quick look at the news this week easily surfaced examples of this kind of fast and loose use of incorrect information, handy subterfuge, and dare I say it…lies.

The first is news from the London Telegraph which notes the venerable United Nations has admitted a report linking livestock to global warming exaggerated the impact of eating meat on climate change or global warming.

The 2006 study, Livestock’s Long Shadow, claimed meat production was responsible for 18 percent of greenhouse gas emissions – more than transportation.

“Its conclusions were heralded by campaigners urging consumers to eat less meat to save the planet. Among those calling for a reduction in global meat consumption is Sir Paul McCartney.”

Now Sir Paul doesn’t strike me as the scientist type so perhaps that should have been a clue. If Dr. Ringo had made the claim that would have been different. The point is for three years many people have been assured eating meat would leading to global Armageddon brought on by nothing less than cow flatulence. Oh, the indignity.

All the time the truth is that “meat and milk production generates less greenhouse gas than most environmentalists claim and that the emissions figures were calculated differently to the transport figures, resulting in an “apples-and-oranges analogy that truly confused the issue.”

If your jaded self is still with me it’s on to example 2. While we have been blissfully driving about in our trucks and SUVs it seems the oil magnates of the world have been manipulating oil supply numbers for financial gain and to curry political favor. (Insert sound effects of heavy and shocked intake of breath here). (more…)

The Meltdown

Guest Blogger:  Laurie Johns, Iowa Farm Bureau

It’s that time again; time to put wool socks and sweaters back in storage (check); shop for garden seeds and repot indoor plants (check); make summer camp plans for my ‘tween (working on it); and time for critics to dust off their finger-pointing stories that blame farmers for Spring flooding.

Wish I was kidding about that last bit. But, it seems no matter what devastating weather hits Iowa, farmers get the blame for the fall-out when the snow melts and finds its way downstream. Do all farmers practice conservation? No, but the overwhelming majority do, and the ‘blame game’ ignores all these herculean efforts to protect the watershed:

* USDA’s National Resources Inventory report shows soil erosion in the U.S. has been reduced by 43 percent.

* Seven major conservation practices used on Iowa farms are estimated to remove as much as 28 percent of the nitrate, 38 percent of the total nitrogen, and up to 58 percent of the phosphorus that otherwise would be present, according to the Center for Agricultural and Rural Development’s “Conservation Practices in Iowa: Historical Investments, Water Quality and Gaps” report.

* Those conservation efforts include having almost 15.2 million acres in conservation tillage (where plant stubble is left on the land after harvest, to prevent erosion) and more than two thousand miles of grassy buffer strips along waterways. (more…)

Top Scientists and Petroleum Operatives See a Future for Bio-Products

If you’ve sort of forgotten about domestic ethanol as an alternative to imported gasoline, be assured that Tom Stephens hasn’t.

Stephens, who was in Orlando recently to speak at the National Ethanol Conference, is vice chairman of global product operations for General Motors. He knows as well as anybody that our gasoline supply won’t last forever, and we’re long past the point where we should be concentrating our efforts on weaning the U.S. from our dependence on oil. GM has lived by that philosophy and has been the automotive leader in offering up flexible fuel vehicles that run on gasoline, E85 or any gasoline-ethanol combo in between.

Despite all their efforts, those by NCGA and many others, there are only 7.5 million E85 capable FFV’s in operation today and 2,000 stations offering up the corn-based, eco-friendly fuel. Surely nothing to sneeze at but given our voracious appetite for gasoline in the U.S. we have plenty of room for improvement.

With that sobering assessment, let’s take a look at some signs of what the future might hold.  The U.S. Department Energy projections say ethanol production is on the rise and we will make 800,000 barrels a day in 2010, up from 700,000 last year. Another 50,000 barrels a day will be added in 2011. The trend seems to document the buzz in the industry that ethanol makers are recovering from the sluggish economic conditions that have plagued every industry.

 That’s a good thing considering the ethanol industry added $53 billion to the U.S. gross domestic product and $16 billion in U.S. household income last year even as the ethanol industry struggled. (more…)

Government Earns 400% ROI on Ethanol Blender’s Credit

Recently, a nation starved for domestic energy supplies and sources, has managed to lose its way in the deep dark forest of the unknown that is the speculative science of indirect land use change. In typical American fashion – or at least this seems to be the new norm – we have missed the point, evaded the crux of the issue and been distracted by ne’re-do-wells with questionable motives.

So in the name of refocusing the energy debate, I offer up the bold statement that ethanol fuel is a slam dunk when it comes to offering a real solution. First, it is here today, not on a drawing board or in a lab and it helps us achieve many of our critical goals such as providing jobs, making us less dependent on foreign oil from often hostile sources, and it pollutes less than gasoline during its manufacture and use. And as a bonus, with biofuels like ethanol we also get a product that is renewable. Anything that directs our focus away from these fundamental truths should be looked at with a skeptical eye.

There appears to be some evidence that rational thinking is not dead and more and more people are beginning to understand the fallacies and foibles of the concept of indirect land use. Historical trends indicate that increased U.S. ethanol demand has not been a significant driver of land use change. Increased crop productivity (growing more on the same amount of land) has primarily provided the growth in production necessary to meet heightened demand. But if history has shown us one thing it is that critics of ethanol will not go gently into that good night.

The next issue can already be seen on the horizon and it can be seen clearly because it is not a “new” criticism. It is called the Volumetric Ethanol Excise Tax Credit (VEETC). This is the incentive put in place to encourage gasoline marketers to blend 10% ethanol in a gallon of gasoline. It is the carrot that got the entrenched oil industry to rethink their century old product mix and make it better. (more…)

Crazy Climate Talk in Cambridge

The home of Harvard wants to advocate vegetarianism and veganism, complete with “Meatless or Vegan Mondays” to respond to the “climate emergency” they are facing.

According to a Fox News story, the Cambridge Climate Congress is proposing a variety of mandates to address the emergency “created by the growth of local greenhouse gas emissions despite the urgent warnings of climate scientists that substantial reductions are needed in order to reduce the risk of disastrous changes to our climate.”

In addition to new taxes and limits on everything from parking to plastic bags, they want to “advocate” less meat consumption. It sounds like they would like to actually tell people that they can’t eat meat and would “institute disincentives for the purchase of non-regional food.”

This is crazy talk. The article quotes Dr. Ken Green, a resident scholar on environment and energy at the American Enterprise Institute, about the regional food idea. “Trying to grow something out of season in a greenhouse locally may produce more greenhouse gas emissions than having the same food shipped in from a place where it grows naturally,” he said. “Studies do not come down uniformly on the side that local is better.” And as far as vegetarianism is concerned, there is definitely no agreement that eating less meat would have any kind of climate impact.

With the unbelievable snow events we have seen just in the last week, I would think we could use some of those greenhouse gases right now to warm us up a bit.

California’s First Love

Nobody ever forgets their first love, even if they turn out to be a dirty, rotten scoundrel.

For all of California’s big talk about going green, the truth is they just can’t forget their first love – Big Oil. This photo is of Signal Hill in Southern California back in 1923. The hill became part of the Long Beach Oil Field, one of the most productive oil fields in the world. Signal Hill was covered with over 100 oil derricks, and because of its prickly appearance at a distance became known as “Porcupine Hill”.

You would think that after EPA reconsidered ethanol’s environmental benefits when issuing the RFS2 rule that California would take a second look at the homegrown fuel and make it part of their Low Carbon Fuel Standard. But last week’s action by the Southern California Association of Governments turning down federal funding to put in dozens of E85 fueling stations showed just how much the state is still in love with oil. Paul Wuebben, a clean fuels officer for the South Coast Air Quality Management District, urged the council to accept the dollars. Ethanol is not perfect, he said, but its wider use would reduce dependence on gasoline and remove pollutants from the air. He also called the panel’s decision a “major lost opportunity for the region.”

Wuebben attempted to sway the panel to reconsider along with Mike Lewis with Pearson Fuels, “It would have created 221 jobs. Dependence on foreign oil is the result of 1,000 little decisions and a few big decisions. This was a big decision.”

California lawmakers and bureaucrats believe that corn-based ethanol causes more harm than good for the environment after being transported from the Midwest. One recent article penned by Roland Hwang, Transportation Program Director for Natural Resources Defense Council in San Francisco, calls it “old, dirty ethanol.” Seriously? If ethanol is old and dirty, what does that make oil?

I guess it’s true that love is blind.

Wildlife Report at Odds with the Facts

As Ken pointed out in an earlier post, a new report out from the National Wildlife Federation that claims increased corn acreage for ethanol is crowding out Prairie Pothole Region wildlife is literally for the birds.

The Renewable Fuels Association did an analysis of the study, titled “Corn Ethanol and Wildlife,” that pretty much refutes everything the NWF claims. The RFA concludes that “selective and questionable use of data, unclear research methods, and emotional arguments cast doubt on the reliability of the conclusions and recommendations.”

The authors deliberately pick and choose certain data from certain years to support their conclusions. In many cases, the authors selected agricultural data points that are obvious outliers when viewed in the context of both mid- and long-term historical trends. As one example, the paper uses 2004 and 2007 data for comparisons of planted corn acres, but uses 2007 and 2009 data for a comparison of acreage enrolled in the Conservation Reserve Program (CRP).

RFA also notes that USDA data clearly show that recent expansion of corn acres nationally and in the four-state region examined in the NWF report came through crop switching, not through the conversion of native grassland, since total crop acres in the four states actually declined slightly from 2004 to 2007. On top of that, the NWF report uses “grossly outdated assumptions about growth in average corn yield per acre and the amount of ethanol yielded per bushel of corn” to suggest the biofuel requirements of the expanded Renewable Fuels Standard will demand an additional 10.69 million acres of corn by 2015 over 2009 levels.

The good news is that this report is generating virtually no coverage in the “mainstream media.” Maybe the media is too busy these days actually covering real news rather than made-up studies with an agenda.