My brother-in-law recently asked me why ethanol had a great reputation for two decades and suddenly seems to be getting pounded constantly, especially in editorial/opinion pages by the media.
He doesn’t have a farming background and isn’t invested in the ethanol industry so he is a neutral and somewhat uninformed observer. He is also one of the busiest guys I know so for him to notice it means the anti-ethanol crowd are now officially pervasive. Apparently, it’s not just me feeling paranoid.
The conversation came back to me in a hurry this week with the latest “ethanol is evil” Tsunami rolling across the country once again. It started with the Wall Street Journal (No link here because you have to pay for this tripe) and the Washington Post and worked its way across the country hitting the Chicago Tribune and Des Moines Register yesterday and likely making its way for the West Coast like some cheap traveling circus.
And like the aforementioned Circus the anti-ethanol gang leave a trail behind much like Barnum and Bailey’s elephants only there is no guy with a shovel and bucket cleaning up in their wake. They leave their load of “misinformation” to fester in the road in full knowledge that most people are also too busy to check the veracity of their propaganda.
The public lynching of ethanol began with the bogus food vs. fuel charade in 2008 and since then has continued to resurface over and over again in several different guises that get trotted out and recycled whenever opportunity presents itself.
Several things remain consistent as the attacks continue. The noxious cocktail they serve up is made with equal parts of the best bad science money can buy and poor logic. And the olive on the toothpick seems to be just plain old avarice.
That’s greed, materialism, or covetousness with a Capital “C.” The people fanning the fires of these attacks have rationale and motivation that are simple if not transparent. They are the folks that want the cheapest corn possible because it boosts their profits; want ethanol to be made from another source; or want ethanol crippled forever because the market share just got too big.
So, for the next couple of days come back here and you will get a sneak peak each day of some of these players and the Machiavellian games they play and fund all to snuff out the only real competition that imported petroleum faces in the marketplace today…ethanol.
Corn growers are in Washington, DC taking care of business. It’s the semi-annual Corn Congress.
Corn farmers from across the country will gather in Washington the week of July 12 for a series of team and committee meetings, Capitol Hill visits with lawmakers and the semi-annual Corn Congress, where grower-leaders from 28 states will elect four new members of the National Corn Growers Association Corn Board. You can hear NCGA President Darrin Ihnen talk about it:
One of the activities that took place today was the presentation of the President’s Award.
National Corn Growers Association President Darrin Ihnen today presented the President’s Award to Senator John Thune (R-S.D.) during NCGA’s Corn Congress events in Washington, D.C. The President’s Award is given annually to a leader who has worked to advance issues important to corn growers and agriculture.
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.
If you are a row crop farmer who hasn’t raised livestock in years you might wonder how much energy and personal capitol you want to expend educating people about the anti-livestock efforts of the Humane Society of the United States. Besides the obvious large feed consumption, recent developments should have you even more concerned.
Regular readers of this blog realize giving donations to your local animal shelters is a good thing. They actually help animals, unlike the loosely related Humane Society of the United States that gives nearly nothing to support these efforts. Instead, HSUS chooses to use its significant and questionably acquired resources to pursue an animal rights agenda and vegan lifestyle.
HSUS is systematically going from state to state trying to enforce their minority agenda by passing laws that would radically change safe, proven and productive livestock rearing practices. And they are leveraging their positive reputation – yes they have one because people think they are saving puppies – to tell farmers and ranchers how to do their job.
Their most recent effort in Ohio seemed to have ended well when voters showed them the door and told the carpetbaggers to go home. Ohio chose to form their own state board of experts to review, monitor and police livestock production practices.
This is where your radar should go up and the red lights should start flashing. HSUS is now trying to get an initiative on the November ballot that would force the state’s new Livestock Care Standards Board to mimic the policies that HSUS got passed with its last ballot measure, in California.
It appears the gathering of signatures wasn’t going well so HSUS sued the state of Ohio over a statute that was written to make sure only Ohioans could gather signatures to change state laws. HSUS remarkably won that suit.
This means groups like HSUS can now bring in paid, if not professional, employees to work the streets and gather the needed signatures to tell Ohio how to run their state. Given their past use of disingenuous images and information to acheive their goal, this does not bode well.
Personally, I am concerned other groups are watching the twisted success of HSUS and contemplating how this strategy might be applied to other issues and governing practices touching your profession and your day-to-day life. Precedence, even bad precedence, carries weight.
The good news is Ohio agriculture is working hard to assure a good outcome. In the interim, do your part by learning more about the real HSUS and tell your friends.
If you haven’t already tuned into the new level of activism in agriculture, especially regarding misinformation on our largest industry, then you won’t find better evidence of this evolving cultural phenomenon than the Corn Farmers Coalition.
Speaking to a couple of family farmers recently they expressed their frustration at the misinformation, innuendo and outright fabrications that are being used to frame their chosen profession. As upset as they were, there was also a prevalent sense that there was nothing they could do to change things.
If you are frustrated and tired of all the attacks and negative news swirling around agriculture you have come to the right place. Read slowly, soak this up, and then if you are a corn farmer give yourself a big pat on the back.
Imagine 60,000 city people getting a positive message about farmers every day. As they go to and from work, go out for dinner, go to a movie, or just go about their life in general. Next imagine that most of these people are employed in jobs on or near Capitol Hill in Washington, DC…Congressmen, staffers, agency employees, lobbyists, environmental groups, and even media. That’s what is happening right now as you read this thanks to the efforts of farmers themselves.
In the attached photo of the Union Station Metro stop in Washington, DC you can see several of the ads that will be prevalent throughout June and July as part of CFC’s efforts. From the highly trafficked Metro system, to Reagan National Airport, to the most widely read political publications like Politico and Congressional Quarterly. Throw in on-line advertising at the aforementioned publications, WashingtonPost.com, National Public Radio, ads in the Washington Nationals baseball team programs, and a smattering of talk, sports, and contemporary radio and you begin to get a feel for the breadth and scope of this campaign. It is conservatively estimated the educational campaign will create more than 10 million positive impressions in the land of policy and regulation.
Equally as impressive is that CFC, and the $1 million in corn checkoff funds backing the campaign, comes straight from family farmers in Maryland, Virginia, Ohio, Kentucky, Indiana, Illinois, Missouri, Iowa, Wisconsin, South Dakota, Nebraska, Colorado, Kansas and Michigan who believe we need to introduce a foundation of facts to the dialogue in Washington.
Ten messages based on USDA and EPA facts will be used in the campaign to show tech-savvy, innovative farmers are growing more corn every year – for food, animal feed, ethanol and exports – while using fewer resources and protecting the environment.
The coalition will meet with media, members of Congress, environmental groups and others to talk about what’s ahead: how U.S. farmers, using the latest technologies, will continue to expand yields and how this productivity can be a bright spot in an otherwise struggling economy.
We have a great story to tell so take heart. You can make a difference and CFC offers clear evidence.
Standing next to a front end loader filled with corn at an ethanol plant in Macon, Missouri on Wednesday, President Obama stressed his administration’s goal to more than triple America’s biofuels production in the next twelve years, and noted that “there shouldn’t be any doubt that renewable, homegrown fuels are a key part of our strategy for a clean energy future.”
Missouri Corn Growers Association CEO Gary Marshall was thrilled that the president visited a corn-based ethanol plant in his state. “It’s fantastic, primarily because it is the first time since he’s been sitting as president that he’s toured an ethanol plant, so I think it bodes very well for future of the corn-based ethanol industry in this country,” Gary said in an interview with Agwired’s Chuck Zimmerman. “This symbolic visit to a corn-based Midwest ethanol plant could really drive a lot of the issues we’re working on at the national level. Whether it’s re-doing the tax credits for ethanol, whether it’s E15 which we think we need to go to because we’re maxed out on the blend wall, or even moving corn-based ethanol forward as an advance biofuel. This just kind of kicks off that entire effort for us.”
The Natural Resources Conservation Service (NRCS) has just released its latest National Resources Inventory. The document is a report card of sorts that gives us a look at how we are doing in regard to managing and caring for non-public lands including farms and ranches.
According to farm leaders like Bob Stallman if you look at the NRI environmental report in conjunction with USDA’s productivity figures you get a compelling picture of an American success story. The shrinking environmental footprint of farmers who produce our food and fiber is remarkable, and even more so when you look at the accompanying increases in productivity.
The latest data basically gives farmer documentation for what we already knew…growers are doing more with less; Less land, less water, less crop inputs from pesticides to fertilizer, and all the while getting gonzo increases in productivity of crops like corn.
This was the very reason corn growers created the Corn Farmers Coalition (CFC) last year; to bridge the large gap between what consumers don’t know or think they know and the reality of modern, innovative farming. In the case of CFC the idea was to start small by educating decision leaders in Washington, DC because of the enormous impact Congress and other federal agencies can have on farmers either legislatively or through regulation.
It is sad how few people outside of farming understand this achievement. In fact some very vocal elitist minorities in our society want us to divert from the progress-lined path that has made U.S. agriculture such a marvel. The good news is the start made by CFC is now part of a larger fabric of educational efforts underway from Monsanto’s Thank a Farmer to The Hand That Feeds Us campaign.
Today’s farm families are making a difference in one of the most fundamental and important professions on the planet…growing crops to convert the sun’s energy to calories. Including calories for food to sustain our bodies, calories to feed livestock, calories like ethanol to drive our cars, and the list goes on.
Now NRCS gives us a well-deserved “A” on our environmental report card. This is a story worth telling, especially given the misleading information being spewed by some agenda driven groups. So, look for opportunities to speak up for your farm; Do it locally, tell your story online through social media, tell your elected officials. We all have a vested interest in getting this right.
You may remember a couple of years ago when oil tycoon T. Boone Pickens called ethanol an “ugly baby.” His quote was that ethanol may be “an ugly baby but it’s ours and it will move cars” and he preferred the “less-than-perfect fuel” over imported oil.
Last week, Pickens testified on behalf of continued tax incentives for domestically-produced renewable energy, including ethanol, during a House Ways and Means committee hearing. “When do we stop investing in OPEC and start investing in America?” he asked the lawmakers. When it comes to energy, he says, “I’m for anything that’s American” including wind, coal, solar, hydro, nuclear, geo-thermal, ethanol, propane, or natural gas.
The straight-talking Texan and chairman of BP Capital Management addressed those who discourage tax incentives for renewable energy on the basis of letting the free market work. “If you think OPEC is a free market, you’re a sap,” he said.
Pickens strongly stressed the need for America to develop an energy plan now. “I’m running out of time, I’m 82 years old next month, and I’ve got to get an energy plan fixed for America because we cannot leave this to generations in the future,” noting his 13 children and grandchildren.
Watch Pickens opening statement here from YouTube:
The ethanol industry is speeding toward the blend wall with a heavy foot on the accelerator and only quick action by the federal government will help it break through.
The industry continues to prove that it can produce record volumes of ethanol and still meet the demands of livestock producers and the export market. The U.S. ethanol industry began 2010 with yet another month of record production. The latest report from the Energy Information Administration (EIA) puts January 2010 ethanol production at an average of more than 818,000 barrels per day, compared to 188,000 in January 2009.
That makes four months in a row of record ethanol production, but gasoline demand remains flat and ethanol stocks are increasing. Returns for ethanol producers are down as prices have dropped sharply. USDA’s latest supply-demand report out Friday left projected 2009-10 corn use for ethanol unchanged at 4.3 million bushels but lowered corn feed and residual use by 100 million bushels lower as March 1 stocks and the record January ethanol production indicate lower-than-expected December-February feed and residual disappearance. The report notes that poor margins for ethanol producers and rising ethanol stocks may limit near-term growth in production.
That means that the future for ethanol literally hinges on the decision EPA has yet to make – moving the allowable blend level for ethanol in gasoline up to 15 percent from the current 10. “Given the fact that gasoline consumption in this country simply is not growing very rapidly and has essentially been flat for some time now, we are getting to the point where we simply have absorbed as much ethanol as we can under the current E10 legislation,” said USDA Outlook Board Gerry Bange
Renewable Fuels Association President Bob Dinneen says the “antiquated” E10 regulations need to be changed to allow the increased use of ethanol and ethanol blends. “The increase seen in ethanol reserves during a time of great economic advantage in ethanol pricing speaks directly to the need for EPA to allow up to 15% ethanol blends for all vehicles, regardless of model year,” said Dinneen.
The EPA has delayed its final decision on the matter until some time this summer. Let’s hope they make it before we hit the wall.
U.S. Senator Chuck Schumer (NY-D) apparently supports biodiesel production in his state, but not corn ethanol.
The senator visited New York’s only commercial biodiesel producer last month to show his love and assure them of his support for the federal tax incentive for biodiesel. However, in a recent Morning Comments subscription email, Informa Economics reports that Schumer has no such love for corn ethanol. In a letter to a constituent, the senator said that “corn ethanol provides no environmental, economic, or security benefit over petroleum, and it raises serious ethical concerns about our obligations towards our neighbors.” At the same time, Schumer does support the development of cellulosic ethanol, saying production does “have the potential to protect the environment and reduce America’s dependence on foreign oil, without putting strains on American agriculture or other countries’ food supplies.”
“Rather than pointing out the inconsistency in your ethanol and biodiesel positions, we wanted to take this opportunity to provide you with more current information about America’s ethanol industry in the hopes that you will revisit your position,” wrote plant owners John and Michael Sawyer, who proceeded to do just that by disputing the senator’s opinions on the fuel. “The justifiable reasons you state for supporting biodiesel and next generation ethanol technologies are the same reasons that should compel you to support existing ethanol producers, including those in your home state of New York,” they concluded. (Read the entire letter here.)
They are planning to contact the senator’s office to set up a tour of their 55 million gallon per year plant located in Medina, NY which was the first ethanol plant built in the northeast United States. The plant uses some 20 million bushels of corn each year.
My brother-in-law recently asked me why ethanol had a great reputation for two decades and suddenly seems to be getting pounded constantly, especially in editorial/opinion pages by the media.
Standing next to a front end loader filled with corn at an ethanol plant in Macon, Missouri on Wednesday, President Obama stressed his administration’s goal to more than triple America’s biofuels production in the next twelve years, and noted that “there shouldn’t be any doubt that renewable, homegrown fuels are a key part of our strategy for a clean energy future.”
Last week, Pickens testified on behalf of continued tax incentives for domestically-produced renewable energy, including ethanol, during a House Ways and Means committee hearing. “When do we stop investing in OPEC and start investing in America?” he asked the lawmakers. When it comes to energy, he says, “I’m for anything that’s American” including wind, coal, solar, hydro, nuclear, geo-thermal, ethanol, propane, or natural gas.
The industry continues to prove that it can produce record volumes of ethanol and still meet the demands of livestock producers and the export market. The U.S. ethanol industry began 2010 with yet another month of record production. The latest report from the 
U.S. Senator Chuck Schumer (NY-D) apparently supports biodiesel production in his state, but not corn ethanol. 
Schumer’s letter prompted officials with