This thread discusses the Content article:
Stop ethanol debacle nowHow come all the user posts from yesterday were deleted from this article?
Basically, I said the author of this article was very mis-informed and was lacking a good understanding of ethanol, how it is made, and what good it does for our planet and society.
Ethanol plays a very minor role in food prices.
In 2002 a 16oz box of Corn Flakes, or a 1 pound package of tortilla's contained 2 cents of corn.
Today, that same box or package contains 6 cents of corn.
1 bushel = 54 pounds of corn.
1 bushel cost $2 a few years back.
Today, you can buy 54 pounds of corn for under $6.
That's a bargain!
While the price of corn has added 4 pennies per pound of food, oil, gasoline, and diesel has gone up in price by $3.00 per gallon!
It is the cost to transport food that makes it more expensive today. The cost of actual food has hardly changed.
Ethaol only uses starch. The protien and fat ( corn oil ) is not used for ethanol.
All the protien and fat comes out of the ethanol facility AND IS USED FOR FOOD. Both for animal feed, and human food.
Some of the corn in your Frito-Lay Corn Chips and Cheese Puffs has come out of the back end of ethanol plants.
Starting in 2010, newly constructed ethanol plants will make food and fuel at the same time.
Our world is carbohydrate rich, and protein poor.
Ethanol does not use a single pound of protein.
For every 1 million pounds of corn shipped into an ethanol plant, half a million pounds of food comes out of that plant. Right now, most goes to feed cattle, and in return, the cattle feed people. Cattle feed from an ethanol plant is sold traditionally at half-price compared to whole kernal corn. Cows have a hard time digesting whole kernal corn, and distillery grain is like baby food for cows... very easy for them to digest.
A modern ethanol plant ( post year 2000 ) takes about 19,000btu of fossil fuel and 0.40 kwh of electricity to make 1 gallon. I know. I make it every day. 1 gallon of ethanol has 76,000 to 77,000 btu of energy. This is less energy per gallon than gasoline, but ethanol burns better, so less of it goes out the tailpipe compared to gasoline.
Ethanol is non-toxic. You can drink it before it is mixed with gasoline at the gas station.
Ethanol is not considered Haz-Mat in most states.
Large spills can be sent harmlessly into rivers, lakes and streams, provided it is diluted at least 5 to 1 with water ( from a fire truck for example ).
Using U.S.D.A. data, 97% of all corn used for ethanol is non-irregated. Only 3% of corn is grown in semi-arid climates like Colorado and Arizona. That 3% only must be irrigated with "up to 1700 gallons" of water the newspaper cites, but forgot to explain.
A modern ( post 2000 which is most of them ) ethanol plant uses 2.5 gallons of water per gallon of ethanol produced. Most of this water is "grey water". Non-potable water is used.
