[Peace-discuss] The madness of biofuels

E. Wayne Johnson ewj at pigs.ag
Sat Feb 19 02:55:04 CST 2011


The consumption of corn starches and seed oils as automotive fuels is 
thermodynamically/entropically stupid, and economically unsound, as well 
as unethical.  Of course it is strategically wise in the minds of the 
evil hegemons who rule the US of A to starve out others as a means of 
more and more power.


The Ethanol industry is driven by politics and some of the most 
unethical xomboid human shells on the planet are ramrodding it, such as 
the "leadership" of the US Corn Growers Association and geniuses like 
Saxby Chambliss.  Like Ted Geisel's Once-ler, they have no intent for 
their positive feedback loop except biggering, and Biggering, and 
BIGGERING.  Damn the young barbaloots in their barbaloot suits.  Who 
cares about crummies in the tummies?  The automobiles of the world 
demand ethanol and their owners have the money to buy the ethanol that 
everyone, everyone, Everyone needs.  This buggery of biggering is backed 
by billions of bucks provided on the backs of the people, and by that 
buffoon Bernanke's infinite printing press and for the benefit of Obot's 
bankster buddies.  They say that Ethanol is good for the environment, 
building lie upon lie.  Babel's bricks are mortared with slime indeed.

*

*

"ad viros qui sedent super murum ut comedant stercora sua et bibant 
urinam suam vobiscum"

_Madness of Biofuels --_

Last month, Peter Brabeck, the chairman of the Swiss food giant Nestle, 
declared that using food crops to make biofuels was "absolute madness."

The epicenter of that madness is the U.S. corn-ethanol sector. This 
year, it will consume 40 percent of all U.S. corn - that's about 15 
percent of global corn production or 5 percent of all global grain - in 
order to produce a volume of motor fuel with the energy equivalent of 
about 0.6 percent of global oil needs.

Congress lavishes about $7 billion in annual subsidies, mandates and 
tariff protections upon an industry that is helping push global food 
prices to all-time highs and shrink grain reserves at the very same time 
that global grain production is faltering and protests over food prices 
are becoming common.

The quantity of grain to be consumed this year for ethanol production - 
4.9 billion bushels - boggles the mind. That's more than twice as much 
as all the corn produced in Brazil and more than six times as much as is 
grown in India. Put another way, that's more corn than the output of the 
European Union, Mexico, Argentina and India combined.

Despite these facts, President Obama said last month in his State of the 
Union speech, "We can break our dependence on oil with biofuels." 
Meanwhile, Newt Gingrich, former speaker of the House, who is 
considering a run for the 2012 Republican presidential nomination, was 
in Iowa recently, cravenly wooing the ethanol producers and slamming 
"big city" critics of the ethanol industry. Alas, there's little reason 
to expect much bravery out of Mr. Gingrich's fellow Republicans on 
Capitol Hill. Current Speaker John A. Boehner, Ohio Republican, recently 
told reporters not to expect cuts to the ethanol subsidies because they 
are "not in the discretionary spending pot."

While Mr. Obama prevaricates and Congress dithers, ethanol boosters are 
once again claiming that their sector has negligible effect on grain 
prices. However, the events of the past few weeks - corn futures at 
near-record highs and social unrest related to food prices - are nearly 
identical to the mayhem that occurred in 2007 and 2008. Back then, more 
than a dozen studies, including ones by Purdue University, the World 
Bank and the Congressional Research Service, exposed the link between 
increasing ethanol production and higher food prices. Soaring food 
prices led to violent protests in Egypt, Cameroon, Ivory Coast, Haiti, 
Mauritania, Ethiopia, Madagascar, the Philippines and Indonesia. Worries 
about adequate food stocks led several countries to ban food exports.

In May 2008, the Rand Corp. warned that diverting corn to the ethanol 
sector was not only bad economics, but a security threat: "Using corn 
for ethanol is economically inefficient and has harmed U.S. national 
security. Diverting corn from food to ethanol production has pushed up 
world market prices for grains and other foods, which, in 2008, resulted 
in riots in a number of developing countries."

In recent weeks, we've seen food price increases and protests that are 
reminiscent of 2008. There have been food riots in Algeria and 
Mozambique. Last month, about 8,000 Jordanians protested in the streets 
of Amman and other cities over rising food prices. In Egypt, the world's 
biggest wheat importer, wheat prices are up by 30 percent over the past 
12 months. Those higher wheat prices are being stoked by rising corn 
prices, which have doubled over the past six months and are at about $7 
per bushel. "Higher corn prices always means higher wheat prices," says 
Bill Lapp, president of Advanced Economic Solutions, an Omaha-based 
commodity consulting firm.

In December, a study by two U.S. agriculture economists, Thomas Elam and 
Steve Meyer, found that corn prices are being directly stoked by demand 
from the ethanol sector. Mr. Elam and Mr. Meyer, who have done 
consulting work for the meat industry, found that without the ethanol 
mandates, the average price of corn would be lower by more than $2 per 
bushel. They also conclude that "biofuels policy has caused significant 
cost increases for all users of feedgrains."

David Orden, a senior research fellow at the International Food Policy 
Research Institute in Washington, told me that surging corn prices are 
"a continuation of what happened in 2008." The push for biofuels, he 
said, "has clearly tightened up agricultural commodity markets. That's 
good for farmers, but it is not good for poor people around the world."

Many of those poor live in the United States. Some 43.6 million 
Americans, about 14 percent of the population, are receiving federal 
food stamps. Since October 2008, the number of Americans relying on food 
stamps jumped by 41.5 percent, and enrollment in the program has 
increased for 26 consecutive months. And thanks to the ethanol scam, 
those many millions are being priced out of the meat aisle. Over the 
past year, beef prices have risen more than 6 percent, and pork prices 
are up 11 percent. Economists are expecting overall grocery prices in 
the United States to rise by about 5 percent this year.

But the real - and likely more dangerous - food-price increases will 
happen outside of this country. Last year, the Organization for Economic 
Cooperation and Development projected that global grain prices are 
likely to be as much as 40 percent higher by 2020, and a London-based 
nonprofit entity, ActionAid, predicted that some 600 million more people 
could be left hungry by 2020 because of increased production of biofuels.

Mr. Brabeck, the chairman of Nestle, the world's biggest food company, 
has rightly put the spotlight on the biofuels madness. As the head of a 
company with $100 billion in annual food-related revenues, Mr. Brabeck 
clearly has a keen understanding of the global food industry. And last 
month during the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, he 
identified the stunningly obvious solution to the ongoing insanity. "No 
food for fuel," he said.

It's time - no, it's long past time - to heed Mr. Brabeck's advice. "No 
food for fuel" should be the mantra on Capitol Hill and at the United 
Nations. In addition, it should be a required oath for all of the 
candidates (Mr. Gingrich in particular) who are planning to campaign in 
Iowa for the 2012 presidential election.

Stop the madness.

/Robert Bryce is a senior fellow at the Manhattan Institute. His latest 
book is "Power Hungry: The Myths of 'Green' Energy and the Real Fuels of 
the Future" (PublicAffairs, 2010)./

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