Ethanol and the US energy policy.

Implications: WSJ’s article “Ethanol Water Shortage”  summarizes very well ethanol from corn shortcomings and why subsidizing it is not a solution to America’s transportation fuels. Ethanol from corn is probably the worst renewable fuel as its production has a negative energy balance, i.e. it requires more energy that can produce, and in addition requires great quantities of water and land to grow the corn. The Big Ethanol lobby has been pushing Congress to pass legislation supporting ethanol as “renewable fuel”, and now House and Senate negotiators are preparing for an energy-bill conference, and ethanol could become a big problem for America.

Analysis: Ethanol, and in particular ethanol from corn, has been presented by politicians and pushed by lobbyists both in Washington and around the world as the magic solution to fuel transportation because they claim improves independence from OPEC countries oil, improves vehicles emissions, provides a steady new source of income for farmers. The reality unfortunately is that biofuels in general and ethanol from corn in particular, are not currently a viable solution as transportation fuel.

Corn based ethanol has been heavily subsidized and this is the only reason for its current viability which is therefore obviously artificial. The University of Minnesota has performed a very interesting study on the benefits of various biofuels and their findings confirm that, with current technology, the energy balance for the production of ethanol is very poor since approximately 20% of each gallon is non-fossil “new” energy. It has been calculated that if all the corn grown in 2006 in USA was used for ethanol, it would replace approximately 12% of the US gasoline market and in terms of “new” non fossil energy it would create only 2.4% more because a lot of fossil energy for fertilizing the corn and running tractors and harvesting combines. In addition, if you currently get in your car 30 mpg with gasoline, you will get approximately 20 mpg on pure ethanol.

However,  this is not the only problem. Because of the ethanol corn “rush”, corn prices have spiked to the point that in Mexico the price of tortillas has doubled causing widespread street protests. In Washington lobbyists of the poultry, livestock and diary industry are pushing to eliminate the ethanol subsidies so that corn and grain prices may be normalized. Since it takes three pounds of corn to produce one pound of poultry and seven to produce one pound of beef, meat prices have been rising and the margin of meat producers have shrunk.

One additional serious problem of corn ethanol production is that it takes about four gallons of water to produce one gallon of fuel, and Cornell Professor David Pimentel says that “when you count the water needed to grow the corn, one gallon of ethanol requires a staggering 1,700 gallons of water”. This would seriously threaten the aquifers and a number of litigations are in place and political local opposition has started in the Corn Belt.

A very serious conflict between “energy”, “food” and the “environment” exists and it must be carefully studied as the world population is projected to double by 2050 and food and energy needs will double with it.

It seems that, unless the current subsidies are abolished, USA farmers will add about 10 million acres of corn to the 70 cultivated in 2006. Some of this acreage will most probably have to come from lands now set aside for government subsidized conservation programs. Those uncultivated acres currently absorb carbon dioxide, and farming corn for ethanol on them means more greenhouse gases in the atmosphere than just continuing to burn gasoline.

Therefore the fact that ethanol is a “renewable” fuel does not make it preferable for the environment to the fossil fuel that it replaces. Many other “renewable” power sources are more efficient and more environmental friendly. For example, solar energy technology is quickly improving and it is already many times more efficient than ethanol.
Does this mean that ethanol and biofuels production and/or R&D have to be abandoned? Certainly not!
However, caution in further developments supported by “political” subsidies should stop in order not to waste taxpayers’ money. The National Biodiesel Board (NBB) reported that currently there are 77 biodiesel plants under construction!

The R&D should continue because biotechnology is making great progress and there is a lot of research in the next generation technology that should improve production rates and the energy balance.
Alternatives to ethanol from corn do exist and are generally more economically viable. As of today, for example, Brazil has an efficient production of ethanol from sugar cane because their technology uses the bagasse, the cane residue, to produce the heat requirements of the process. In addition sugar cane produces about twice ethanol per acre than corn and releases into the air much less greenhouse gases than gasoline. Brazilians are confident that they can improve their production and efficiencies with next generation technologies that are being studied.

The Brazilian biofuel industry could be environmentally friendly if the authorities will be able to stop the destruction of the rainforest to clear acreage for sugar cane plantations. Destruction of the rainforest and its impact on the world ecosystem is one of the most serious environmental dangers of our days and it must be prevented.

Sugar cane is not the only alternative to corn for ethanol production because often biomass is indicated as the most probable economical and environmental friendly source of ethanol. The term “biomass” commonly indicates plants that are grown for the production of biofuels. The University of Minnesota has conducted a 10 year study on many different species of native prairie plants that can be grown in degraded and infertile soils and found out that planting a mixture of native plants and not a single species yields a higher productivity. The results of this research project were published in December 2006 Science magazine explaining the interesting findings that mixtures of native prairie grasses have great beneficial greenhouse gases effect as they restore carbon content in the degraded and infertile soils by removing it from the air carbon dioxide. Investing taxpayers’ money in this type of R&D seems to make more sense than to continue subsidizing the corn ethanol industry.

In conclusion, great attention should be paid by the American public, by the media and by the voters to the progress of the energy bill currently in conference in Washington to make sure that we are not left with some law that does not make any sense.
Any new bill must be "ethanol-free" because ethanol from corn is probably the worst renewable fuel as its production has a negative energy balance:  it requires both more energy than it can produce, and great quantities of water and land to grow corn. In addition it is not advantageous for the environment as there is not a greenhouse effect reduction and it subsidizes today the farmers creating an agricultural economy that is not viable for the farming community which will suffer when subsidies inevitably disappear.