Sherman, set the wayback machine to 1979. We're going to investigate how since 1974 the EPA has been knowingly mandating a smog producing gas alternative on American citizens.
When our second energy crisis hit in 1979, a 40 cent per gallon tax credit went to push ethanol. Within 5 years 163 ethanol plants were built. When oil prices dropped in the 1980s and gas prices went down, ethanol couldn't compete and many plants closed up. Shortly after in another attempt to make people use more ethanol Congress enacted tax credits for E-85 vehicles. GM chose their Chevy Suburban which got 15 mpg, but with credits for being E-85 capable the credits earned gave its Corporate Average Fuel Economy (CAFE) ratings of 29 mpg.
In actuality, Congress knew that gas mileage would drop by at least 25%, or more. All these credits did was save Detroit millions each year in penalties for not meeting the CAFE mileage standards. This started the "Live Green, Go Yellow" ads that gave the impression that buying their vehicles and using E-85, we could reduce our dependence on foriegn oil. What GM left out of these ads is the fact that E-85 use would increase smog in summer months (the EPA attorneys admitted as much in 1995), and decrease fuel mileage. With E-85 selling for 13 cents a gallon more than regular, gas users would pay an extra $1,000+ in fuel costs per year.
Clinton's Clean Air Act of 1990 again tried to create an ethanol industry in America by having the EPA mandate that a full 30% of the oxygenates to be used in gasoline come from a renewable source, knowing that it poluted more and was not as efficient as gasoline. So Al Gore calls it an Incovenient Truth, I call it a Fractured Fairytale.
Go to Business Week Online Ethanol: A Tragedy in 3 Acts.
There is an excellent post from January 30,2007 on the
The Inside Dope blog entitiled 'Boland to further mandatory ethanol consumption.
4 comments:
I do not know what the best answer is. But if you look at our national dependence on a product that is controlled by people who want us dead, factor in our motor vehicle industry is dying a slow death and that we know that fossil fuels, being sold to us from the people who want us dead, are also bad for the atmosphere, then the situation screams for an immediate nationally controllable change. The logical moves would be to concentrate and create an alternative energy source that we can control the availability from a product such as corn. Plus we need to get the automotive industry and the countries fossil fuel using infrastructures committed to that change. And third we need to do it fast, best and with the mind of controlling the market nationally and worldwide before someone else does and then straps us further into more markets driven by other countries.
scoundrel,
We have capped oil wells that would produce alot of the oil we need. We even have several in Iowa. In the meantime if they would step up the development of Butanol; it is a replacement for gasoline that is looking promising. It also can be run 100% with no gasoline added. We could convert ethanol plants to produce butanol, and use other products; beets, sugar cane, sawgrass, etc,. to produce it. The monies need to be found to finance research and development of alternatives, but we can't expect a struggling auto industry to do it on their own. Things could be done, but too many people are making big money with the current set-up. Like you, I don't know the best answer, but there has to be a better choice than E-85. I cannot using a product that polutes more and gets less gas mileage as a short term fix.
As crazy as it might sound, if someone that was in the business of promoting Butanol as an alternative was looking for a springboard, one of the places I have seen where people get a fair shake to introduce their product to a live audience is on the Coast to Coast A.M. radio show. In fact if the show producers like an alternative energy source they promote the heck out of it with their five million strong audiences.
The main reason I think butanol isn't heard of is because it used to be expensive to produce. Recent development of a process to add an extra molecule of carbon has dropped the cost to that of ehtanol. The differences are many, but one of the biggest in my book is that the entire gallon made can go in the tank with no gasoline. The claims are less polution with greater gas mileage.
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