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| Future ethanol: Environmentalists and energy-security advocates hope ethanol can be made from agricultural waste, such as
these corn cobs piled high on this South Dakota farm. Dirk Lammers/AP |
The politics of ethanol outshine its costs
Despite higher food prices and environmental damage, it's warmly embraced in Congress.
By Mark Clayton | Staff writer of The Christian Science Monitorfrom the November 15, 2007 edition
Page 1 of 2
With gasoline near $3 a gallon, climate concerns rising, and an election season in full swing, politicians are eager to tell constituents that they're doing something to help at the gas pump.
Enter ethanol – or, more specifically, a plan in Congress to mandate that US gasoline refiners add a minimum of 36 billion gallons of ethanol to the nation's gasoline supply – up from the 7.5 billion gallons currently mandated by 2012.
Ethanol's popularity comes despite charges from environmentalists, livestock farmers, and opponents of subsidies that the move won't meet energy goals and may damage the environment as food prices soar. Energy-security experts say the measure also falls short on a key goal: weaning America off foreign oil.
Boosting ethanol production is the political equivalent of motherhood and apple pie these days. Politicians on both sides of the aisle as well as presidential candidates eager to do well in Iowa, the nation's No. 1 ethanol-producing state, are behind the measure, unglamorously named the "Renewable Fuels Standard." The RFS, part of the energy bill in the Senate, is so popular that it may be enough to ram through energy legislation this year, despite bitter disagreements over other parts of the bills.
"Quite a few folks around here think the biofuels title alone can carry the entire energy bill," says Bill Wicker, a Democratic staff aide for the Senate Committee on Energy and Natural Resources. "Biofuels are not a red-state, blue-state issue."
The energy bill faces the threat of a presidential veto, but if RFS does become law, it would provide a huge boost to the ethanol industry. The measure would create a demand for about 36 billion gallons of ethanol by 2022, or about 15 percent of US gasoline consumption, nearly a fivefold increase from the target under the current law. It could also save the industry from an acute glut.
Evidence of an ethanol glut had been growing this year with ethanol prices falling dramatically until they rebounded a bit last month. Several recently announced ethanol plants are on hold, experts say.
"This new RFS is simply vital for the industry," says Tom Koehler, vice president for public policy of Pacific Ethanol, Inc., a manufacturer in Sacramento, Calif.
Among its advantages: Ethanol fuel can create fewer greenhouse-gas emissions than gasoline and it's made from corn, a US-made renewable resource, instead of nonrenewable oil, which increasingly comes from abroad.
Nevertheless, many critics say that boosting corn-based ethanol alone is wrongheaded. For example, energy security is a key driver of the RFS. But the ethanol measure falls short, says Anne Korin, chairman of the Set America Free Coalition, a Washington-based energy security advocacy group.
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