Ethanol Myth Blasted in New Science Bag
Jon Markman
Corn-based ethanol production is sure to go down as one of the greatest mistakes ever in U.S. energy policy, yet it is so heavily embedded in election-year politics it just won't go away.
The government's recent move to boost ethanol production -- embedded in the Energy Independence and Security Act of 2007 -- panders to Midwestern and Southern farm-state electorates that are influential in presidential races, yet will end up costing the nation billions more than it purports to save.
I wrote about this scam back in October in a column titled, "Shuck the ethanol and let solar shine," but apparently for some reason my expression of outrage was not enough to prevent Congress from passing a law in late December that will cost taxpayers as much as $550 billion over the next four years.
Now scientists have finally completed research that shows ethanol is not only bad business but also bad for the environment. According to news reports, the latest issue of Science magazine highlights studies showing that biofuels produce more greenhouse gas emissions than fossil fuels when all of their production inputs are accounted for.
Two studies shows that replacing fossil fuels with corn-based ethanol would double greenhouse gas emissions over the next three decades. The studies show that switchgrass, an alternative to ethanol that's more weed than plant, would boost emissions by 50%.
How? It's because, as I described in my piece, so much energy is required to fertilize, harvest and refine the fuels. It's also because the growing of fuel plants replaces the growing of vegetation that actually consumes harmful greenhouse gases.
The research at Princeton and the Nature Conservancy found that an intensified push to grow fuel crops would also rob the world of biodiversity as it would require the clearing of vast tracts of pristine rainforest in South America and Africa. In total, the researchers said they discovered it would take as much as 300 years to pay off the carbon debt caused by biofuels' initial cultivation.
Luckily, some public officials are waking up to the danger of ethanol. The United Nations recently tasked a panel to evaluate biofuels sustainability, and there are rumblings that the next session of Congress will look at the possibility of already reforming the recently passed bill.
Investors meanwhile should continue to avoid the ethanol-based stocks, including popular names like Pacific Ethanol and recent initial public offering BioFuel Energy.
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