The Ethanol Myths

You gotta love John Stossel. He has the unmitigated gall to actually question things that are foisted off on Joe and Jane Q. Public as fact. We should know better when "those in the know" are quick to do what they want to do without much debate (sort of reminds me of the new "immigration" bill they want on the fast track).

Anyway, Stossel has written a good expose' on the ethanol craze. It's just another reason why we should never believe the folks in Washington when they insist they're only doing what's best for us.

Automobile aficionado and host of KLIF's Inside Automotive, Ed Wallace, knows the automotive industry inside and out and wrote a comprehensive report about ethanol in the April 27 2006 edition of Business Week Magazine. It was titled Ethanol: A Tragedy in 3 Acts. Here's a sample of Wallace's findings:

The other negative aspect of this inefficient fuel is that numerous studies have found that ethanol creates less energy than is required to make it. Other studies have found that ethanol creates "slightly" more energy than is used in its production. Yet not one of these studies takes into account that when E85 is used, the vehicle's fuel efficiency drops by at least 25% -- and possibly by as much as 40%. Using any of the accredited studies as a baseline in an energy-efficiency equation, ethanol when used as a fuel is a net energy waste.

Furthermore, no one has even considered the severe disruption in the nation's fuel distribution that mandating a move into ethanol would cause. Over the past month, gas stations from Dallas to Philadelphia and parts of Massachusetts have had their tanks run dry due to a lack of ethanol to blend. The newswires have been filled with stories bemoaning the shortage of trucks, drivers, railcars, and barges to ship the product. Ethanol can't be blended at refineries and pumped through the nation's gasoline pipelines.

The recent price spikes for gasoline have forcibly reminded the people of Chicago and Wisconsin of what happened when ethanol was forced on them during the summer of 2000. Moreover, the promise of energy independence that Brazil has explored through ethanol is widely misunderstood. Recently a Brazilian official, commenting on our third and most recent attempted conversion to ethanol, said that when Brazil tried using agricultural crops for ethanol, it achieved only a 1:1.20 energy conversion rate, too low to be worth the effort.

On the other hand, ethanol from sugar cane delivered 1:8 energy conversion, which met the national mandate. Unfortunately for us, sugar cane isn't a viable crop in the climate of our nation's heartland. But the part of Brazil's quest for energy independence that the media usually overlooks is that ethanol wasn't the only fuel source the country was working on: Its other, more important, thrust was to find more oil. To that end, last week Brazil's P50 offshore oil platform was turned on. Its anticipated daily output is high enough to make Brazil totally oil independent.

More smog, infinitely worse gas mileage, huge problems in distribution, and skyrocketing prices for gasoline. Maybe now that we're witnessing the third act in America's ethanol play, the upcoming epilogue will close this show forever. Even great advertising works only if the product does.

Wallace is straight shooter and if anything, he leans a bit to the left. He's not "big oil"...he's just a pragmatic automotive enthusiast with a keen sense of history and apparently, the future.

Hat tip to ALTERNATIVE ENERGY BLOG for ethanol cartoon.