State of the UnionFollow

3rd to last, and also a blue state. Felt I should point that out to you, Rime.

Hi, false dilemma!

God, you're so stupid it hurts.

Aside from straight out "get votes" subsidies to the heartland, subsidies towards ethanol production are actually aimed at lowering the price of ethanol so that it can be a viable fuel additive at the consumer pump. The government picks up part of the tab because, otherwise, we'd either have to abandon using ethanol or else the price of gas would shoot up. For that matter, industrial use of it would probably taper off compared to fossil fuel use as well.

Why does ethanol cost more* than oil? Bunch of reasons, not the least of which is a much younger infrastructure, need for specialized transport to avoid water contamination (ethanol tends to absorb water and weaken itself chemically), a lower rate of energy return than petroleum (though still a net positive), diminishing amounts of corn for sale (ethanol use has already halved the 'excess' corn stockpiles in the US in the past year or so) etc. Additional refineries are popping up in response to oil prices (which are lower than expected right now due to climate effects but that's another post) which will take some pressure off of ethanol prices but, as long as demand exceeds supply, the price won't drop by any great amount. And demand does exceed supply -- we're actually importing ethanol from Brazil to meet our consumption. As an aside, Brazilian ethanol is actually tariffed upwards because Brazil has a much more efficient and expansive ethanol industry going on and so its selling prices are a fraction of those in the US. So the US price fixes in order to keep the US ethanol industry "competitive". For better or for worse.

So why subsidize? Because the government has decided that the return on the investment of subsidies will be greater energy independence, a cleaner environment and a hedge against the day when oil supplies run low. In the mean time, ethanol prices to the consumer need to remain competitive or else the industry won't get a toe-hold in on petroleum usage. Which is why we have subsidies towards the industry and why we have state level mandates to add ethanol into gasoline. It has nothing at all to do with ethanol being a negative return energy source -- that's just stupid. It's simply less "productive" at present than fossil fuels but waiting until fossil fuels run out is a bad time to start investing in a fledgling ethanol infrastructure.

Really, if you wanted to complain about subsidies, you'd complain about subsidies to the petroleum industries. Without those, ethanol would be more viable on its own compared against petroleum. I'm not actually advocating this as such, but it'd make more sense.

*Edit: In terms of final cost per unit of energy as well as raw dollars. The 2006 wholesale cost of ethanol was ~$3.15/gal

Edited, Jan 24th 2007 3:29pm by Jophiel

If internet video-teaching were really better and more economical, why do we still have old-fashioned classroooms?

Soylent Green is People!!

i dont think bush's troop delployment is a bad thing i think it will help the problem as kaolian wrote that it makes more sense to put more troops. president bush has talked with generals over in the war in iraq and probley there complaints were not enough men to do the job so increasement in troops would be the solution. the problem with people is his sense he's been president he has ALOT of **** to deal with and i'm pretty postive any other president would have made some of the same decesions he has maybe a little different maybe worse.

I think Monx is confusing "net energy gain" with "net economic gain". The two are completely different concepts.

We gain 38% more energy growing corn and producing ethonol from that corn then it costs to run the entire process (growth through refining through shipping, etc...). But that says nothing about how much it *costs* to do that. I'm also on the fence when it comes to ethonol subsdidies, but mainly because of the product being used. Corn is arguably the least efficient crop to use to generate ethonol, but since there are much stronger corn lobbies in the continental US, then there are beet and cane sugar lobbies, it's what ends up being used.


The problem is that it's *still* cheaper to generate gasoline from crude oil and use that to power our cars and such then it is to produce and use ethonol (although it's getting pretty darn close nowadays). The issue is and will continue to be an economic one. As long as it's cheaper to use gas, we'll use gas. Making the issue more confusing is that as with any product, the price tends to come down as the volume increases. That's where the subsidies come in. No one wants to be the guy producing and trying to market the first few million barrels of ethonol since you wont have a sellable product. But everyone will want to be the guy selling the 50 millionth barrel, since that's about when it'll be really profitable to do so. Subsidies work in this situation because they can make ethonol "profitable" prior to hitting the market volume point at which it would naturally be profitable, allowing volume to meet that level much sooner then it would naturally.


That's the real argument for subsidies. I agree that if ethonol will *never* be as cost effective as gasoline, then a subsidy to make it so might be questionable. However, given gasolines non-renewable source, we can state that at some point ethonol *must* become more cost effective (and we can also argue the environmental benefits of getting there sooner rather then later), thus it's reasonable to talk about subsidizing the product until it reaches that cost effective point. The issues I have concerns about really have to do with the details. What exact product is subsidized? Is that correctly targetted and improving our overall energy picture? And how much will it cost in relation to not subsidizing (or waiting a bit longer to do so)?

just to break the thread's and forum's character for a momnet;

would everyone pretty much agree that arguing about this really is no different than arguing about god/religion because really there is no way that we can truly know what is raelly happening and all of our opinions are simply personal suppositions based on the best (yet incomplete) data allowed to us?

would everyone pretty much agree that arguing about this really is no different than arguing about god/religion because really there is no way that we can truly know what is raelly happening and all of our opinions are simply personal suppositions based on the best (yet incomplete) data allowed to us?
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no.

only someone who doesnt pay attention could make that assessment. there is 1000 years of history to guide us if we would only pay heed to it. if only we would pay attention.....

Rime- Louisiana has a democrat govern(ess) ( who totally blew it during katrina and is standing in the way of recovery) Democrat mayor in N.O.( see above about dem response to recovery) and democrat representatives in congress. Nice colored maps you found though, chief.



Having fun on your 74 blm?

Corn has the advantage of being a major part of the world market. Even when ethanol companies aren't buying it, you can find someone needing it for livestock feed and, if they aren't buying, it has the added advantage of being able to sit in a silo and wait for the market to recover.

If you're growing sugar beets and Jerusalem artichokes and the ethanol market falls (as it's done since this past summer), you're pretty much fucked short of a major government bailout. You can't silo sugar beets and refining them into storable form means they're more expensive. Cane sugar simply doesn't have the option of being grown across the American midwest so that's out as a major source.

While you do have some ethanol refineries owned by corn farming collectives even they are ultimately businesses and, if we had abundant supplies of other crop sources which would increase their productivity 200%, they'd be buying them. But until the ethanol market is more guaranteed, I don't see many farmers wanting to pin their financial stability on sugar beets.

you don't know that.
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yes, i do. and so does anyone else who has ever studied history about the middle east.

they have NEVER let a non-muslim force remain within their reach unmolested. EVER. Israel is a living testament to that. and because of Israel, they are now more determined to make sure it never happens again.

the cruisades. the british attempt at colonization. russias go at afganistan. same ole same ole. us in iraq will end the same way. even afganistan is STILL a conctant battle between U.N. forces and the muslims who live there.

look at lebonon. it wasnt their american backed governmnet that tossed israel out, it was their people, ie, hamas.

it will be the same with iraq. iraq is more of a democracy than the us is. it is hhe people in iraq who insist on a muslim country that will eventually decide how there country is ran, not the government we set up.....just like lebonon right now, and the same with afganistan.

we are loosing on EVERY FRONT in the middle east. and the reason we are lossing is because of trying to support what that one third of the world wants, we are trying to change it through their leadership. but unlike this country, their people are willing to die rather than let it happen.

we can not win with out the support of the people. and we can not win the support of the people by shoving something they consider more vile than death down their throats.

yes, i do know. so does anyone else whoever studied the history of the middle east. just read Bush Sr,s book on why he didnt go into bagdad. HE KNEW too.

the only people who dont know are those that dont pay attention to history and its lessons. like bush jr for instance.

The info on the web is widely all over the place. I've got 1200 WSJ articles to go through. That zFact link just seemed like a decent non-partisan beginning.

Regardless, if ethanol can not be sold at a profit, it is by definition wasting energy (which of cource includes the time and effort expent by humans in production), wasting scarce resources. But still, it'd be nice to have some more exact numbers of how much energy and scarce resources are being wasted in the production of ethanol.

But it was nice that you quoted the Q: and zFact:, but did you click the explanatory links?



WTF? It takes less energy to produce ethanol than it does to produce gasoline? But it costs more to produce ethanol than it does to produce gasoline? It's a free lunch with ethanol but it's the exact opposite of a free lunch with gasoline. And STILL, gasoline costs less than ethanol. Something is b.s.



I don't really want to as yet get into the detailed chemistry and physics. But make sure you understand you have to put in the equivalent of the energy it takes to manufacture *3* gallons of ethanol to match the energy output of *1* gallon of gasoline. So MULTIPLY 1 GGE of ethanol requires 0.74 GGE of fossil input energy TIMES 3 = 2.22 VERSUS 1.23 for gasoline. And that's just the fossil energy input. There's the Fred Flintstone rub. Why?







WTF? How can something seemingly so simple vary so wildly? That's why I'm suspicious and researching in depth now. You could light your house on fire to warm yourself up and while the house burns down it might technically qualify as a "net energy gain", it's surely a "net energy *loss*" over time as you shiver your *** off when the flames die down. I think you'd agree that continuing to buy new houses and light 'em up for heat is a "net economic loss" and a relative "net energy loss" as well over time when you accurately incorporate all the correct calculations into the equation. And if you're measuring economically efficient energy production that will be measured in the form of profit for efficiency, loss for inefficiency.

Or how about the net energy created by the terrorist attack on the twin towers? You've got planes with mass and speed going in combined with fuel and the falling of the towers going out. Are we going to call that a net energy gain? Or was that a net energy loss because of all the post productivity losses of the buildings? If it shows as a loss on the balance sheet it's an unproductive inefficient use of scarce resources.

Regardless, I'd like to see this info:





Maybe. Maybe not. If it's an energy gain it should be profitable, plain and simple. How can something which leaves you with 38% more energy be an economic loss?!?!?!? It makes no damn sense, and I intend to find out wtf is up. You compare the price of gas with the price of ethanol. That will tell you which is the more efficient production of energy. Why the hell do you think the USSR never knew how much of what to produce and failed? Because they had no prices directing economic activity. They were copying prices out of American Sears catalogues, but still had absurd inefficient shortages of things people wanted and absurd surpluses of things people didn't want. As good as digging ditches by day and filling those ditches in by night to keep the workers employed. And subsidizing something which is a net economic loss is exactly the same as digging ditches by day and filling those ditches in by night. It's total waste.

If it was indeed wrong, then ethanol would sell for a profit. Explainerz it then: How can you get 38% more of something, of absolutely anything, by performing input actions and that results in an output LOSS? Wellllll, we're waiting ....