Biofuel Subsidized Corporate Farms Sober News About Ethanol Fuel

[Stinger2]

Biofuel Subsidized Corporate Farms Sober News About Ethanol Fuel
2007

For those interested in preserving the environment, this week brings sobering news about ethanol. This fuel, distilled from plants like corn and switchgrass, has been widely touted as an eco-friendly, clean-burning alternative to gasoline.

But a study published this week in the journal Environmental Science and Technology suggests that replacing our current gas-guzzlers with vehicles that burn ethanol would actually increase pollution and damage human health.

Stanford scientist Mark Jacobson used a computer model to predict air quality in the year 2020, when ethanol-powered cars are expected to be widely available in the US. His simulation showed, among other things, that cars that burn a blend of 85 percent ethanol will significantly increase ozone, a prime ingredient in smog.

So in a world where the cars run on switchgrass juice, more people will get asthma, more people will be hospitalized with respiratory distress, and more people will die from breathing in ozone than if we’d kept on driving our gas-powered clunkers. At least according to Jacobons. So if you want to celebrate Earth Day this weekend, raise a glass of bubbly to our beautiful planet. Just don’t share any with your gas tank.

http://www.scientificamerican.com/podcast/episode.cfm?id=06022F79-E7F2-99DF-3CFE3EB8DBBAA57D

Exploiting clean energy for profit


Policy analyst James Bovard observes in Archer Daniels Midland: A Case Study in Corporate Welfare (1995, Cato Institute) that ADM “has been the most prominent recipient of corporate welfare in recent U.S. history.” The world’s largest producer of corn and soybeans also produces more than 40 percent of U.S. ethanol. Soybeans and corn are two of the five subsidized staple crops in the United States, and ethanol production has been instigated by subsidies for three decades.

The following October 2003 Los Angeles Times opinion piece entitled “A Complete Waste of Energy”, submitted by Sierra Club Director Dan Becker and the libertarian Cato Institute’s Jerry Taylor characterizes the subsidy program this way: “The Midwest is a region that throws its presidential and congressional vote to those who promise farmers the biggest sack of federal loot, so ethanol we shall have regardless of its merits as a fuel.”

http://newfarm.rodaleinstitute.org/features/0604/biofuels/index.shtml

They would rather not let people know that this fuel is horrible for humans and the air we breath. Obama seems to be going along with the scam, people should be outraged and get this shut down, A total waste in every aspect.

[John Q. Citizen]

1. Ethanol from corn and bio-diesel from soy is lame. Ethanol from sun-chokes is cool.

Bio-diesel from mustard seed is cool too!