Tag: renewable fuel

Bush Pushes for Renewable Fuel Program

The Bush Administration is proposing a Renewable Fuels Standard Program. It aims to double the use of renewable fuels such as ethanol and biodiesel. The GLRC’s Lester Graham reports:

Transcript

The Bush Administration is proposing a Renewable Fuels Standard Program. It aims to
double the use of renewable fuels such as ethanol and biodiesel. The GLRC’s Lester
Graham reports:


This new regulation would require more renewable fuels at the pumps. The Bush
Administration predicts we’ll cut petroleum use by nearly four billion gallons a year.
Most of those fuels are expected to come from crops such as corn for ethanol and soy
beans for soy-diesel. But some scientists say using food crops for renewable fuels is a
short-term fix.


That’s because it takes a lot of energy to produce ethanol from corn. At best, the net
energy gain in growing, harvesting, and processing corn into ethanol is: one energy unit
input producing a one-and-a-quarter energy unit output. And, ethanol production has been
heavily dependent on government subsidies.


The Environmental Protection Agency notes that new technologies might be able to
produce ethanol from agricultural and industrial waste, such as scrap wood chips,
at a cost that’s competitive with today’s gasoline prices.


For the GLRC, this is Lester Graham.

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Use of Corn for Ethanol Production Increases

Every few years, the amount of corn being used to produce ethanol doubles in the United States. That’s causing concern that too much of the country’s corn crop is being taken out of food production. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Erin Toner reports:

Transcript

Every few years, the amount of corn being used to produce ethanol
doubled in the United States. That’s causing concern that too much of the
country’s corn crop is being taken out of food production. The Great
Lakes Radio Consortium’s Erin Toner reports:


Demand for ethanol is increasing as more states start requiring the corn-
based fuel to be blended with gasoline, and Congress has required that
the amount of renewable fuel used in the U.S. triple in the next six years.


Keith Collins is chief economist for the USDA. He’s says he’s not
worried about a food shortage. He says there were record corn crops in
2004 and 2005, and there’s 35 million acres of cropland in reserve in the
U.S.


“Some of that has to stay there because its environmentally fragile land,
but some of it could come out if demand for food goes up, and demand
for fuel goes up. I think we have a very strong resource natural resource
base that can produce a lot more agricultural commodities, both for food
and for fuel.”


Overproduction has kept corn prices as low as they were in the 1950s,
but Collins expects corn to get more expensive over the next few years as
ethanol production increases.


For the GLRC, I’m Erin Toner.

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