N.Y. Times: Court Overturns E.P.A.'s Biofuels Mandate (http://www.nytimes.com/2013/01/26/business/energy-environment/court-overturns-epas-biofuels-mandate.html)
QuoteWASHINGTON – A federal appeals court threw out a federal rule on renewable fuels on Friday, saying that a quota set by the Environmental Protection Agency for incorporating liquids made from woody crops and wastes into car and truck fuels was based on wishful thinking rather than realistic estimates of what could be achieved.
QuoteThe ruling by the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia involved a case brought by the American Petroleum Institute, whose members were bound by the 2012 cellulosic biofuels quota being challenged.
QuoteProduction of advanced biofuels for use in gasoline is a cherished goal of the Obama administration and a major long-term hope for reducing emissions of greenhouse gases.
The ethanol mandate is also causing many food commodity prices to skyrocket (for example, check the recent wholesale market for chicken and especially wings!) due to the price of corn-based feed. This is also a major issue in other countries where corn-based human food is the norm (ie, Mexico), to the point of potentially becoming socially destabilizing.
And DON'T get me started on other major problems with ethanol as an internal combustion engine fuel ingredient.
:banghead:
Mike
The sooner we move past our obsession with ethanol and onto alternative energies that are actually sustainable, the better. It's best for everyone if we just focus our energy right now on getting oil out of the ground while developing an energy source that's actually going to help us in the long run and isn't just a band-aid.
It seems like conservatives and liberals are mostly both anti-ethanol... if for different reasons. I don't get why it's being shoved down our throats.
Quote from: mgk920 on January 27, 2013, 12:41:00 AM
The ethanol mandate is also causing many food commodity prices to skyrocket (for example, check the recent wholesale market for chicken and especially wings!) due to the price of corn-based feed. This is also a major issue in other countries where corn-based human food is the norm (ie, Mexico), to the point of potentially becoming socially destabilizing.
And DON'T get me started on other major problems with ethanol as an internal combustion engine fuel ingredient.
:banghead:
Mike
Part of the problem is also that we (US/Canada) are the world's breadbasket. I do wish other people would do proper land reform (Mexico) and have real farmers tending the land (Zimbabwe) so the burden could be spread over more areas. There is no reason why large, industrial-scale corn farming cannot be done in Mexico, for example. That's regardless of ethanol or anyone's thoughts on it. If other places were producing as they should, our recent drought would be a minor blip at most, and entirely an internal problem.
Quote from: corco on January 27, 2013, 01:31:01 AM
It seems like conservatives and liberals are mostly both anti-ethanol... if for different reasons. I don't get why it's being shoved down our throats.
I have been surprised by this also...but NOT surprised by their lack of effort to reverse it. :verymad:
Quote from: cjk374 on January 27, 2013, 08:27:53 AM
Quote from: corco on January 27, 2013, 01:31:01 AM
It seems like conservatives and liberals are mostly both anti-ethanol... if for different reasons. I don't get why it's being shoved down our throats.
I have been surprised by this also...but NOT surprised by their lack of effort to reverse it. :verymad:
Subsidy habits are like smoking. Easy to start, hard to quit the addiction. Plus, once they get started, they have an inertia all their own.
Quote from: corco on January 27, 2013, 01:31:01 AM
The sooner we move past our obsession with ethanol and onto alternative energies that are actually sustainable, the better. It's best for everyone if we just focus our energy right now on getting oil out of the ground while developing an energy source that's actually going to help us in the long run and isn't just a band-aid.
It seems like conservatives and liberals are mostly both anti-ethanol... if for different reasons. I don't get why it's being shoved down our throats.
Because it's easy. And because we have a ton of corn that we don't know what to do with. Seriously, the supply of corn is far larger than the demand - it's to the point where corn farmers depend on government subsidies to make a living! In the 70s we used to pay farmers to NOT GROW ANYTHING because of this, but then the federal government decided they didn't want to do that, so instead they now pay every farmer a subsidy to offset the inevitable loss they make each year. Further, very little of the corn we grow is actually edible.
Plus anything that gets livestock off of corn-based feed is a good thing. It's not natual for these animals to eat corn, in fact it's very bad for them (farmers just don't care because the animal will be killed at the end of the year anyways), and this translates into less healthy food for people. Con-based feed (and the use of corn-based additives in other food) is by far the largest cause of the current obesity crisis.
Plus the world has more food than it needs anyways. The problem is that we'd rather throw it away than give it to starving kids in Africa.
I have traveled through the Panhandle of Texas many times in the last 45 years. I noticed where much wheat used to grow now it is corn. We know corn takes much more water than wheat. Also Lake Meredith has a water level very much lower than it was several years ago. I wonder if the two are connected.
Quote from: deanej on January 27, 2013, 11:32:32 AM
Plus anything that gets livestock off of corn-based feed is a good thing. It's not natual for these animals to eat corn, in fact it's very bad for them (farmers just don't care because the animal will be killed at the end of the year anyways), and this translates into less healthy food for people. Con-based feed (and the use of corn-based additives in other food) is by far the largest cause of the current obesity crisis.
I've always heard that corn-fed beef tastes better than grain-fed beef. I don't know that I have ever eaten beef that I knew had been fed on one food source vs. another.
If we are making more corn than we can use, why are the prices for feedstock, deer corn, & food at the grocery store so blasted high?? :confused: If they (whoever they happen to be) are controlling the amount of corn going on the market so they can inflate the prices have definitely taken a page out of the oil business' playbook. :angry:
Quote from: cjk374 on January 27, 2013, 08:27:53 AM
Quote from: corco on January 27, 2013, 01:31:01 AM
It seems like conservatives and liberals are mostly both anti-ethanol... if for different reasons. I don't get why it's being shoved down our throats.
I have been surprised by this also...but NOT surprised by their lack of effort to reverse it. :verymad:
For those unaware and not to get overly political over this but think of when Iowa has their presidential cauci when compared to the other states....
:no:
:banghead:
Mike
QuoteI noticed where much wheat used to grow now it is corn. We know corn takes much more water than wheat. Also Lake Meredith has a water level very much lower than it was several years ago. I wonder if the two are connected.
And that's part of what i don't get- corn is one of the most environmentally taxing things to grow. It uses a ton of water, is really hard on the soil, leads to awful drainage that fucks up rivers (look at the sediment plume on the Mississippi Delta, for instance) with fertilizer...I'm not some hippie on this sort of thing, it just seems like corn has taken our ag lands hostage for no apparent reason.
Without delving too far into sounding like a hippie...it's weird, there are some very easy steps that could be taken that would yield us a far healthier food supply, not diminish the taste of available food, and do so in a way that doesn't exhaust farmland but those don't get implemented because the profit margin and subsidies would be less.
We want to talk about cutting spending but nobody talks about the insane amount of agricultural subsidy and government control that happens in that industry, and the government control doesn't even act in a way that acts in the interests of its people. I feel like there has to be a way to get out of paying farmers to grow corn that we don't need- if we're going to pay them to grow food/feed/fuel (which we shouldn't), let's pay them to grow things that are actually healthy. I guess it's a relatively boring subject...it's not as sexy (and, honestly, I would suspect not as partisan) as talking about cutting entitlements or defense spending, but it's a massive line item.
Quote from: mgk920 on January 27, 2013, 12:41:00 AM
The ethanol mandate is also causing many food commodity prices to skyrocket (for example, check the recent wholesale market for chicken and especially wings!) due to the price of corn-based feed.
As an asides, the reason for the spike in wing prices is mainly due to the massive demand for the wings:
Chicken Wing Prices Reach Record High (http://gma.yahoo.com/blogs/abc-blogs/chicken-wing-prices-reach-record-high-210433855--abc-news-Recipes.html;_ylt=Ap.Shf7WLwOigw3N0f6W2Ch.oFlH;_ylu=X3oDMTNvN25yYWZxBG1pdAMEcGtnAzhhNGQzYzM1LTUyZTYtMzQxMi1hODgwLTZmZjQxZDNkZTZlNQRwb3MDNARzZWMDTWVkaWFCQ2Fyb3VzZWxNaXhlZExQQ0EEdmVyAzc0NDg2ZTlhLTY2ZjktMTFlMi1iZjdmLWU2YzBlYTFhZWQ4YQ--;_ylv=3)
While the notions of some of the corn crop being diverted to biofuels, and the drought's effect on the market this year have had an effect on the number of chickens out there, the fact is that chicken wings have become massively popular.
What we need are chickens with more than 2 wings.
Quote from: corco on January 27, 2013, 01:49:22 PM
leads to awful drainage that fucks up rivers (look at the sediment plume on the Mississippi Delta, for instance)
Most of that plume is because the river is channeled between two levees to keep it in its channel. If the river were to flood as it naturally wants to do, there'd be far less of a plume. Place the blame for this where it belongs with the USACE.
The corn ethanol debate is interesting, but not exactly what this news is about (see bolded text):
QuoteWASHINGTON – A federal appeals court threw out a federal rule on renewable fuels on Friday, saying that a quota set by the Environmental Protection Agency for incorporating liquids made from woody crops and wastes into car and truck fuels was based on wishful thinking rather than realistic estimates of what could be achieved.
QuoteThe ruling by the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia involved a case brought by the American Petroleum Institute, whose members were bound by the 2012 cellulosic biofuels quota being challenged.
It's true corn ethanol for motor vehicle fuel is a bullshit operation, but that's not what this is about. Cellulosic ethanol is made from wood chips or crop residue (everything we don't eat or make into food). It's a less efficient method of producing ethanol because it takes time and energy to break down the woody material to small enough pieces to facilitate ethanol production.
The best thing for making into ethanol fuels is what they call "switch grass"; a folksy name for whatever grasses just grow on their own if you stop plowing a field. They require no fertilizers, no pesticides, no additional water, not even any real planting in many cases. It's literally the equivalent of mowing your lawn and making moonshine out of the grass clippings. Now the grass is not as energy dense as something like corn or beets or sugar cane, but because you don't have to do anything special to grow it, you come out ahead energy-wise.
At least that's the idea.
Quote from: mgk920 on January 27, 2013, 12:41:00 AM
The ethanol mandate is also causing many food commodity prices to skyrocket (for example, check the recent wholesale market for chicken and especially wings!) due to the price of corn-based feed. This is also a major issue in other countries where corn-based human food is the norm (ie, Mexico), to the point of potentially becoming socially destabilizing.
And DON'T get me started on other major problems with ethanol as an internal combustion engine fuel ingredient.
:banghead:
Mike
Edit: I wanted to talk about cellulosic ethanol and butanol but triplemultiplex beat me at the finish line.
On a off-topic sidenote. I spotted a old article from Popular Mechanics about these fuels http://www.popularmechanics.com/science/4260296 and 2 articles about "gdiesel" who's a blend of diesel fuel with 10% of natural gas. http://news.pickuptrucks.com/2010/04/is-gdiesel-the-diesel-fuel-of-the-future-.html
http://www.motortrend.com/features/consumer/1109_gdiesel_breathrough_diesel_fuel/
QuoteMost of that plume is because the river is channeled between two levees to keep it in its channel. If the river were to flood as it naturally wants to do, there'd be far less of a plume. Place the blame for this where it belongs with the USACE.
Disagree- it's the obscene amount of nitrogen fertilizer runoff that comes from upstream cornfields (which need a ton of fertilizer because corn loves nitrogen) and then phosphorous. Unless you're arguing that the excess nitrogen/phosphorous enters the river as far downstream as Louisiana because of the levees, but that would be a weird argument.
Essentially
QuoteExcess levels of nutrients (nitrogen and phosphorus) and sediment flow through the 31 states that make up the
Mississippi River Basin into the northern Gulf of Mexico, where these pollutants stimulate the development of massive algae blooms. When the algae die, they decompose and in the process rob the water of oxygen and suffocate
all marine life that cannot swim or crawl away fast enough. The Dead Zone forms each spring and lasts through the
summer until the hurricane season arrives in August to break up the zone's swath along the northern Gulf of Mexico.
http://www.ewg.org/files/EWG-Dead-Zone-Factsheet.pdf
I mean, yeah I guess the plume would be lessened if the river could flood, but all the bad effects would still be there, they'd just be in the flooded river. Louisiana would just turn into a salty wasteland, and that would eventually seep into the Gulf anyway, but maybe at a more gradual pace.
I guess the point isn't so much the plume as the fact that we're excessively fertilizing soils so corn can grow, because corn is a resource hog, and since we had to modify the natural water system and tear out wetlands to accommodate cornfields, all that excess shit is going straight into the river, which is bad news all around, if only because now more money is spent on things like water treatment.
In the end corn is cheap, but in order to offset the issues associated with corn growth society has to pump money into other things, so why not spend just as much money to grow crops that may be a bit more expensive to grow, but offer more nutritional value so we don't have to eat as much and can spend less on healthcare and don't cause us to have to do all this environmental mitigation to otherwise maintain our quality of life, and go from there? As far as its use as a fuel...I've said my piece. Let's just continue extracting shale oil for now while we put resources into developing something that's actually environmentally friendly.
Quote from: hbelkins on January 27, 2013, 01:30:28 PM
I've always heard that corn-fed beef tastes better than grain-fed beef. I don't know that I have ever eaten beef that I knew had been fed on one food source vs. another.
Can't speak about beef, but I can say from personal experience that I do not particularly care for grass-fed milk. It tastes earthy rather than milky. Corn-fed milk is superior tastewise, at least IMO.
Quote from: triplemultiplex on January 27, 2013, 04:04:30 PM
It's true corn ethanol for motor vehicle fuel is a bullshit operation, but that's not what this is about. Cellulosic ethanol is made from wood chips or crop residue (everything we don't eat or make into food). It's a less efficient method of producing ethanol because it takes time and energy to break down the woody material to small enough pieces to facilitate ethanol production.
The best thing for making into ethanol fuels is what they call "switch grass"; a folksy name for whatever grasses just grow on their own if you stop plowing a field. They require no fertilizers, no pesticides, no additional water, not even any real planting in many cases. It's literally the equivalent of mowing your lawn and making moonshine out of the grass clippings. Now the grass is not as energy dense as something like corn or beets or sugar cane, but because you don't have to do anything special to grow it, you come out ahead energy-wise.
Indeed. The problem is not ethanol inherently, it's that corn is a poor source material for it. Corn in general is a very inefficient crop - the kernels and the cob are all you do anything with. The husk and the stalk is all waste material. If you could find a way to make ethanol out of those too, then you'd be in better shape. This is where the whole deal of cellulose ethanol comes in. Problem is it's more difficult.
Quote from: Mr_Northside on January 27, 2013, 02:26:12 PM
As an asides, the reason for the spike in wing prices is mainly due to the massive demand for the wings:
Chicken Wing Prices Reach Record High (http://gma.yahoo.com/blogs/abc-blogs/chicken-wing-prices-reach-record-high-210433855--abc-news-Recipes.html;_ylt=Ap.Shf7WLwOigw3N0f6W2Ch.oFlH;_ylu=X3oDMTNvN25yYWZxBG1pdAMEcGtnAzhhNGQzYzM1LTUyZTYtMzQxMi1hODgwLTZmZjQxZDNkZTZlNQRwb3MDNARzZWMDTWVkaWFCQ2Fyb3VzZWxNaXhlZExQQ0EEdmVyAzc0NDg2ZTlhLTY2ZjktMTFlMi1iZjdmLWU2YzBlYTFhZWQ4YQ--;_ylv=3)
While the notions of some of the corn crop being diverted to biofuels, and the drought's effect on the market this year have had an effect on the number of chickens out there, the fact is that chicken wings have become massively popular.
What we need are chickens with more than 2 wings.
The popularity of the chicken wing has to be one of the greatest triumphs of marketing in history. They have managed to take a throwaway part of the chicken and turn it into a delicacy.
I'm still a breast man myself.
Quote from: triplemultiplex on January 27, 2013, 04:04:30 PM
The best thing for making into ethanol fuels is what they call "switch grass"; a folksy name for whatever grasses just grow on their own if you stop plowing a field. They require no fertilizers, no pesticides, no additional water, not even any real planting in many cases. It's literally the equivalent of mowing your lawn and making moonshine out of the grass clippings. Now the grass is not as energy dense as something like corn or beets or sugar cane, but because you don't have to do anything special to grow it, you come out ahead energy-wise.
I think you nailed it.
Quote from: corco on January 27, 2013, 04:37:02 PM
Corn in general is a very inefficient crop - the kernels and the cob are all you do anything with. The husk and the stalk is all waste material. If you could find a way to make ethanol out of those too, then you'd be in better shape. This is where the whole deal of cellulose ethanol comes in. Problem is it's more difficult.
I am not an expert at organic chemistry, but it seems to be that if we can make fuel out of switchgrass, then we might well be able to make it out of corncobs and stalks and other inedible plant matter as well.
Quote from: hbelkins on January 27, 2013, 05:26:28 PM
Quote from: Mr_Northside on January 27, 2013, 02:26:12 PM
As an asides, the reason for the spike in wing prices is mainly due to the massive demand for the wings:
Chicken Wing Prices Reach Record High (http://gma.yahoo.com/blogs/abc-blogs/chicken-wing-prices-reach-record-high-210433855--abc-news-Recipes.html;_ylt=Ap.Shf7WLwOigw3N0f6W2Ch.oFlH;_ylu=X3oDMTNvN25yYWZxBG1pdAMEcGtnAzhhNGQzYzM1LTUyZTYtMzQxMi1hODgwLTZmZjQxZDNkZTZlNQRwb3MDNARzZWMDTWVkaWFCQ2Fyb3VzZWxNaXhlZExQQ0EEdmVyAzc0NDg2ZTlhLTY2ZjktMTFlMi1iZjdmLWU2YzBlYTFhZWQ4YQ--;_ylv=3)
While the notions of some of the corn crop being diverted to biofuels, and the drought's effect on the market this year have had an effect on the number of chickens out there, the fact is that chicken wings have become massively popular.
What we need are chickens with more than 2 wings.
The popularity of the chicken wing has to be one of the greatest triumphs of marketing in history. They have managed to take a throwaway part of the chicken and turn it into a delicacy.
I'm still a breast man myself.
x2! :clap: :thumbsup: :cheers:
Quote from: cjk374 on January 27, 2013, 01:39:38 PM
If we are making more corn than we can use, why are the prices for feedstock, deer corn, & food at the grocery store so blasted high?? :confused: If they (whoever they happen to be) are controlling the amount of corn going on the market so they can inflate the prices have definitely taken a page out of the oil business' playbook. :angry:
Well, regardless of the overall supply/demand issue, the supply is still less, isn't it? Sounds like a great excuse to raise prices...
Quote from: hbelkins on January 27, 2013, 05:26:28 PM
I'm still a breast man myself.
This is a perfect line to take out of context.
Quote from: hbelkins on January 27, 2013, 05:26:28 PM
I'm still a breast man myself.
The context goes for me for more than just chicken! :sombrero: :clap:
Quote from: cpzilliacus on January 27, 2013, 09:20:45 PM
I am not an expert at organic chemistry, but it seems to be that if we can make fuel out of switchgrass, then we might well be able to make it out of corncobs and stalks and other inedible plant matter as well.
Corn is a much 'woodier' plant than grasses, so you run into the inefficiencies of cellulosic ethanol. Somewhat ironic since humans developed corn by selectively breeding a species of grass over millennia. If we humans hadn't been so successful at making corn not like a grass, the crop residue from corn would make ethanol better.
And as of late, around my part of the country, E-85 ethanol has been as much or more than the regular gasoline 10% ethanol blend. So why would anyone pay more to get less gas mileage & less power???
I think what teh gobernment needs to do is pick a year-round fuel blend for the entire country. By mandating a single "eco-friendly" gasoline fuel blend (not including what additives/octanes/detergents the different gas brands add to their final product), I believe we would shave off a few dimes-per-gallon off the fuel prices.
It makes no sense that California must have one type of gasoline that isn't manufactured for the rest of the country if making the air cleaner is the responsibility of the ENTIRE country. :nod:
But states are always able to enact more stringent rules than the federal.