The Ethanol Debate

Ethanol is a promising new energy source, derived from corn and almost devoid of emissions when used in vehicles. It's easy to modify cars to use this energy source and already available in some pumps and in some vehicles.

However, there are issues that arise when we consider something like ethanol that's causing a debate throughout the scientific and humanitarian community. Ethanol is made from corn, wheat, barley, or sugarcane, all of which are cheap and widely used sources of food. It's a conflict of interest if there ever was one: to use our food to make fuel or our fuel to get food?

Ethanol itself is a pretty straightforward process (1) which, ironically, is remarkably similar to the process used to make beer (I guess alcohol and cars DO mix...just only in the gas tank). It's currently being used by several oil refineries to replace a chemical called MTBE (2), which was commonly used in gas as a way to increase octane ratings and reduce "engine knocking." This has actually been mandated in several areas of the US because MTBE can contaminate water supplies if it's introduced through run-off. Ethanol, being naturally derived, doesn't damage water quality.

Other plants have started producing what's commonly known as E10 ethanol, or a mixture that's 10% ethanol, 80% gasoline, and 10% chemical additives. There are already cars out there that can run on E10 and do. The United States Congress, in 2005, mandated that ethanol production be increased to 7.5 billion gallons by 2012 (3).

But was this decision too hasty (as many congressional decisions are)? The trouble comes when you take a closer look at the consequences of turning a good portion of food into our fuel. According to the Earth Policy Institute , food prices around the world have seen a huge jump in prices that is severely affecting poor nations and industrialized alike:

"In mid-January, corn was trading over $5 per bushel, close to its historic high. And on January 11th, soybeans traded at $13.42 per bushel, the highest price ever recorded. All these prices are double those of a year or two ago.

As a result, prices of food products made directly from these commodities such as bread, pasta, and tortillas, and those made indirectly, such as pork, poultry, beef, milk, and eggs, are everywhere on the rise. In Mexico, corn meal prices are up 60 percent. In Pakistan, flour prices have doubled. China is facing rampant food price inflation, some of the worst in decades.

In industrial countries, the higher processing and marketing share of food costs has softened the blow, but even so, prices of food staples are climbing. By late 2007, the U.S. price of a loaf of whole wheat bread was 12 percent higher than a year earlier, milk was up 29 percent, and eggs were up 36 percent. In Italy, pasta prices were up 20 percent." (4)

The numbers are pretty staggering, but it makes sense. Corn, grain, and sugarcane are some of the most central foods to every diet, whether you eat tacos or chow mein. With industrialized countries clamoring for alternative energy and seeing ethanol as the ultimate solution, of course more farmers are going to see profit in selling their crops for fuel rather than food. With rising gas prices, distillers can pay more for corn and still make it cheaper than oil.

Increase in land used for corn sold for ethanol also takes available land away from other crops such as soybeans or grazing fields for cows. Corn is also not a very good crop for soil or water quality, leeching nitrogen into soil communities and water sources. One article says that enough corn to produce 15-36 billion gallons by 2022 would increase nitrogen content in the Mississippi by 10-15% (5).

Even more disturbing is the fact that recent studies have shown that because of land conversion issues such as turning old growth forests into farmland, and unsustainable farming practices, ethanol production could actually cause an INCREASE in greenhouse gases (6).

Another article from Logical Science explains in even more depth how corn-based ethanol is potentially unsustainable (7).

So what does this mean for the future of energy independence? Personally, I think ethanol will play a role in our journey toward sustainable energy development, but it shouldn't be held up as the be-all-end-all. If anything, it should be the poster child for how complicated this issue is. Not only that, it should be used as a lesson that has the potential for opening the door to a closer look at how sustainable our entire economy is.

As far as energy goes, I believe that the core of any sustainable energy policy should be energy conservation and research. THAT is the short-term solution that everyone's scrambling for, not offshore drilling, not drilling in ANWR, and certainly not relying on another potentially unsustainable energy source.

(1) http://www.ethanolrfa.org/resource/made/
(2) http://www.seco.cpa.state.tx.us/re_ethanol_mtbe.htm
(3) http://www.businessweek.com/technology/content/may2006/tc20060519_225336...
(4) http://www.earth-policy.org/Updates/2008/Update69.htm
(5) http://www.pnas.org/content/105/11/4513.abstract
(6) http://www.ucsusa.org/clean_vehicles/fuel_economy/land-use-and-biofuels....
(7) http://www.logicalscience.com/technology/bad/Ethanol.html