- American-produced corn for biofuel has added more than $6.5 billion to the food import bills of developing countries
- cattle farmers are feeding cows candy instead of corn, corn goes for about $315 a ton, ice-cream sprinkles $160 a ton
- energy from crops has driven up food prices and hunger as well as spuring enormous corporate land grabs in poor countries
- history shows that rising food prices have been a significant contributor to global unrest, social upheaval, and even war
- a world shortage of pork and bacon next year is now unavoidable," according to an industry trade group
- the EPA requiring some gas stations to sell at least four gallons of gasoline at a time, the theory is the four-gallon minimum would dilute any residual E15 remaining in the hose enough to keep it from damaging small engines
- ethanol from corn actually increases the greenhouse gases in the atmosphere at a higher rate than gasoline, yet, the U.S. uses taxpayer money at a rate of $10 to $30 billion each year in farm subsidies
- the UN is now pleading with the U.S. to suspend its ethanol mandate — to prevent food price poverty
- the EPA has determined there is enough biofuels made from non-food products to meet the renewable fuel standard for 2012 (WHAT!?!)
- to make US produced ethanol competitive here at home, producers in this country get a 45-cent-per-gallon federal subsidy but a 54-cent-per-gallon tariff imposed on foreign imports (that means foreign producers can make it, and ship it here, for a dollar cheaper than we can produce it at home… still think you’re not getting screwed?)
- the power density of ethanol is so low that in 2011, to produce a quantity of motor fuel whose energy equivalent was just 6-tenths of one-percent of total global oil consumption, the American corn-ethanol sector had to convert a mind-boggling 4.9 billion bushels of grain into ethanol… more corn than the combined outputs of the European Union, Mexico, Argentina, and India
- under US law, 40% of the corn harvest must be used to make biofuel… even after the crop as been dramatically reduced by drought
- according to a January 23, 2012 Center for Scientific Review report, supposed benefits of the Renewable Fuels Mandate have not appeared… our dependence on foreign oil hasn't been reduced at all, and there is no evidence that the ethanol has lowered energy prices
Should I go on? I have more… much more, such as…
Federal regulations demands oil refiners use millions of gallons cellulosic ethanol (made from wood chips, corn cobs, switch grass and whatnot), but it doesn’t exist in those quantities because the technology for mass-producing cellulosic ethanol hasn't been perfected. This hasn’t stopped the Environmental Protection Agency from
imposing hefty yearly fines on oil refiners for not using it… which of course, the cost of which is just pass on down to
you!