Until recently, the world once believed that fossil fuels would supply their respective nation with an endless amount of energy. However, faced with the reality of depleting reserves along with the backlash over pollution and global warming, countries felt obligated to experiment with alternative energy sources. Ethanol was at one time, hailed as the United States’ revolutionary replacement to crude oil. Almost a decade later, the American public is still largely uninformed with the complications associated with switching to ethanol. The most controversial aspect surrounding ethanol is using corn as the source. In addition, the actual and incidental costs of producing ethanol reach deeper than just refining corn into fuel. Finally, looking at ethanol itself will show how problematic and destructive this fuel really is when blended with gasoline. Ethanol is not a practical alternative fuel source and the United States needs to abandon detrimental ethanol legislation to safeguard food stocks and remove this destructive fuel from the pumps.
Most people can easily relate a price increase of corn products when every year, more corn is diverted to refineries. However, corn used for general human consumption in the form of starches, sugar, syrups, cooking oils, etc. only make up 12 to 15 percent of the crop. Prior to the ethanol boom, seventy-five percent of all the corn produced in the United States fed livestock consisting primarily of cows, hogs, and chickens (Magness and Markle Par 9). Faced with rising feed prices every year due to the short supply and high demand of corn, livestock farmers have passed those costs on to the consumer. Consumers are directly affected, whether at the checkout line with groceries or sitting down at a re...
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...ates needs to abandon detrimental ethanol legislation to safeguard food stocks and remove this destructive fuel from the pumps. The growing of corn to produce ethanol releases chemicals into the environment, takes a lot of coal and natural gas energy to process into a useable fuel, and causes unwanted wear and tear within the equipment that burns it. Modern biofuels are not a suitable long-term solution for any developed nation. Additionally, the idea of diverting a heavily relied on food source to refineries could have disastrous results when crop production is weather reliant. A couple consecutive, dry, unproductive years could result in a considerable food shortage. Unless United States creates a more efficient way to produce biofuels as well as invent a way to influence the weather, ethanol legislation should be reversed and production for blending should cease.
The U.S. government spends billions of dollars every year subsidizing corn production, livestock feed, processed foods, and ethanol production account for the greatest uses of corn in the United States. Supplying the livestock and processed food industries with cheap corn ultimately leads to an American diet that is heavily based on the consumption of meat and sugary processed foods. This diet is thought to contribute to America’s obesity epidemic. Corn subsidies also encourage production of ethanol. Ethanol may be no better than fossil fuels because of the required energy inputs and the environmental damage caused by its production.
In the New York Times article “When a Crop Becomes a King”, author Michael Pollan argues there is an overproduction of corn that does more harm than it does good. He writes this in response to a farm bill signed by then President Bush to increase the budget for corn production which caused much controversy. Pollan uses an infuriated and frustrated tone in order to convince American consumers that corn has taken over their environment and economy. Michael Pollan uses rhetorical strategies to challenge conventional views of corn and to argue against additional corn production.
In doing so, the industry has effectively implanted an industrialized system which is, in part, a reason for its ability to offer ‘abundance, accessibility, and affordability’; the industry has been equally prosperous in cultivating and maintaining such a system. America’s agriculture has grown in scale, fully utilized biotechnology, and mechanized, which leads to questions for the consumer as well as demands for the industry leaders. This is due to the symbiotic relationship Walmart has with its consumers, they are able to offer lower prices in more locations and consumers desire affordability and proximity. Despite the obvious dominance of the economy by Walmart, less conventional producers and consumers are present and on the rise.
this notion of stable supply and demand affected prices of farm commodities. “Low prices on
...nergy from an acre of Iowa farmland. Unfortunately, for more than fifty years, farm policies is designed to encourage the overproduction of this crop and hardly any other. It simply because the government subsidize high-fructose corn syrup in this country. While the surgeon general is warning the epidemic of obesity, our government is still signing bills encouraging the river of cheap corn flowing. It is clearly shown that food production in America is partly a mixture of politic, economic and morality.
Currently, the United States is the largest producer of corn in the world. In 2010, it produced 32% of the world’s corn crop. Corn is grown on approximately 400,000 U.S. farms, showing the importance of corn in the United States’ diets. Twenty percent of the corn produced is exported and corn grown for grain accounts for almost one quarter of the harvested crop acres in this country (National Corn Grower's Associatio...
A counter argument to the conclusion that we should not trust nor buy from our food industries could be the obvious reason that food is cheaper than ever before. When times are hard in America, we can always count on the cheap price of our fast food restaurants and their dollar menus. However, these cheap prices come at a high cost. The reason meat or grains, for example, are so cheap, is due to subsidizing the market. While this may be great for consumers, it is actually incredibly harmful to local farmers. Artificially driving down the prices
...self to not be such a good place for hard earned taxpayer money. It shows great signs of reducing of automobile pollution, decreased foreign oil dependency as well as steps towards being a greener society. On the reverse, the implicated price would be significantly higher, at a starting price of $3.95 per gallon, the induced miles per gallon in FFVs takes a huge hit and are the miles per gallon are significantly lower which would lead to an even higher estimated cost for consumers. Not to mention the production of corn ethanol draws a net negative energy loss due to ethanol’s weak energy output. This all meaning that more money goes in to get less energy out. Over all, ethanol is a great idea in the mindset of moving towards a greener society and becoming self-sustainable as a country, but proves to be a negative investment choice as far as a government subsidy.
Ethanol production was developed in hopes of severing our ties with fossil fuels in favor of alternative energy, such as biofuels. Although, VOCs emissions are released during production of ethanol in a factory, the quality of air is greatly improved when burning ethanol versus fossil fuels. Burning ethanol instead of fossil fuels reduces the amount of cancer-causing greenhouse gases that go into the atmosphere. Ethanol production ranks at the bottom of industrial water usage, but is still not out of the woods with the abundance of water usage needed in corn feedstock and ethanol manufacturing and processing facilities. Many acres of land are needed to grow corn crops, however, many corn farmers are successful in growing more corn on less acreage.
Given the amount of resources that the world as a whole has access to why use corn as a source of fuel? Some would say that countries, such as the United States have an overabundance of food produce. Logically, those countries that have an over surplus of food MUST have enough to put a dent into the rapidly increasing costs of oil and gasoline. Unfortunately, that is a misconception. In order to produce enough corn to fuel the global economy it is important to analyze what that actually means for farmers and the government, not to mention the actual food supply. In order to produce corn ethanol, we must first grow an abundance of corn. Simple right? Wrong, corn is very draining on the soil it is grown, which, in short, means that whomever is growing the corn would have to rotate the corn plantation with something that will restore the nutrients of the soil. Unfortunately, that takes both time and money to do. The task would cal...
Selling corn in massive quantity can lead to a greater profit. An ear of corn may averages about eight-hundred kernels in sixteen rows and a pound of corn consists of approximately 1,300 kernels. One-hundred bushels of corn makes approximately 7,280,000 kernels. Every year, a single U.S. Farmer may provides food and fiber for 129 people in the U.S. and 32 overseas. In the U.S., corn production is 2 times that of any other crop. Over 55% of Iowa’s corn goes to foreign markets and the rest is used in other parts of the United States of America.
Corn took over American farmlands at the end of World War II, when a new synthetic fertilizer was introduced and manufactured by former munitions factories. It allowed for the elimination of crop rotation, leading to the switch from family farms to the corn monoculture. Economically, this system seems to make more sense, but it destroyed the once sustainable, sun-driven fertility cycle. Now, farmers are trapped into making more and more corn by government policy. As the abundance of the crop causes prices to fall, farmers must plant even more in order to make ends meet, surviving off constantly decreasing government subsidies. What’s worse is that the New Deal system that allowed corn farmers to stay afloat has since been dismantled in an effort to lower food prices and increase production without considering the farmers
Pollack, P. L. (n.d.). Consumer Demand for Fruit and Vegetables: the U.S. Example, United States Department of Agriculture. Retrieved Nov. 22, 2011, from http://www.ers.usda.gov/publications/wrs011/wrs011h.pdf
...her combination of intoxicant. There are several better plants to use, sugar cane and algae all produce far more ethanol than corn does. Keep in mind that running on electric sometimes is better than running on gas all of the time, But to see for yourself go down to the car dealership and ask for yourself.
The concept of this essay is to stress that biofuels are a viable and sustainable energy source than fossil fuels, showing its advantages but not ignoring its disadvantages which also enlightens us about the cleaner and renewable natural resources. Biofuels is an alternative source of energy which can end the global dependence on fossil fuels.