The Next American Idol:
Corn-Based Ethanol
Environmentalists bash corn-based ethanol for its many green transgressions, so why is it the current pop darling among those building cars and spending taxes?
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| Illustration by Chris Nititham |
America is a car culture. People drive to destinations six blocks away when walking or biking would no doubt be faster, if not more environmentally friendly. They do this despite knowing there is an oil crisis and a global warming crisis.
These damning proclamations are becoming the clichés of “doom and gloom” environmentalists. But Americans have a keen ability to look on the bright side, and alternative fuels are the florescent lighting of their dependence on fossil fuels.
One of the most popular alternative fuels is corn-based ethanol. It is produced, at least right now, primarily from corn grown right here in the United States. There is a great debate raging about ethanol’s Energy Return On Investment (EROI), a statistic commonly used to determine whether an alternative form of energy is worth producing. The EROI calculates how much fossil fuel energy is required to produce an equal amount of, in this case, ethanol.
As the debate narrows, and as ethanol production becomes more politically expedient, the evidence seems to point to the impossible fact that technology lets us end up with more energy than we have to input.
But that’s only half the story. This and other debates all must answer to quantity and availability. Without enough ethanol, debates over whether it is a clean fuel are moot. The fact is, according to a recent study by the University of Minnesota — Twin Cities, if all U.S. corn crops were used for fuel instead of food, they would still only produce enough fuel to replace 11 percent of the gasoline demand.
Yet, in a recent speech, Tom W. LaSorda, president and CEO of the Chrysler Group, said: “We plan to sell more than 250,000 ethanol flex-fuel vehicles in 2007. And we plan to nearly double that number to about one-half million in 2008, including both fleet and retail sales. That’s roughly 25 percent of our total production that we’re committed to making capable of running on ethanol blended fuels.”
LaSorda isn’t the only one. President Bush touted biofuels in his State of the Union speech in January of this year. General Motors has an entire Web site and advertising campaign that builds from the slogan “Live Green, Go Yellow,” meaning that environmentally-friendly consumers should purchase flex-fuel vehicles that can run on E85 (a blend of 85 percent ethanol and 15 percent gasoline).
In short, ethanol is the current pop darling among those building our cars and spending our tax money.
It is true that using ethanol in some measure can reduce our dependence on foreign oil and reduce greenhouse gas emissions. But even if we had a limitless supply of corn to make ethanol, it would come with major drawbacks, including:
- Reduced gas mileage because it has a lower energy content than gasoline (75,670 British Thermal Units (BTUs) vs. 115,400 BTUs, respectively);
- The need for more infrastructure because it can taint gasoline during traditional pipeline transport;
- Increased pollution from pesticides, which are petroleum-based products used heavily in corn cultivation; and,
- Ethical questions about the food supply, as whenever the demand expands for ethanol, it becomes less likely that people who already struggle to buy food will be able to buy corn-based products. As Lester Brown, a contributor to the Washington Post and the head of the World Watch Institute, said: “The grain required to fill a 25-gallon SUV gas tank with ethanol would feed one person for a full year.”
So ethanol is not a silver bullet, but it is all the rage. Why is ethanol the only household name in alternative fuels?
There are four possible reasons why ethanol is at the top of the alternative fuels agenda: 1.) Automakers reap the benefits of greenwashing, 2.) Politicians love agricultural topics, 3.) Entrepreneurs make a lot of money on the ethanol industry, and 4.) Consumers find it to be a simple solution to a complex problem.
Automakers: The Big Three
While GM, Ford and Chrysler don’t need more criticism in their dark hour, it bears mention that ethanol technology has been with us since 1896, when Henry Ford designed his first automobile to run on ethanol. In fact, the 1908 Model T was the first flexible fuel vehicle.
U.S. taxpayers have subsidized ethanol fuel since 1978, so ethanol is an off-the-shelf technology that does not require much ingenuity to get off the ground and into a new Taurus. This fact is reinforced by Michelle Kautz, director of communications for the National Ethanol Vehicle Coalition, who said that her organization advocates for ethanol use because it is here right now, and there are already flexible-fuel vehicles on the road.
But there is something much sweeter at play than the crude that flows through our fuel lines. Auto makers get Corporate Average Fuel Economy (CAFÉ) credits for building flexible-fuel vehicles, whether or not we ever fill up with E85. That means they can keep on building those big SUVs and offset the gas-guzzling numbers ascribed to them by also building cars with flex-fuel technology.
Politicians: Kissin’ Babies & Lovin’ Farmers
All politicians with executive aspirations know that the home vote must be courted in Iowa, where corn is popular, the Iowa Corn Growers Association is a powerful political lobby and candidates for President are made or broken at the country’s first caucus.
Iowans know that the corn they grow is essentially a subsidized fuel source with the potential to bring millions of government dollars into the local economy, and the politicians seeking their votes know they have to take the “ethanol pledge” to survive their campaign.
Ethanol subsidies buy refineries to turn corn into ethanol, which equals more jobs and higher profits for corn growers — the U.S. Department of Agriculture estimates a 24 percent price increase per bushel in 2006 compared to 2005. Plus, while Iowa and other Midwestern states aren’t usually the first places manufacturers look to establish facilities, they are prime real estate for the ethanol industry. As Wells Fargo economist Michael Swanson said: “If you’re in rural Iowa right now, there is no other industry that can bring along a $125 million plant.”
If corn equals ethanol, and ethanol equals manufacturing jobs, and both corn and ethanol equal high government subsidies, what politician wouldn’t like them?
Entrepreneurs: The Money Trail
Where there are subsidies, there are investment bankers. So it goes for ethanol. Currently, ethanol subsidies are $0.51 per gallon through 2010. These subsidies enable a lot of people to make money producing ethanol, especially as technological improvements over the past 30 years have made it more economically feasible to produce.
Companies such as Archer Daniels Midland (ADM), and even Monsanto (the company that brought you DDT) have their hands in ethanol production. A recent article by the New York Times even credited the former CEO of ADM, Dwayne Adams, as a founding father of ethanol subsidies.
Subsidies thus make ethanol a timely investment opportunity for some of the world’s largest corporations. There is nothing wrong with making a profit on environmentally-friendly solutions — but only when the solutions make sense.
Consumers: For the Love of the Car
Americans love SUVs and, as stated at the beginning of this article and 1,000 times before, Americans love to drive. By marketing large SUVs to Americans that are “flexible fuel,” and can run on E85, consumers probably feel a little better about their contribution to the environment. It is a simple solution:
- SUV owner likes his SUV
- SUV owner is tired of high gas prices and hearing that using so much gas might be contributing to global warming
- SUV owner wonders if she should give up their SUV
- The auto industry says no, they shouldn’t. In fact, what they should do is get rid of it and buy a new SUV that runs on E85, a renewable resource grown right here in the USA.
This chain of logic is what our consumer society is based upon. “[Industrial] design was specifically invented to convince people that the washing machine, the car or the refrigerator they had was out of fashion,” said Walter R. Stahel, an economist at the Product-Life Institute in Conches, Switzerland.
In other words, Americans deal with new problems by creating new products to solve them. And ethanol, in this case, is the new product that “solves” the global warming problem in many consumers’ eyes. They can have their cake (their SUV) and eat it, too (“help” the environment by using ethanol).
The Future Isn’t Here Yet
General Motors wants to produce viable hydrogen cars by 2011, according to Bob Lutz, a GM executive. Other automakers are also working on exciting solutions, such as hybrid clean diesel engines and even cellulosic ethanol, which can be made from a wide variety of plants and even utilizes a chemical already in the plants as a fuel source to produce the fuel.
But these solutions aren’t ready for 2006. If you go to your local auto showroom, you can get some hybrid models, a few flexible fuel models, one or two diesels (that don’t yet meet emissions standards for all 50 states, unless you can afford an E-class Mercedes), but mostly good old gasoline vehicles.
Being environmentally friendly is, and has always been, about using less before you use as much of a substitute. And that, ultimately, is where ethanol breaks down.
It just isn’t a silver bullet.
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Rich Grogan is a Ph.D. student in the media and information studies program at MSU. He plans to focus his research on multiple aspects of the development of new alternative fuels and can be reached at groganri@msu.edu. He also wrote the nature essay in this issue.
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