America and its attempt to fix a climate that is not broken continues to promote renewable fuel sources for automobiles in the form of corn-based ethanol to the tune of 47% of the world’s ethanol production.
The Renewable fuel Standards RFS program started in 2005 requires transportation fuel to contain a minimum amount of renewable fuels. While the amount varies with the states, the level of 10% seems a standard.
There is much to say about how this program has benefitted the climate, with many saying it has worsened the air and has cost the country water that has degraded with more run off of fertilizer and other chemicals than ever imagined. With corn being the most planted crop over time larger farms have prospered with smaller farms going out of existence.
Forty percent of all corn grown is used to make ethanol. All this corn growth has made Archer-Daniels-Midland $2.7 Billion in profits.
Despite the idea of the DFS reducing greenhouse gas emissions the NAS (National Academy of Science) in a paper has shown that corn cultivation has come at an eye-popping environmental cost. Fertilizer use surged by 3-8% while corn production increased 8.7% (6.9 million acres). All this has polluted our waters by an increase of 3-5% and has increased the greenhouse gas emissions to be equivalent to 24% higher than gas use alone.
RFS has caused corn costs to spike by 30% with soybeans rising by 20%. This has caused every piece of available land to be planted with corn or soybeans. With corn and soybeans rotating over 3 years to preserve the soil, many farmers are skipping the soybeans and causing depletion of once fertile soil.
All previous studies, however, dramatically underestimated the impact of those land use changes where pastureland and conservation tracts were plowed under to reap the money from the program. Another government program, the CRP (Conservation Reserve Program), where the government pays the farmer to keep the land fallow has seen a severe diminution in the voluntary placing of land in the program.
The bottom line is bluntly straightforward. “If you crank up demand, you get land use change.”
Like all money-making opportunities, there has been a rush to take the money while it is still there. With 42 ethanol plants in Iowa, it is the biggest producer of corn and ethanol. Where there is money, politics cannot be far behind.
The convergence of politics and economics generates the biggest lies and the idea of this “saving the planet” and raising employment, has, like all of the same, not lived up to its advanced billing with 46,000 jobs promised, has at most 7,500 overall.
We currently use over one-third of the corn we produce for biofuel, and it offsets 6 percent of gas use. We could get the same benefit by increasing the fuel economy of cars from 22 to 24 miles per gallon.
This spectacularly inefficient corn to ethanol converts 0.15 percent of solar energy into usable energy, while a solar cell today converts 15 to 20 percent of sunlight to energy.
Okay, enough. We don’t grow corn, but this is not about corn; it is about houses. We are fully enmeshed in a rush to pave over every acre of buildable land, each piece given dispensation to increased density. We are using the “Builders” the construction industry version of Archer-Daniels-Midland, to wring a one-time RFS-like conversion of farmland into productive domiciles and productive communities.
Yes, and like the idea of doing something for somebody, the land and water are being polluted. We are told we have the right to develop our property, but the local government does not understand that “over time” we all see what God Has Wrought.
All good ideas have a devil in the details and when those elected must learn their job from others who have an agenda, the hired “experts,” they are on shaky ground.
No community or government can live on ad valorem taxes. None. So, whether you are making ethanol from corn or planting houses, there is “No there, there.” While the RFS will continue to fuel America’s addiction of trying to fit 10 lbs. in a 5 lb. bag, once we plant a house, it is permanent until the land becomes more valuable than the house.
As we reap what we sow, it is those who suffer the weeping and the gnashing of teeth paying for it all.
By Dr. Richard Pitz