Ethanol production eats into corn supply for food production.

EPA Puts A Hefty Price on Snack Time

Our Renewable Fuels Rules are Stuck in the Past

By Michael James Barton

 

The Environmental Protection Agency recently released its renewable fuel rules for 2017. Private energy companies will be required to produce at least 18 billion gallons of renewables next year, over half a billion more than this year.
That's a step in the wrong direction. The EPA's renewable policies are badly broken and outdated. This backward looking mandate is failing to meet its goals while driving up everyday costs for working families. It needs to be reformed.
The new renewable production target is housed under the federal Renewable Fuel Standard. The RFS was created in 2005 as part of the Energy Policy Act when policymakers were panicked about America's foreign energy dependence. Domestic production was low, which forced America to rely on unstable or antagonistic regimes for energy.
Boosting renewables, the thinking went, would reduce that dependence.
But times have changed. America is experiencing an unprecedented production boom and is closing in on total energy independence. Daily crude oil production has almost doubled since 2005. And technological innovations like hydraulic fracking have yielded access to huge natural gas reserves; they're now uncovering 80 billion cubic feet of gas per day.
The United States recently became the world's top energy producer. Oil and gas imports are at their lowest levels since the Reagan administration. And U.S. oil reserves now surpass Saudi Arabia and Russia.
So one of the key goals of the RFS is now obsolete. While America is no longer energy dependent, the ethanol lobby and its media echo remain addicted to the cash flow from taxpayers.
The other goal of the RFS was environmental. When burned, renewables supposedly emit fewer carbon emissions than traditional fossil fuels.
But the last decade has proven that renewables aren't so green after all. And ethanol, which constitutes 94 percent of domestic biofuels, is particularly bad.
Most ethanol in the United States comes from corn. However, existing corn field acreage proved insufficient for production targets. So farmers converted forest areas to fields. Between 2008 and 2011, about 8 million acres of wetlands and grasslands were plowed for ethanol production -- that's double the size of the Yellowstone, Zion, Yosemite, and Grand Canyon national parks combined.
This conversion fuels climate change. Farmers burn foliage make more fields. That process itself releases huge amounts of greenhouse gases. 
Ethanol production also contributes to soil erosion. Tilling farmland opens up topsoil to wind and rain. Irrigation runoff does further damage. The Environmental Working Groups estimates that every gallon of ethanol produced destroys 24 pounds of soil.
So the other core justification for the RFS falls because renewables generate significant environmental harms.
Despite obvious flaws, legislators have yet to reform the RFS. And their inaction costs Americans real money. 
Ethanol production eats into corn supply for food production. In 2000, less than five percent of corn was produced for fuel. By 2014, that slice jumped to over 40 percent. Consequently, corn prices for food have steadily risen, driving up the price of corn-derived products like cereal, bread, and potato chips.
The Renewable Fuel Standard is an antiquated policy erected in a radically different energy environment. It shouldn't be raised -- it should be fundamentally reformed.
Michael James Barton is the Founder of Hyatt Solutions and speaks around the country on energy and energy security matters. He previously served as the deputy director of Middle East policy at the Pentagon.

The Caldwell County News

101 South Davis
P.O. Box 218
Hamilton, MO 64644
Phone: 816-583-2116
news@mycaldwellcounty.com

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