Ethanol subsidies a useless boondoggle

Ethanol is the gift that keeps on giving – but only to corn-growers and opportunistic automakers. For taxpayers, however, it’s a dream that failed and a rat-hole down which our governments keep pouring our tax money. This useless boondoggle must stop.

Last week, CanWest News Service reported on a government memo that says clearly that Ottawa’s costly effort to promote E85 fuel – industry shorthand for 85 per cent ethanol and 15 per cent ordinary gasoline – will do no good.

In fact, we believe the whole push for ethanol – produced mainly from corn in Canada – will bring no actual reductions in total greenhouse gas emissions, but will cost taxpayers $2.2 billion in federal subsidies, plus more from provinces, especially Ontario.
Full story

Suncor rekindles expansion of Sarnia ethanol plant

Suncor Energy Inc (SU.TO) said on Friday it has revived plans for a C$120 million ($111 million) expansion of its Sarnia, Ontario, ethanol plant in another sign the chill in energy investments is easing.

Suncor said the project would double output of the renewable fuel additive to 400 million litres (106 million gallons) a year by late 2010 or early 2011.

The company deferred the project at the start of the year as financial and energy markets skidded. It was initially to have been completed by the end of this year.

Construction will create 350 jobs in the Sarnia-Lambton area of southern Ontario.
Full story

Environmental impact of ethanol fuel overstated, government warned

Ottawa’s push to use high-level ethanol fuel in cars is doing little or nothing to cut Canada’s greenhouse gas emissions nor will it, says a government briefing note prepared for Natural Resources Minister Lisa Raitt and obtained by Canwest News Service.

Moreover, government officials have warned Raitt that giving automakers credits toward new fuel efficiency standards by making cars that can use environmentally friendly E85 fuel will not actually reduce emissions because those cars will never actually use the ‘green’ fuel and will continue to use regular gasoline.
Full story

Ethanol cooperative chair challenges report

Ethanol production has increased the availability of corn in Ontario says Tom Cox chair of the Integrated Grain Processors Cooperative, which operates an ethanol plant in Aylmer, Ontario. This, in response to a report from the George Morris Centre entitled Opening the Throttle and Applying the Brakes , which concludes it is the growth in the ethanol sector that is largely responsible for the struggles in the hog industry here in Ontario.
Full story

Ethanol undermines Canada hog farm rescue

WINNIPEG, Manitoba, Aug 19 (Reuters) – Canada’s rescue plan of the hog industry will fail to save it because the government continues to support ethanol production, the industry’s rival for feed grain supplies, a report by an independent farm research centre said on Wednesday.

The Canadian government said on Saturday it will pay some farmers to stop raising hogs and offer loans to help others restructure. Canada’s hog industry is in crisis, with high feed prices, a buoyant Canadian dollar, fears about H1N1 flu and a U.S. food labelling law making pig farming unprofitable.

A mandate from the Canadian government, starting next year, that oil companies must market fuel with 5 percent renewable content, has spurred rapid expansion of ethanol production. That’s driving up prices of corn and feed wheat, from which ethanol is produced and which farmers feed to cattle and pigs.
Full story

Suzanne van Bommel will not seek Liberal nod in Elgin-Middlesex-London

BELMONT – The next federal election ballot will not feature the name Suzanne van Bommel on it.
The past federal Liberal candidate, van Bommel has made it known that she will not be seeking the nomination for the riding of Elgin-Middlesex-London for an election that could be held as soon as this fall. The long-time Liberal insider in both provincial and federal politics has accepted an extended contract with her current employer, GreenField Ethanol, that will keep her from committing as much time and energy as required to seek public office.

Ethanol worries

The point here is that ethanol can be a big problem for engines, engine systems, certain types of fuel tanks and fuel lines. So as governments, ethanol producers and various proponents promote efforts to increase the amount of ethanol in fuel to 15 per cent from five to 10 per cent now, we should all take a deep breath.
Full story

Ottawa to push ethanol, despite concerns

Ottawa is set to push ahead with a plan to dramatically increase the use of grain-based ethanol, despite growing controversy over the greenhouse gas emissions that result from agricultural practices used to grow the feedstock grains.

Environment Minister Jim Prentice has won cabinet approval to proceed with regulations requiring refiners to include at least 5 per cent ethanol in their gasoline by September, 2010, sources say. A spokesman for Mr. Prentice’s office said the Minister had “nothing to announce” on the issue of ethanol regulations.

The department has invited the industry to a briefing this week in which officials will outline how the government intends to proceed.

Full story

Is wind the next ethanol?

WASHINGTON D.C.: Repeating past mistakes has long been a part of Washington’s energy policy, but Congress used to wait a while before making the same blunder again. Not anymore. New legislation requiring wind energy closely resembles the ethanol mandate that sparked a backlash just last year.
Full story

GreenField Ethanol’s facility in Chatham will get up to $72.8 million in federal funding

GreenField Ethanol's Chatham facility

A major corn-based ethanol plant operating in Ontario since 1998 will get up to $72.8 million in federal funding from an incentive program for renewable fuel production.

Local MP Dave van Kesteren on Friday announced the funding from the federal government’s ecoEnergy for Biofuels program for GreenField Ethanol’s facility at Chatham, Ont.

Full story

Ethanol ‘disaster’ risk for boats

Posted by Ian:
Have posted info on this in the past, but growing evidence that ethanol use in marine engines, generators and off-road vehicles poses hazards. And now more documentation, this time from Sydney, Australia …

Ethanol blend fuel poses a risk for boat owners and is “potentially disastrous” for any vessels that use petrol fuel tanks more than a few years old, industry experts say.

Government and industry adviser Gary Fooks said the blended fuel might be all right for 60 per cent of cars but was a “no-no” for 99 per cent of boats.
Full story

Canada on target to meet 2010 ethanol mandate

Canada currently has 1.4 billion liters in ethanol production capacity, with another 600 million liters under construction – all adding up to the 2 billion liters of ethanol production required to meet the federal government’s five-percent renewable fuels standard (RFS) by 2010.

Canada currently has 15 operating plants with a combined total capacity of approximately 1.4 billion liters.
Full story

Water worries cloud future for U.S. biofuel

Corn ethanol’s future is already muddied by concerns that it requires a substantial amount of energy to produce and that heightened demand makes corn more costly in human food and livestock feed. Now, with climate change concerns mounting and drought becoming more of a problem in many areas, the water-intensive nature of creating ethanol also is a growing concern.
Full story