[Terrapreta] evil ethanol

[lou gold]

I think that we understood that Michael but it was a good opportunity to
point out the distortions and dislocations and inefficiencies promoted by
the subsidies to corn ethanol. The point was that the shift to corn was
raising the price of other crops such as soybeans.



On Thu, Apr 24, 2008 at 7:48 AM, Michael Bailes <michaelangelica at gmail.com>
wrote:

>  *Corn ,The "evil' ethanol producer**" had risen the least. *
> I meant that comment to be sarcastic or ironic or something. Certainly not
> to be taken literally
> Although you will see so much about the "evils" of bio-fuels on websites
> such as *Care2 *and *Permaculture Forms*
>
> I started this discussion some time ago on Hypography
>
> http://hypography.com/forums/terra-preta/11716-what-plants-might-grown-just-bio.html
> .
> It seems to me there are many opportunities for growing a wide variety of
> plants that do not compete with food plants.
> *
> I also suspect that a lot of the hysteria about ethanol and biofuels is
> being 'fuelled' by Big Oil.*
> * When you can make bio-fuel for $65 a barrel rather than $115 for oil you
> can see bio-fuels are a threat to Big Oil.*
>  Bio-fuel production is spread among thousands of farmers and producers
> not centralised into the hands of 5-6 Big Oil companies. Big Oil must be
> scared stiff by that.
>
> *ALSO*
> Last night the ABC News ran a segment  the NY stock exchange and food
> prices.
> . Money, they said, was flowing into food futures at an ever increasing
> rate (One BILLION a day now) as the stock market and the housing market had
> lost their appeal to Fund Managers and other Investors.
> It seems to me this is one of many reasons food prices are going up.
>
> Michael
> 2008/4/23 Gerald Van Koeverden <vnkvrdn at yahoo.ca>:
>
>  I get weary of reading of "evil ethanol".  Ethanol is merely a symptom,
> > albeit a knee-jerk reaction to rising drilled oil and natural gas costs.
> >  The dramatic rise in cost of these natural commodities beginning a few
> > years ago, meant that all at once it was cheaper to burn corn, wheat, etc.
> > in boilers than buy gas and oil.  In fact, at $2/bushel corn, heat could be
> > produced at half the cost of natural gas.  As agricultural commodity experts
> > predicted at that time, the cost of these commodities would rise to at least
> > equal its value as heating fuel.
> >
> > Its the unaturally high price of natural gas and oil that is distorting
> > the world economy.
> >
> > If you want to calculated the relative cost of heating with different
> > materials, just plug the present values into the following exel sheet:
> >
> >
> > http://pikul.lib.ku.ac.th/www/thes_th_adv.php?term=%CB%AD%E9%D2%BE%A7&sort=alphabatic&browse=%E0%C3%D5%C2%A1%B4%D9&opt=exact
> >
> > Gerald
> >
> > On 22-Apr-08, at 8:57 AM, Michael Bailes wrote:
> >
> >  Corn ,The* "evil' ethanol producer*" had risen the least.
> >
> >
> >
> Michael the Archangel
> How strange and sad for the species - have people forgotten that they can
> always escape to the fairy dell and talk to the ducks?
> -Leunig, 2008
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