Hillary Clinton and Ethanol

I generally like Hillary Clinton but some of her policies worry me. Her support of ethanol, which sounds as if she is supporting energy independence, the environment and renewable energy, overlooks growing concerns about the ethanol bandwagon; making ethanol from corn is beset with considerable problems and mythologies (see Donkey Path on the 60 Minutes ethanol story). Many of us have spent the last five years criticizing the Bush administration for failing to base their decisions on the facts rather than ideology. Democrats need to be careful not to fall into the same trap. This country clearly needs alternative energy but the alternatives have to make sense.

Robert Rapier (who has his own blog, R-Squared) has done a post on The Oil Drum showing the truly poor results we will get if our country tries to use the E85 version of ethanol (E85, as I understand it, is simply fuel that's 85% ethanol and 15% gasoline):

According to the Bureau of Transportation Statistics, our annual gasoline consumption is up to almost 140 billion gallons. That means on a BTU equivalent basis, converting the entire corn crop into ethanol would amount to 13.4% of our annual gasoline demand. Putting all of that ethanol into the gasoline supply would mean ethanol could comprise 19% of the gasoline supply on a volumetric basis (while consuming all of our corn production). In other words, all of the gasoline in the country could be E19 if we wanted to use 100% of the corn crop. Of course if we only want to turn all of our current exports into ethanol (ignoring the many implications), that would amount to 2.5% of our annual gasoline demand. In that case, E10 could make up about a third of our gasoline supply on a volumetric basis. If we want to convert all of the corn exports into E85, it could make up 3.3% of our total gasoline pool.

Keep in mind that a gallon of ethanol has less energy than a gallon of gasoline. If we stopped using corn for export and stopped using corn for domestic consumption and converted all of it into ethanol, ethanol would only amount to 13.4% of our annual gasoline demand. That's not a long term energy solution though it sounds like a large dent in our near term energy consumption. But it's not. Mr. Rapier gives the bad news (bold emphasis mine):

According to the previously mentioned USDA study, it takes 77,228 BTUs of fossil fuel inputs to make 83,961 BTUs of "green, renewable" ethanol. Ignoring co-products for a moment, that means the created energy was a mere 8% in excess of the input energy. Given that the fossil fuels (primarily natural gas) that went into making the ethanol can usually serve as transportation fuels, the amount of transportation fuel that is displaced is only the 8% that was "created". That means that in reality, using our entire corn crop would only displace 1% of our annual gasoline consumption.

Even if it were feasible to convert our entire corn crop into ethanol (thus ignoring corn as a food source as well as the range of products made from corn), one percent is not a solution, not even a near term solution. We need much better solutions and we don't have one at this time unless we count conservation and better fuel mileage. If we look at ethanol production more as a pollution issue and continue pouring money into ethanol research (this would assume a modest increase in the production of ethanol), that is probably justifiable. But converting our entire economy to E85 at this time makes very little sense. We need major research in all areas of alternative energy and we need the research now.

Given the failures of the Republican Party, Democrats have a golden opportunity to get things right. Hillary Clinton needs to go back to the drawing board. And her staff needs to do their homework.