Ethanol organizations received a Government Accounting Office report on biofuels this week with mixed reviews. On the plus side, the GAO report indicated that using indirect land use change to evaluate the lifecycle greenhouse gas emissions for biofuels under the Renewable Fuel Standard may be difficult due to uncertainty in how that can accurately be measured. According to the report, …
Ethanol May Be Innocent in Baltimore Police Car Problems
Baltimore police may have charged the wrong suspect in the crime of disabling city cop cars last week. A Baltimore Sun blogger is now reporting that the gasoline supplier, IsoBunkers, conducted its own tests and “found the gas was 10 percent ethanol — just what it was supposed to be.” In a story that went nationwide, Baltimore city officials blamed …
Ethanol Co-Product Demand in China
The U.S. Grains Council’s (USGC) Annual China Corn Tour currently underway is finding big demand for the ethanol co-product distillers dried grains for livestock feed in that country. According to Cary Sifferath, USGC Senior Director in China, drought conditions in China this year have led to high corn prices. “Those high prices have led to some opportunities for US feed …
Wisconsin Corn Ethanol Sponsors Lung Walk
Wisconsin’s corn ethanol industry is putting on the green and walking for clean air at Milwaukee’s annual Lung Walk October 4 at the Milwaukee County Zoo and is offering free Green Team T-shirts to everyone who joins them. The walk is a major fund-raising event that helps the ALA, the oldest nationwide voluntary health agency in the United States, fight …
Ethanol Plants Left Out of Greenhouse Gas Reporting
The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) issued final regulations for the nation’s first greenhouse gas reporting system to begin in 2010, but ethanol plants have been removed from the initial list of facilities required to report emissions. The regulations require large emitters of heat-trapping emissions to begin collecting greenhouse gas (GHG) data under the new program which will cover approximately 85 …
ACE Responds to Ethanol Attack Ad
The American Coalition for Ethanol (ACE) is calling claims made by an advertising campaign against ethanol by a coalition food and oil company groups “half-baked.” “If the products sold to consumers by Big Food are as half-baked as their ethanol claims, we have a life-threatening food safety crisis in America,” stated Brian Jennings, Executive Vice President of ACE. “Never before …
Farmers Become Guardians of Ethanol Plant
A group of farmer-owned ethanol plants in Minnesota, Iowa and Nebraska have teamed up become the guardians of a former VeraSun facility in Janesville, Minn. Guardian Energy is a joint venture between ethanol plants in Little Falls, Benson, Claremont, and Winthrop, Minnesota as well as Mason City, Iowa and Minden, Nebraska that last week closed on the purchase of the …
Ethanol Group Finalizing Comments to EPA
The Renewable Fuels Association today released comments to be filed with the Environmental Protection Agency regarding proposed regulations to implement the expanded renewable fuel standard (RFS) program enacted by Congress in the Energy Independence and Security Act (EISA) in 2007. “Reducing America’s dependence on foreign oil was part of the Energy Security Act, providing economic opportunity and job creation and …
EPA Admits Uncertainty in Indirect Land Use
A group of Midwest senators led by Senator Tom Harkin (D-IA) dropped an amendment to appropriations legislation that would have prohibited the EPA from spending funds to include international indirect land use change (ILUC) emissions in the implementation of the Renewable Fuels Standard (RFS). Sen. Harkin withdrew his amendment after receiving a letter from EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson that promised …
Proposed EPA Regs Would Cost Corn Growers
A study commissioned by the National Corn Growers Association finds that proposed regulations by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency to implement the expanded Renewable Fuel Standard would cost the ethanol industry as much as $420 million a year. The study found that the up-front cost to the ethanol industry for compliance with the new regulations could total $30 million, with …