energy.agwired.com

Gas prices all over the country are higher than ever – more than 50 cents a gallon from a year ago – and with the latest spike in crude oil prices hitting record levels of more than $82 a barrell, expect those prices to continue to climb.

But KELO-TV in Sioux Falls, South Dakota says while regular unleaded is hitting $2.93 in that town, ethanol is considerably cheaper:

Gas with 10 percent ethanol is more than 20 cents a gallon cheaper and drivers are gobbling it up.

Mark Madeja of AAA South Dakota says, “I think especially in Midwestern area where ethanol is so prevalent, you do have more drivers switching over; regardless of what you might hear about how it affects miles per gallon and fuel economy and those sorts of things.”

We couldn’t find anyone at this service station not filing up with an ethanol blend. And that can be really good for the economy because it has people driving more and spending more money.

Jeff Parker says, “Phenomenal. I don’t know why everybody doesn’t use it.”

Amen to that.

The Renewable Fuels Association is fighting back against the latest report put out by the nation’s livestock and food and meat processing industries that tries to blame ethanol for the rise in corn prices and the harm to consumers.

Renewable Fuels Association President Bob Dinneen has issued the following statement to respond to the latest smokescreen from meat and poultry producers and processors:

“Yet again, America’s big meat and poultry producers are using sky-is-falling rhetoric and fact distortion to mislead consumers.

“The face of agriculture is changing, much to the chagrin of corporate meat and food producers. Farmers, many of them livestock producers as well, are proving that they can continue to feed the world and now help fuel a nation. Unfortunately, big meat and food processors are starting sound a lot like Big Oil. Their solution to our nation’s growing energy and environmental crisis seems to be more oil. Taking a page from the petrochemical industry’s playbook, companies like Tyson’s and Smithfield are seeking to kill the only industry that is viably offering this country a chance to take steps down the path toward greater energy, environmental and economic self-reliance for what one has to assume is their own bottom lines.”

But it’s not just Dinneen who is dismissing the big meat and poultry false claims:

USDA Chief Economist Keith Collins: “Ethanol Not to Blame”

Stenier went on to say, “Global price fluctuations in the grain markets have always existed, although we are for some, like wheat, at historic highs at the moment. It would be somewhat premature to say that pasta costs more because there is biofuel grown in other parts of the world.”

Even ethanol critics aren’t believing the meat industry claims:

Report Says Food and Meat Processors Using “Ethanol Smokescreen” to Raise Consumer Food Prices

The group also notes that, “Now, food and meat processors are using the ethanol smokescreen to justify grocery price increases that are unlikely to decline when corn’s historically volatile price falls.” (www.foodandwaterwatch.org/food/us-farmbill/retail-realities/.)

Finally, one of my favorites is a February 2007 Tufts University study that points out, the broiler chicken industry saved an estimated total of $11.25 billion between 1997 and 2005 by purchasing feed at prices an average of 21 percent below the cost of production. During the same time, the hog industry saved an estimated $8.5 billion with feed prices 26 percent below production costs. Hmmm… think they have any reason to discourage the use of corn as ethanol?

You can get more FACTS about ethanol by going to the RFA’s web site.

Nebraska is becoming one of the leaders in ethanol production and is shipping about 900 million gallons of the biofuel out of state. Since the ethanol industry has not quite figured out how to get the fuel through existing pipelines, long lines of tanker rail cars are the only way to move ethanol around.

This story in the Columbus (NE) Telegraph says how to handle those materials in an emergency situation was the subject of training last week:

With those sorts of concerns in mind, BNSF was among the hosts for a seven-city training tour for emergency responders that pulled into Lincoln for Thursday and Friday sessions along the tracks just west of the Haymarket.

Besides Lincoln Fire and Rescue, Friday’s audience included emergency teams from surrounding towns including Adams, Beatrice, Hickman, Malcolm, Milford and Seward, and others from as far away as Ponca and Winnebago.

The railroad points out that their cars, built like Sherman tanks, are the safest way to transport ethanol… but some past incidents show that rail still has some accidents, and this training will help those emergency and train crews to handle what’s nearly a certainty.