Obama Touts "Clean Energy Economy"

(AP)  The Obama administration renewed its commitment Tuesday to speed up investments in ethanol and other biofuels while seeking to deflect some environmentalists' claims that huge increases in corn ethanol use will hinder the fight against global warming.

President Barrack Obama directed more loan guarantees and economic stimulus money for biofuels research and told the Agriculture Department to find ways to preserve biofuel industry jobs. The recession, as well as lower gasoline prices, has caused some ethanol producers to suffer, including some who have filed for bankruptcy.

Obama said an interagency group also would explore ways to get automakers to produce more cars that run on ethanol and to find ways to make available more ethanol fueling stations. "We must invest in a clean energy economy," Obama said in a statement.

The reassurances to the ethanol industry came as the Environmental Protection Agency made public its initial analysis on what impact the massive expansion of future ethanol use could have on climate change. Rejecting industry and agricultural interests' arguments, it said its rules - which will take months to develop - will take into account increased greenhouse gas emissions as more people plant ethanol crops at the expense of forests and other vegetation and land use is influenced worldwide by the demand for biofuels.

When Congress in 2007 required a huge increase in ethanol use - to as much as 36 billion gallons a year by 2022 - it also required that ethanol - whether from corn or cellulosic crops like switchgrass or wood chips - have less of a "lifecycle" impact on global warming than does gasoline. It set the threshold at 20 percent climate-pollution improvement for corn ethanol and 60 percent for cellulosic ethanol, although ethanol made from facilities already operating would be exempt.

EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson said the analysis shows corn ethanol emitting 16 percent less greenhouse gases than gasoline, even taking into account global future land-use changes.

But that's true in only in one of the scenarios the EPA examined; another showed corn ethanol would account for 5 percent more greenhouse gases than gasoline. The scenario Jackson cited assumes future environmental benefits over a period of 100 years will more than pay back the initial increase in greenhouse gases from land use changes.; the second assumes a shorter payback period of 30 years.

Frank O'Donnell, president of Clean Air Watch, an advocacy group, said the Obama administration was "walking a tightrope" to try to reconcile the expansion of corn ethanol with its determination to address climate change aggressively. He called the assumption of a 100-year ethanol payback to make up for early greenhouse emission increases "nothing but an accounting trick to make corn ethanol look better."

But environmentalists also praised the EPA for making clear it will take into account worldwide land-use changes in assessing ethanol's climate impacts. "The devil is always in the details, but we're pleased that the EPA proposed rules that would require all global warming pollution from biofuels to be taken into account," said Kate McMahon of Friends of the Earth.

The ethanol industry and farm-state members of Congress had wanted only a comparison of direct emissions, which show ethanol as the clear winner, but welcomed the EPA's promise to examine the issue further.

"There is currently no scientific agreement or certainty to quantify domestically produced ethanol impacts on land use change," argued Roger Johnson, president of the National Farmers Union, responding to the EPA assessment.

Jackson said that as the EPA develops its regulation it will seek out peer-reviewed scientific views on the issue and make its final determination "based on the best science available."

[paddyhayes]

Speaking of drilling in ANWR...

I was just wondering if any of you planet raping right-wing extremists have heard of the NPR-A?

The National Petroleum Reserve - Alaska.

It abuts ANWR and sits on the very same oil formation.

If you have to continue the process of making money hand over fist while destroying the planet, why bother whining about ANWR?

Just go down to see your friendly BLM office and get a drilling permit for the NPR-A. No red tape.

[iDragon13]

75% of what "righties" say is either lies or exaggeration. We all know this. Having said that, fuel from corn is a terrible idea. Next.

[quapawsix]

Damn this means we'll have to pay more for taco's at Taco Bell if they increase ethanol production.

[andylance1]

It is really stupid to use food like corn for fuel. It is terrible and raises the price of food commodities. There is a tree that grows in Mexico, Texas, New Mexico and Arizona called a Jatropha tree where the extracted seed oil of the fruit becomes biodiesel.

The government should legalize hemp and grow it everywhere for bio fuels. Hemp can boast a higher oilseed yield than any of today's oilseed crops (soy, canola or safflower).

[hawksprings]

Yes, lets put more and more of our rich farmland into growing not food, but fuel.

Obama looks dumber by the day.

[budmag06]

As the Obama socialists turn their attention to mass taxation and control over all of our energy usage, there is a growing movement of sensible Democrats (who don't get media attention) who propose off-shore drilling in the Gulf. They should be commended for their brave actions. These respectful Democrats actually are actually concerned with welfare of the American middle class. While the US is worrying about whether corn/cornstalk ethanol promotes harmful environmental emissions, China is mass drilling in the Gulf and feeding fuel to Cuba.

[ubrew12]

itsjustathought said: "Maybe you whiners didn't read the headline....OBAMA TOUTS...that's your cue to start the applause. "

Just-a-thought: Never read the headline. Read the lines, and then read between them. The headline is as far from the truth as the media can push it.

I voted for Obama: but his attachment to ethanol reminds me of Bush: nothing good will come of this, and he should be fought on it.

[ubrew12]

Corn is not a good substitute for fuel. Using it as such raises food prices all over the world: people will starve to death so americans can drive around in 'green' cars.

Instead, adopt the Pickens plan: plan windmills in Texas, Oklahoma, etc and use the natural gas saved by wind power to power our cars. This kills two birds with one stone: less CO2 is produced cuz of the use of wind power, and we no longer have to import oil from the Middle East to power our transportation.

Biofuels only work in tropical areas, where year-round growing seasons allow sugar cane in Brazil, for example, to be used economically as ethanol-fuel. Elsewhere, palm oil can be used as fuel, but Indonesia tore up so much of its rainforest for palm oil plantations that they ended up INCREASING the amount of global CO2 released cuz the forest is a much better CO2 sink than the palm oil plantation.

American corn into ethanol is just pork for American farmers, who get alot of pork already. And pork is expensive, someone ends up paying for it. We need energy solutions that actually work. This is not one of them. Maybe for Brazil, or Hawaii, but not for us.

[whitemale08]

Carbon dioxide could never overwhelm oxygen because the two are mutually exclusive; the more carbon dioxide the more trees that need carbon dioxide.

This is all austerity disguised as 'saving the planet' when the true purpose is to make sacrifice for endless bailouts to Warren Buffet at Goldman Sucks.

[jscott418]

The real issue here is we are looking only at one thing greenhouse gases. What about costs to the consumer? This has to be included. Not everyone is a "Tree Hugger" and will spend more because they are saving the earth. Corn prices are just as unpredictable as oil. One bad season and corn will skyrocket! We also have to account for the fact that ethanol has less energy by volume then gasoline. So the more percentage added to gasoline the less fuel mileage you will get. One reason why E85 has not caught on. As gas prices went down it did not make sense to buy E85. I guess in my own opinion we should be working on more fuel efficient engines and not so much what we put into them. We are a ways dow the road yet before electric or any other type of fuel will replace gasoline mostly because of our large distribution system of gasoline and little of anything else. Where is all the capital going to come from to invest in these new fuels? Our government is not hardly in any position to spend any money on pipe dreams. We should think much longer on these fuel changes and look at all aspects of their use. Don't just embrace them because their "GREEN".