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WSJ Ethanol Editorial--everyone should read

JamesBailer

New member
Basically poses a lot of the same questions we've been asking for a while.

Ethanol Backlash
November 12, 2007; Page A16
Like water seeping out of the giant High Plains Ogallala aquifer, support for corn ethanol seems to be ebbing in Congress. As political news goes, this is of the miracle variety, but apparently the market distortions caused by ethanol mandates are finally having an impact.
"We're in a strong position," says Senator John Cornyn, the Texas Republican who is blocking a conference on the energy bill because the House version contains billions in new oil taxes to be spent on ethanol subsidies. Meanwhile, in the House, there's opposition to the Senate's mandate to increase ethanol production by 30 billion gallons annually by 2022.
Let's review: the House energy bill taxes oil to subsidize ethanol, drawing Senate opposition, while the Senate bill forces U.S. consumers to buy more ethanol, drawing House opposition. Seems to us that the two chambers could simply agree that expanding on the already enormous subsidies for ethanol is a costly mistake and go home to enjoy Thanksgiving dinner, but we don't pretend to fully understand the ways of Congress.
What we do understand is that opposition to corn-based ethanol from environmentalists has Speaker Nancy Pelosi seeking a rewrite of the Senate's mandate. As the speaker attempts to fashion a stripped-down bill that can move in both houses, the House's tax-and-subsidy scheme for ethanol also doesn't appear to be part of the package. And with good reason.
Last month, the National Academy of Sciences reported on the impact of ethanol production on water supplies. A University of Iowa professor chaired the report committee, so Big Corn might have hoped for a home-court advantage. But NAS reported that, "in some areas of the country, water resources are already significantly stressed . . . Increased biofuels production will likely add pressure to the water management challenges the nation already faces as biofuels drive changing agricultural practices, increased corn production, and growth in the number of biorefineries." When ethanol is criticized by scientists at Iowa's two largest state universities, you have to wonder who is for it.
Meanwhile, investors are figuring out that these government policies are turning water into an increasingly scarce resource on which money can be made. Last week brought news that legendary oilman T. Boone Pickens has purchased 400,000 acres of water rights in the Texas panhandle. This will allow him to dip a straw into the Ogallala aquifer, portions of which "show water table declines of over 100 feet since about the 1940s," according to the NAS report.
When oil barons decide there's money in drilling for scarce water in the American West, it's time for Congress to stop subsidizing an inefficient and thirsty energy source that soaks up more of that water. Ethanol has prospered on taxpayer subsidies fed by political panic over oil prices and old-fashioned Congressional log-rolling. It's about time that some in Congress are finally stopping to inspect ethanol's many, and growing, costs.”
 

Red Robin

Well-known member
PORKER said:
Burning Corn directly for heat is the most efficient energy today and the cheapest.
Now what do you base that on? It's sure not cheap here compared to other sources of heat. Wood is way less.
 

PORKER

Well-known member
Firewood is selling for $375.00 a cord in my country, so corn is cheap heat at $4.00 bucks a bushel. Check out this table graph.
http://energy.cas.psu.edu/energyselector/cornfire.html

This is a great unit; http://www.ja-ran.com/burn.php
 

PORKER

Well-known member
Thats cheap! If you chipped that wood and made wood pellets you could sell them in Home Depot for $700 a ton. You better quite raising cattle.
 

Red Robin

Well-known member
PORKER said:
Thats cheap! If you chipped that wood and made wood pellets you could sell them in Home Depot for $700 a ton. You better quite raising cattle.
I don't make much noise raising cattle now. Never much enjoyed looking at a wood chip turn into a pellet. I like watching my breeding decisions come around every year. Kind of makes you feel good when it works and it's challenging when it don't. I'll stick with beef.
 

PORKER

Well-known member
Over here it is 4' x 4' x 8' for a cord of wood and a run is a third of a cord. To be officially classified as a cord, the wood should be stacked so tight as to allow a squirrel to get through but not let the cat that is chasing it get through. Cord weighs about 4000 lbs.

We have had our first snow of the season and the calves just slide around which is funny to see. We are going to split the pairs on this next warm spell . The RFID tags will come in handy to record the calf weights before shipping to capture weaning wts for each cow. Then I am going deer hunting.
 

Red Robin

Well-known member
PORKER said:
Over here it is 4' x 4' x 8' for a cord of wood and a run is a third of a cord. To be officially classified as a cord, the wood should be stacked so tight as to allow a squirrel to get through but not let the cat that is chasing it get through. Cord weighs about 4000 lbs.

We have had our first snow of the season and the calves just slide around which is funny to see. We are going to split the pairs on this next warm spell . The RFID tags will come in handy to record the calf weights before shipping to capture weaning wts for each cow. Then I am going deer hunting.
A rick is 4X8 and cut to length to fit the stove, here anyway. I said 35 a rick because usually it's 18 to 20 inch wood, 35 dollars whether it's 16" or 24" wood. I realize a cord is 4' deep so I estimated 80 dollars. It isn't sold by the cord here.
 

Red Robin

Well-known member
kolanuraven said:
Red Robin said:
Good dry red oak is 80bucks a cord here split and stacked. Actually 35 a rick all day long.


At my house all the red oak you want is free...if you cut and clean up the mess!
Same here. Wood costs nothing, you're buying the labor to cut it and fuel to deliver it.
 

Tex

Well-known member
I would like to point out something ya'll are hitting on.

Wood is cheaper, but it takes labor to "get it to the barn".

If we had ALL our energy needs met by wood, you wouldn't have wood for houses (you would, of course, but the price would go up because of its use as a fuel instead of just lumber or pulp), paper, and other products. The price of wood would go UP, just as corn has.

We have to have sustainable source of energy and wood would not keep up with the demand.
 

Red Robin

Well-known member
Tex said:
I would like to point out something ya'll are hitting on.

Wood is cheaper, but it takes labor to "get it to the barn".

If we had ALL our energy needs met by wood, you wouldn't have wood for houses (you would, of course, but the price would go up because of its use as a fuel instead of just lumber or pulp), paper, and other products. The price of wood would go UP, just as corn has.

We have to have sustainable source of energy and wood would not keep up with the demand.
I don't know the truth to the statement but I've heard there is more timber in America now than when Lewis and Clark explored it.
 

PORKER

Well-known member
The following heat equivalents to one cord of average dry oak hardwood.
60 bu. of rye
55 to 63 bu. of corn depending on test wt.
150 gallons No. 2 fuel oil
230 gallons LP gas
21,000 cubic feet natural gas
6,158 kwh electricity
note;Wood burning is only 60% efficient and has the highest cost of labor and materials.
 

Tex

Well-known member
PORKER said:
The following heat equivalents to one cord of average dry oak hardwood.
60 bu. of rye
55 to 63 bu. of corn depending on test wt.
150 gallons No. 2 fuel oil
230 gallons LP gas
21,000 cubic feet natural gas
6,158 kwh electricity
note;Wood burning is only 60% efficient and has the highest cost of labor and materials.

Yep, the best thing about fuel oil down is that generally all you have to do is throw a switch or adjust the thermastat.

Firewood heats you at least twice. Once when cutting, splitting, and stacking, and once when burning.
 
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