Comments on: Corn-Based Ethanol: Is This a Solution?

By: Food, fuel and the price of rice: a WWO preja-vu « World Without Oil - serious game for the public good

Thu, 24 Apr 2008 15:49:29 +0000

[...] been apparent to some from the start, and WWO player GailTheActuary laid them out pretty clearly in this post back during the game. But it’s still strange to see this sort of unintuited ramification of [...]

By: jwiv

jwiv — Thu, 31 May 2007 00:10:50 +0000

Ethanol’s EROEI is complete garbage. The reason WHY U.S. politicians continue to support it is exactly what you said at the last - Iowa corn farmers are a powerful lobby with an early primary election. The real danger of the subsidy is that it allows politicians to make all sorts of ludicrous claims (I’m pro enviroment! I support our farmers! We’re dealing with our dependance on foreign oil), while simultaneously stealing money that could be going to research viable alternatives.

By: Claire M.

Claire M. — Wed, 30 May 2007 17:46:42 +0000

I’m a knitter, not a scientist, but it seems our politicians’ heads are in the sand about the ethanol energy equation. If it takes more fossil fuel energy to produce it than you get out of it, what’s the point? I’ll support ethanol when the energy balance for producing and transporting it becomes positive. Until then, all I see are agricultural subsidies (read voter support) and corporate subsidies to companies like Archer Daniels Midland and Cargill (read campaign contributions). SIGH.