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EPA weighs measuring ethanol pollution
A tank holding ethanol at a fuel tank farm in the Global Petroleum facility in Boston, Mass.
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BILL RADKE: Also in Washington today, the EPA weighs in on a vexing question: Renewable fuels are supposed to be eco-friendly, right? But how exactly do we measure that? From the Marketplace Sustainability Desk, here's Jennifer Collins.
JENNIFER COLLINS: U.S. ethanol producers want you to hear this:
ETHANOL AD: It's better for your environment because it's a renewable fuel that greatly reduces harmful tailpipe emissions.
NATHANAEL GREENE: The reality is that ethanol can be produced in good ways and it can be produced in bad ways.
Nathanael Greene is with the Natural Resources Defense Council. He says clearing farm land, using fertilizer and refining ethanol creates pollution.
GREENE: And we need a tool to go out and tell which gallons are produced well and which gallons are produced poorly.
Recently, California became the first state to put out its own standards. Bob Dinneen represents major corn ethanol producers. He says the EPA should not mirror California's mandate.
BOB DINNEEN: As currently structured the California low-carbon fuel standard would represent a 'do not enter' sign for Midwest ethanol.
The new EPA standard will determine whether Midwest ethanol grows or withers.
I'm Jennifer Collins for Marketplace.
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Someone correct me here but it's my understanding that 99% of ethanol is used as a fuel additive for emissions and not as a primary fuel. The reason for this is that it's almost non-toxic if a little of it gets into ground water.
has anyone come up with an environmentally safe alternative for ethanol as an oxygenation additive for fuel?
Taming Ethanol
Ethanol has the potential to represent substantial energy resources worldwide but the most promising ethanol production strategies are unproven on a commercial scale, may not be economical for some time, and will certainly entail side effects and limitations not yet completely understood. We do know that large-scale ethanol production will require vast water resources, endanger areas reserved for conservation, spur deforestation, and decrease food security. The net greenhouse gas impact could be positive or negative depending on the type of feedstock plant materials, the process used to distill the biofuels, and the difference in reflected solar radiation between biofuel crops and the preexisting vegetation.
Alternately, if we focused our efforts on cutting energy consumption in half, which would still leave us with more energy per capita than numerous other nations with comparable standards of living, we wouldn’t need to find additional locations for ethanol facilities but could rather decide which existing fuel plants should be decommissioned first.
Ozzie Zehner
Ozzie Zehner is an energy consultant and the Executive Director of Imagitrends.com, a nonpartisan 501(c)(3) nonprofit. His forthcoming book, The Alternative Energy Fetish: Better Alternatives to Alternative Energy, will be published in 2010.
Taming Ethanol
Ethanol has the potential to represent substantial energy resources worldwide but the most promising ethanol production strategies are unproven on a commercial scale, may not be economical for some time, and will certainly entail side effects and limitations not yet completely understood. We do know that large-scale ethanol production will require vast water resources, endanger areas reserved for conservation, spur deforestation, and decrease food security. The net greenhouse gas impact could be positive or negative depending on the type of feedstock plant materials, the process used to distill the biofuels, and the difference in reflected solar radiation between biofuel crops and the preexisting vegetation.
Alternately, if we focused our efforts on cutting energy consumption in half, which would still leave us with more energy per capita than numerous other nations with comparable standards of living, we wouldn’t need to find additional locations for ethanol facilities but could rather decide which existing fuel plants should be decommissioned first.
Ozzie Zehner
Ozzie Zehner is an energy consultant and the Executive Director of Imagitrends.com, a nonpartisan 501(c)(3) nonprofit. His forthcoming book, The Alternative Energy Fetish: Better Alternatives to Alternative Energy, will be published in 2010.
