Ethanol is a bad option

Once again, a lobbyist for the ethanol industry, Tom Buis, CEO of Growth Energy, resorts to exaggerations to sway the public into supporting an inferior product (“Renewable fuel standard works,” Crossroads, Aug. 9).

In his column, Buis touts ethanol as lower in cost and higher performing. I would propose removing all government mandates and subsidies on ethanol and see where the market price falls before claiming lower cost. As for performance, on a volume basis, ethanol has 30% less energy content than pure gasoline. The result is lower fuel mileage.

Buis seems to be able to speak for all members of Congress (all 535 of them) that they all knew the goals of Renewable Fuel Standards would require E15 or higher. He praises the men and women who built over 200 ethanol plants. The only reason these people built these plants was because of government mandates creating a demand for ethanol.

The drop in our dependence on foreign oil is due mostly to the oil fields in North Dakota and the use of fracking. Yet Buis has the nerve to give ethanol the credit for this. He claims the RFS gives consumers the ability to choose fuels. Wrong. I’m stuck buying E10. Again, remove the government mandates and sell pure gasoline, E10 and E15 side by side. If ethanol blended fuels are so great, people will buy them.

Buis then writes of the great reductions in greenhouse gas emissions due to the use of biofuels. Ethanol is still a hydrocarbon and therefore still produces CO2 when burned. Also, due to the lower energy content mentioned earlier, and the subsequent reduction in fuel mileage, you are going to burn more of it. I believe these greenhouse gas reductions are greatly exaggerated if not nonexistent. Furthermore, has anyone ever considered the CO2 produced during the fermentation process at ethanol plants?

If the industry Buis represents produces a product of such great value to the consumer, then it should not need to rely on government mandates and subsidies to exist.

Lee Roller Grafton