From Townhall.com: The Many Myths of Ethanol by John Stossel.
If ethanol's so good, why does it need government subsidies? Shouldn't producers be eager to make it, knowing that thrilled consumers will reward them with profits?Posted by Forkum at May 23, 2007 04:42 PMBut consumers won't reward them, because without subsidies, ethanol would cost much more than gasoline.
The claim that using ethanol will save energy is another myth. Studies show that the amount of energy ethanol produces and the amount needed to make it are roughly the same. "It takes a lot of fossil fuels to make the fertilizer, to run the tractor, to build the silo, to get that corn to a processing plant, to run the processing plant," Taylor says.
And because ethanol degrades, it can't be moved in pipelines the way that gasoline is. So many more big, polluting trucks will be needed to haul it.
More bad news: The increased push for ethanol has already led to a sharp increase in corn growing — which means much more land must be plowed. That means much more fertilizer, more water used on farms and more pesticides.
This makes ethanol the "solution"?
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