Global warming reports: poor prospects for corn ethanol

Global warming could scorch the corn economy to the tune of about $1.4 billion a year, according to a report that compiles data from academia and government. The damage would come in the expected places: the Midwest and South, according to the Environment America study released Thursday.

The report contradicts assurances from climate-change skeptics that warming would have a net benefit on agriculture by increasing growing seasons and crop yields.

“Not all the effects of global warming will be bad for agriculture; growing seasons will be longer, and increased carbon dioxide levels encourage plant growth,” the report states. “But global warming will make some of the

 challenges that agriculture faces significantly worse, including increasing temperatures, more damaging storms, ozone pollution, and spreading pests, weeds and diseases.”

That's more bad news for advocates of corn ethanol as an alternative to fossil fuels. And it comes on top of a Congressional Budget Office study that blames corn-based ethanol for about 10% to 15% of the recent rise in food prices, by increasing demand for the crop and the land on which it's grown.

"CBO estimates that from April 2007 to April 2008, the rise in the price of corn resulting from expanded production of ethanol contributed between 0.5 and 0.8 percentage points of the 5.1 percent increase in food prices measured by the consumer price index (CPI). Over the same period, certain other factors — for example, higher energy costs — had a greater effect on food prices than did the use of ethanol as a motor fuel."

Corn ethanol use has been helping trim greenhouse gases, according to Argonne National Laboratory, which has calculated the well-to-wheels impact of transportation fuels. But the report notes that those calculations show the savings wane as more land gets cleared to grow corn, eliminating important carbon "sinks" that absorb carbon dioxide:

"If increases in the production of ethanol led to a large amount of forests or grasslands being converted into new cropland, those changes in land use could more than offset any reduction in greenhouse-gas emissions — because forests and grasslands naturally absorb more carbon from the atmosphere than cropland absorbs. In the future, the use of cellulosic ethanol, which is made from wood, grasses and agricultural plant wastes rather than corn, might reduce greenhouse-gas emissions more substantially, but current technologies for producing cellulosic ethanol are not commercially viable."

California is about to set a standard for such fuels, and that is likely to sharpen the debate on a national level. A spokesman for Pacific Ethanol already has called the Air Resources Board's blueprint "a perversion of science and a prescription for disaster."

Why such fighting words over a move away from fossil fuels? California, unlike the federal government thus far, would not require a specific amount of biofuels to be sold, which gave a big boost to distillers of corn already in the market. California's rule requires refiners to reduce the carbon intensity of their fuels by certain percentages. And California officials promise to factor in the carbon downside of corn -- fertilizer, land-use effects and more. 

-- Geoff Mohan

Photo: Corn in a field near Seneca, Ill. Credit: Scott Olson/Getty Images

 

Comments

[janet Hallam]

Please understand the CBO report you quote. It does not blame ethanol for food prices. It does not serve your readership to misquote or misuse stats. Ethanol is the only viable solution to the mess we are in as a result of the oil industry. Please read, David Blume's "Alcohol Can Be a Gas." Or go to the web site. Converting to ethanol will sequester 12x the CO2 that is burns in an engine, provides for 25 million American jobs, (DOE stats), gets us off oil and the wars it causes, and feeds more people, not less. In China, the coal/oil pollution is causing a decrease in crop yeald due to less sun by 10%. Why is ethanol blamed for so many problems? I smell the oily hands of the petrolium insustry in this propoganda. Please do not repeat this nonsense. And ask your editor is the American Petrolium Institute is funding the LA Times in any way. Print media must find new sources of revenue, and the oil industry is licking their lips.

[shuma]

There is no indication that forests or otherwise will be felled if we convert to a fuel crop, corn or otherwise. We currently do not culitvate 30% or our agricultural land since this is how we control commodities prices. Who says that the rain forest will be compromised? Who says? This is just another thing that will fool greenies into believing that ethanol is bad. And the rain forest has been under attack for decades because people want cheep hamburgers. Why is so much blamed on ethanol? Food v. Fuel, Rain forest distruction.... I smell the oily hands of the petrochemical industry in this one. Please do better research when dealing with such a vital issue, and not just reitterate dubious speculation. We are talking about the livability of the planet. Ethanol is the solution to so many problems. There are over 400 crops from which to derive carbohydrate ethanol, not cellulosic. Corn is what we grow. But fuel crops can be grown in the desert, in swamps, even off shore as kelp beds. Once again, stop blaming these fabricated problems on ethanol. Or get used to tar sands and oil shale, black skys and more wars.

[janet hallam]

Please reread the CBO report. It does not blame the increase in food prices on ethanol! No service is done to enlighten people if stats are misunderstood and misused. How much does the American Petrolium Institute contribute to the LA Times? For the truth, please read, "Alcohol Can Be a Gas" and visit the web site. If the US moves to ethanol, there will be more food, not less, we can sequester 12X the CO2 from the air as ethanol burns, all gasoline engines can be converted to run on ethanol for about $ 200. and an ethanol fuel economy will provide for 25 million American jobs, (DOE statistics). Please write an article that is fair to ethanol, and stop spreading Oil Industry propoganda. We currently use about 75% of our ag land to feed cattle, not people anyway.

[M Ried]

Only 10-15% you say? If I'm spending several thousand dollars a year on food, an additional 10-15% because of ethanol is a lot of extra cost. Especially since it gives worse gas mileage, meaning I have to fill up more, meaning I'm spending even more on gas, AND the whole mess is being subsidized by my tax dollars instead of going to other things like infrastructure, hospitals, parks etc. The CBO also said that because of ethanol and its effect on food costs, it cost us 100's of millions of dollars MORE of our tax dollars for the food stamp program. Corn ethanol ain't green, and it ain't cheap. It is however, a scam

[Todd Neeley]

The CBO report cited in this story is actually GOOD news for corn-based ethanol and food prices. If you read the study more closely it says that corn-based ethanol accounts for only 10 to 15 percent of the overall 5.1 percent increase in food prices. That's only .5 to .8 percentage points. This backs up what corn-based ethanol advocates have been saying all along -- that corn-based ethanol plays little or no role in the run up in food prices.

[Garacka]

I don't understand. Essentially all previous reports say the opposite about corn production and plant growth in general. CO2 (a gas of life) dramatically increases plant growth and it allows for plant growth to occur with less water, so if one area gets increased drought, a CO2 increase tends to offset any reduced water. That's why many greenhouse operators boost concentrations from the current 380PPM to 1000PPM.

The bigger issue is that man's influence on CO2 levels is very, very small, even from what seems to us to be a large contribution, it is dwarfed by the oceans and other natural systems. What that means is very good news, because we don't have to worry about the CO2 "problem" and can focus on what we should be focusing on; reduction in pollutants, energy efficiency, energy stability and reliability, etc.

The (non) problem of CO2 is not based on sound science but on ideological and Global financial control advocates putting together a good, and so far, long sustained propaganda campaign which hijacked the good-hearted Environmentalist movement. If they want to make arguments for a new Global financier controlled world order or world socialism/marxism/communism/fascism or whatever "ism", make them on their own merits, don't hide them behind the good parts of the Environmental protection programs. What's actually heart wrenching is that radical curbs in CO2 emissions will likely have the opposite effect on the Environment.

[sheila]

this is actually a 2-way street. corn and other "row crops" are TERRIBLE for their own ecosystems and contribute to global warming far more than natural ecosystems.

check out a great analysis of how restored grasslands (usually restored from erosion and depletion - causing corn, soy and alfalfa crops) can be used to feed cattle and improve the ecosystem and the emissions of the area:

http://www.motherearthnews.com/Sustainable-Farming/Grass-Fed-Meat-Benefits.aspx

nature has already made the planet perfect. all we have to do is follow her lead. the arrogance of humans has been the number one cause of blight and disaster - at what point will we start going for "sustainable" policies instead of "growth" models in our economy, ecology and relationships?

[Ronald Adamowicz]

The use of corn ethanol is the cause of the problem, that is the past. Today there are eight different companie pouring billions into new cellulosic ethanol plants throughout America, for example, Verenium and BP have partnered to produce cellulosic ethanol from energy cane, a waste product that grows in the gulf region. VRNM/BP's cost for producing ethanol is well below $3.00 a gallon, very effecient. Energy cane is not price controlled, once a producer locks in a buying price, it will not change. Verenium's yields from energy cane is 1800 gallons per acre, well above corn ethanol at 380 gallons an acre.