Plumbing the Depths of Ethanol Ignorance – The Auto Channel

By Marc J. Rauch Exec. Vice President/Co-Publisher THE AUTO CHANNEL

I mention all this about Paul and Joe because as good as they are at being "car guys," they represent the overwhelming majority of people in the auto industry, they mirror the typical interests of the public. From the top to the bottom, from the influencers to the consumers, people like Paul and Joe are the hearts and minds of the automotive world. Their understanding and appreciation of ethanol fuel represents the automotive marketplace's level of understanding and appreciation of ethanol fuel. For those who may have forgotten, this is where the battleground for the ethanol fuel industry lies. You lose here, you lose everywhere. Sadly, the ethanol industry has done very poorly; there is no momentum.

This past Friday, Paul's website published a story written by Joe regarding the 2nd Presidential Debate that took place the evening prior. The article "Biden, Trump Clash about Energy in Debate," centered on those issues related to energy, which are logically most relevant to his website (as they are to THE AUTO CHANNEL).

In reply to the article - and in effect, to the debate itself - my business partner Bob Gordon posted a comment that questioned why ethanol was not included (considered) in the article or in the debate, as it should be because ethanol is the only available, proven, and safe alternative engine fuel, and it's 100% domestically produced. Specifically, Bob wrote:

Bob also appended a link to a story that was published on TheAutoChannel.com just three days prior: "Any Meaningful Electric Vehicle Ecological Benefit Wont Happen Until All Of Us Are Dead But Instant Benefit Can Come From Using Green American Flex-Fuel Now!"

Paul Eisenstein replied to Bob's posted comment. He wrote:

"Ethanol is the fuel of the future and always will be, Bob. We saw the industry push it during the first years of the new millennium and it went nowhere. If corn-based, it turns out, the environmental advantages are questionable, at best. It also has helped drive up food prices because of the impact on corn costs."

I had also read the Joe Szczesny story, and then Bob's post, and Paul's reply - which struck an interesting, all-too-true, sarcastic tone. Since Paul jumped into the exchange, I now did so, too. I replied to Paul's comment:

"Ethanol will always be just the fuel of the future as long as incorrect information about it is allowed to continue being circulated.

"Corn prices right now are only about as high as they were in Dec. 74/Jan. 75, which was well before the expanded use of ethanol fuel and the RFS program. In May of 2020, corn prices were just about the same level they were in late 1947.SEE: Historical Corn Prices (graphs)

"There were some high corn price spikes about 12 years ago which resulted in an erroneous World Bank story that blamed increased food prices on the price of corn. This story was the basis for the spread of the myth about ethanol production causing the rise in food prices. However, two years later the World Bank retracted the story and correctly laid the blame on higher food prices on the tremendous spike in petroleum oil. The World Bank has since reiterated this correction on the corn/food prices story on at least two occasions. SEE: World Bank Study Debunks Food vs. Fuel Myth

"A $4.00 box of corn flakes has between a nickel and a dimes worth of corn in it. So even if corn prices tripled it would have minimal effect on the overall price of any food. The price spikes on corn at any time during the last dozen years are largely attributable to commodity investor speculation.

"Regarding environmental advantages, the only questions come from people who dont know what theyre talking about. In every imaginable way ethanol is cleaner, healthier and safer than petroleum oil fuels. And if you compare a flex fuel vehicle running on E85 with a fully electric vehicle, when you take into account the GHG emissions created in generating the electricity and the production of the batteries, the two vehicles are roughly equal in GHG emissions.

"There are arguments that ethanol corn crops require too much water, land, and fertilizer. However, less water, land and fertilizer is used to grow corn today than at many times in the past 80 years, and yet the yield per acre, per annum is far greater than ever before. If the lies and misinformation about ethanol could be stopped and the demand for ethanol be allowed to increase, then the economics of ethanol would dramatically improve. "

A couple of hours later, in response to my post, Paul countered with:

I liked Paul's reply. I liked his reply, first and foremost, simply because he allowed my response to be posted on his comments section and then actually replied to it (something that doesn't always happen). I also liked his reply because it meant the "chess game" was on (I haven't played real chess in decades but I consider literary exchanges to be like playing remote chess).

Since my Sunday was shaping up to be a quiet day - outside of a dozen different "honey-do" obligations, I was happy for the diversion. The following is my response to Paul's reply to my post that was made to respond to his observation of Bob's comments about Joe's story....

Paul -

Thanks for your reply and the list of links. Your links and their respective authors prove my statement that only "People who don't know what they're talking about" question the advantages of ethanol. I say this despite their professional and academic credentials.

Over the past decade and a half, I've already engaged some of the authors and reports contained in the links you suggested. Some of these engagements are included in my book "THE ETHANOL PAPERS," which was published online nearly two years ago, and then in print about a year ago. Where possible, I will respond one-by-one using links to my full individual replies as I originally wrote and published them. In the instances where I hadn't previously encountered the author or link I will provide specific responses.

I'll start with your first link (an article written by Carlisle Ford Runge for the Yale.edu website) and then your very last link to the James Conca editorial published on Forbes.com. They seem to be your heaviest hitters by virtue of their affiliation with Yale and Forbes, respectively.

My rebuttal to Mr. Runge is part of this editorial: The Case Against Ethanol Opponents: They Are Simply Incorrect

As for the 2014 James Conca/Forbes.com article, it was a laugh riot, a virtual comedy of errors. If you visit the link today, you'll see at the bottom of Mr. Conca's article his thanks to Commenters for pointing out errors in his story. There were many. Forbes.com used to have a "comments section" but they did away with it. Unfortunately, the deletion of the comments section means you can't see all of the errors that readers pointed out. However, using Waybackmachine.com I was able to retrieve one archived page of the many pages of comments that the story generated. This will give you a sense of the errors that Mr. Conca made: https://web.archive.org/web/20150623063842/http://www.forbes.com/sites/jamesconca/2014/04/20/its-final-corn-ethanol-is-of-no-use/2/.

My personal rebuttal to Mr. Conca and Forbes.com, which had been published on the Forbes.com blog is no longer available to be seen. But I still have my original copy of what I posted on their blog more than five years ago; it's as follows:

"Let me begin with Mr. Conca's reference to The International Institute for Sustainable Development's claim that the CO2 and climate benefits from replacing petroleum fuels with biofuels like ethanol are basically zero, and that it would be almost 100 times more effective, and much less costly, to significantly reduce vehicle emissions through more stringent standards, and to increase CAFE standards.

"The IISD's claim might be a true statement, but the reason that MPG fuel economy has been so traditionally low, and harmful vehicle emissions so high, is because of the collusion between the oil industry and the automobile manufacturers to squeeze consumers for as much fuel money as possible, while doing everything possible to resist making changes to tetraethyl-lead and MTBE-laden gasolines.

"If we had an auto industry that was not benefitting (in fact, they were partnering) from the excessive use of gasoline, the automakers would have long ago produced vehicles that were capable of using less fuel that causes such voluminous harmful emissions. I consider this segment of Mr. Conca's article to be a good example of misinformation.

"Mr. Conca goes on to examine, "...Where is the U.S. today in corn ethanol space?" He writes, "In 2000, over 90% of the U.S. corn crop went to feed people and livestock, many in undeveloped countries, with less than 5% used to produce ethanol. In 2013, however, 40% went to produce ethanol, 45% was used to feed livestock, and only 15% was used for food and beverage." This complaint is simply sleight-of-hand; three-card monte; the old shell game.

"Let's look at how this works out: In 2000, U.S. corn production was 251,854 metric tons. According to Mr. Conca's figures, this means that 226,668 MT went to feed people and livestock. Please note that Mr. Conca has combined the human and livestock figure. In 2013, U.S. corn production is estimated to be 353,715 metric tons. For some unexplained reason, for 2013 Mr. Conca breaks up the use of corn into two categories (livestock food and human food, 45% and 15%, respectively). However, when you combine the two categories they amount to 60%. This means that 212,229 MT went to feed people and livestock; nearly the same total amount in 2013 as it was in 2000. So while Mr. Conca was obviously trying to present a horrific factoid to support his pejorative headline, he was engaging in deceit by making it seem like there was a great change in usage. The above corn production numbers come from the US Dept of Agriculture. http://www.indexmundi.com/agriculture/?country=us&commodity=corn&graph=production.

"Clearly, more corn went to ethanol production, but it was because since 2000 there has been a greater demand for ethanol and our American farmers were capable of ramping up to meet that demand - while also earning more money...without forcing humans or animals into starvation. I agree that the amount of corn available in 2013 for humans and animals was less than 2000, but the difference was marginal. In short, can you recall any point in 2013 when you couldn't find enough corn to eat at your local grocery store?

"As for Mr. Conca's comment about people in undeveloped countries; people in undeveloped countries don't eat corn on the cob or corn niblets like we do, so any short fall of U.S. corn production had no serious effect on them.

"Moreover, there's a great problem with our supplying free or very inexpensive corn to undeveloped countries for livestock feed; it tends to force their own farmers out of business because they can't compete with the free/cheap corn they get from us. There's an old saying that "If you give a person a fish, he eats for a day; but if you teach him to fish, he will eat everyday." Putting their farmers out of business means that they must continue to rely on others rather than ever becoming self-sufficient. And their relying on our food costs us American taxpayers. As an American taxpayer, I am not happy to be paying for their food, their medicine, and their defense in addition to paying too much for poison gasoline.

"Mr. Conca also states, "We should remember that humans originally switched from biomass to fossil fuels because biomass was so inefficient, and took so much energy and space to produce." This is a lie - it might be an unintentional lie because he simply doesn't know the truth, but it's a lie. We did not switch to fossil fuels because biomass fuels were so inefficient and required too so much energy and space to produce. For example, Americans switched from alcohol to kerosene for indoor heating and light because the tax on alcohol (to finance the Civil War) was so great that people were forced to use stinky, black-smoke producing kerosene.

"Furthermore, alcohol (ethanol) was always considered by the automobile pioneers to be the superior more-efficient fuel. Until the FREE ALCOHOL ACT of 1906, gasoline had a significant price advantage over ethanol, but the poor efficiency of gasoline restricted gasoline engines to slow speeds and under-nourished horsepower. From 1906 until Prohibition, ethanol was approximately the same price as gasoline, and because it could be used in higher compression engines, automobile manufacturers like Henry Ford were building ethanol-only or bi-fuel engines that could be adjusted according to fuel availability. Early race car drivers preferred ethanol over gasoline.

"Once Prohibition became the law of the land, the issue was moot since all alcohol production was illegal. We were forced to buy John Rockefeller's junk fuel, and in order to mimic the natural anti-knock characteristics of ethanol, the poisonous tetraethyl-lead was added to gasoline. America then had to put up with several decades of being forced to use inferior fossil fuels, being told lies about the dangers of leaded gasoline.

"Mr. Conca brings up other issues such as high water usage and the problems with over-fertilization of land (and the water run-off). Gasoline production requires almost as much water as ethanol production, and many of the problems associated with water run-off are caused by fertilization used on golf courses, corporate and educational campuses, and residential lawns and gardens."

As usual, I had emailed my response to James Conca. He's never replied.

Paul, moving down your list of citations you present a 2009 article from Wired.com, written by Chuck Squatriglia, titled "Another Argument Against Ethanol." This is a terribly misleading and incorrect article for a couple of reasons. The first is that the title makes it seem as if the writer or Wired.com had previously published one or more stories against ethanol, or that there are an unlimited number of arguments against ethanol. But in reviewing the author's previous editorials there doesn't appear to be any indication that he had ever published any previous "Argument Against Ethanol." Consequently, labeling this article isn't "another argument," it's his first argument.

The second problem with the Wired.com article is that it is just a story about someone else's story. The writer, Chuck Squatriglia, only made reference to an article written by Ed Wallace for BusinessWeek and then added a reply from Growth Energy (an ethanol advocacy group). Moreover, Growth Energy's reply largely rebuts Ed Wallace's negative comments. So in reality, including this link in your list of citations is worthless because the Growth Energy rebuttal defeats the article's negative comments. It makes me think that you didn't fully read this Wired.com story and consider its potential value in rebutting my earlier comments.

The third problem is that Ed Wallace's BusinessWeek story was nonsense. In 2015, after I replied to a different nonsensical article regarding Jay Leno and his sudden dislike for ethanol-gasoline blends (after being a fan of ethanol-gasoline blends), I received an email from a reader named Max Macke who challenged me by citing this same 2009 Ed Wallace story - this Wallace story was titled "The Great Ethanol Scam". My reply to the reader, and BusinessWeek, and directly to Ed Wallace in an email to him, was:

"Ed Wallace's article is disparaging and demeaning the corn ethanol industry by relying on information that is either out-of-date or was never correct at any time. He engages in fear mongering by relating anecdotal stories that are unlikely to have ever been true and he uses at least one situation that would have been impossible to have been true.

"For example, in trying to describe how ethanol damages vehicle engines, this article refers back to a previous article he wrote in which he states that an Exxon station in Texas mistakenly filled a customer's flex-fuel vehicle with 100% pure ethanol. Mr. Wallace says that it wasn't Exxon's fault, that it was the fault of the distribution center. However, regardless of who was at fault, where did this mythical 100% pure ethanol come from? Basically speaking, just as there is no such thing as 100% pure gasoline (gasoline is not one substance but the combination of many, which includes substances like tetraethyl lead or MTBE or other "aromatics" that are not in-and-of themselves an engine fuel), there is no 100% pure ethanol outside of a specialized laboratory. At the very most, the distribution center would have had denatured alcohol (ethanol) which is not 100% pure ethanol. You could argue that this is a very minor discrepancy, but it is still an exaggeration that was invented to instill fear and distrust in ethanol.

"In any event, for this distribution center to have shipped out a very high-level denatured alcohol that exceeded E85, the worst thing that Mr. Wallace was able to report was that the vehicle didn't start. If an engine doesn't start that doesn't mean that the engine was damaged. In all likelihood, if the engine didn't start it didn't start because the onboard computer didn't recognize the fuel and it stopped the vehicle from starting. In other words, the vehicle's onboard computer did what it was supposed to do. If water or diesel or Coca-Cola was mistakenly pumped into the fuel tank the engine would also have not started. I'm not saying that putting water, diesel or Coke in your gasoline fuel tank is a good idea, but it's a long way from making the kind of destructive claims that he makes about ethanol.

"Mr. Wallace refers to the Pimentel-Patzek study that claims it takes more energy to make ethanol then the ethanol puts out. This study was never correct; it used preposterous assumptions to create an exaggerated scenario. Even Patzek's home university (at the time) UC Berkley did a later study in which they found the Pimentel/Patzek study to be wrong. Incidentally, Mr. Wallace published his two articles in 2009 and 2010. The UC Berkley study that corrected Pimentel-Patzek was done in 2006. So the information was there if Mr. Wallace wanted it, but he obviously didn't want correct information.

"Ed Wallace is supposed to be a car guy with many, many years of experience. He quotes mileage reduction statistics that are wrong. I think that he would have done what I've done over the years, and that is to actually try putting E85 in a car and see what happens. Apparently he has never done this. I'm not surprised, because I've found that very few automotive journalists have tried this. Those that have always (to my knowledge) reported that the mileage loss is no where as great as those suggested by new vehicle Monroney stickers or manufacturer handbooks. Why is this you ask? There are at least three reasons: First, Monroney MPG statistics are often wrong, even when just referring to gasoline. Second, the gasoline used to make the MPG estimates is often different than the actual gasoline you buy at a retail filling station. Third, when dealing with flex-fuel estimates, the estimates are not necessarily based upon actual on-road performance, but based upon an on-paper BTU calculation. The problem with this is that BTU rating is irrelevant when dealing with an internal combustion engine. Ethanol does indeed have a lower BTU rating than gasoline. However, a gasoline-powered engine will deliver more miles with gasoline fuel (as compared to using an ethanol fuel) because the engine is optimized to run on gasoline. The same engine optimized to run on ethanol will deliver the same or more miles when run on ethanol. While diesel fuel has a higher BTU rating than gasoline, and it is derived from the same petroleum oil as gasoline, it will deliver far fewer miles if you tried using it in a gasoline-powered engine (in fact, the engine might not even start)."

Ed Wallace never replied to me, BusinessWeek never replied, and the reader (Max Macke) disappeared. Unfortunately, the negative story and the wrong impressions it made are still there.

Next up on your list, Paul, is a link to a 2016 NPR story titled "The Shocking Truth About America's Ethanol Law: It Doesn't Matter (For Now)." The writer, Dan Charles, begins his article with what he says is a riddle that's bothered him for years: "Suppose somebody yanked away the law that currently props up the nation's ethanol industry, as Cruz has proposed. What would actually happen?"

Mr. Charles goes off in search of someone to answer the riddle. He finds two different someones and he gets the same very simple answer that comes down to: "If the law changed tomorrow and gasoline companies were free to ignore ethanol, they'd almost certainly keep right on blending ethanol into their fuel."

The reason given for this answer is a one word answer: "octane." Ethanol provides the octane boost that's needed to prevent engine damage from "knocking."

The simple answer to the great conundrum that puzzled Dan Charles for so many years is actually a bit more complex and also very ironic to the entire issue before us. As I'm sure you know, Paul, there are other ingredients that could be used to increase the octane level of gasoline, such as additional aromatics (benzene, toluene, xylene, etc.). So why would the gasoline companies still go outside of their own community to get an octane booster like ethanol? That answer is because ethanol is cleaner, safer, healthier and less expensive than anything else. Therefore, this one article that you cited to bash ethanol actually goes a long way to dispel the primary negative comment you made about ethanol's "questionable" environmental advantages.

Mr. Charles' NPR story goes on to include information from author/spokesman Robert Bryce. Next to David Pimentel and Tad Patzek, Robert Bryce is the most notorious slinger of anti-ethanol bullshit. Robert Bryce wrote and published "Gusher Of Lies: The Dangerous Delusions Of Energy Independence" in 2009. Despite the fact that Mr. Bryce had no real background in energy and alternative solutions, the book became highly heralded and it propelled him into a starring role as a slayer of alternative fuel monsters. In 2013, I wrote and published a review/rebuttal to "Gusher Of Lies." My review/rebuttal to his book was nearly 70 pages long. That's how much he got wrong. It took me almost 70 pages to correct the garbage contained in his book, and I didn't even address his chapters on natural gas, nuclear power, and solar (which comprised roughly 40% of his book).

In the seven years since I published my rebuttal to "Gusher Of Lies," Mr. Bryce only ever responded to me once, and that was just after I sent him the link to where my review could be read. His immediate reply was "Thank you." I laughed and thought to myself "After he reads my review I hope he remembers that he thanked me."

Since then he's had plenty of time to read it, respond, challenge me, and even sue me for libel/slander if he believed I had mischaracterized him or what he wrote; but he has never done so. The most egregious part of all this is that in the years subsequent to publishing "Gusher Of Lies," whenever Mr. Bryce makes an appearance and discusses the subject of the book, he relies on the same bad and/or outdated information that rendered his book rubbish in the first place. My review/rebuttal of "Gusher Of Lies" can be found by CLICKING HERE.

Your next link is to a story posted by SEMA Action Network (part of Specialty Equipment Market Association). It is merely a reiteration of numerous lies and myths invented by API starting in the 1920's. It's wildly irresponsible of them to post this story, but I assume they did so because of sponsorships and funding they receive from oil industry entities and affiliates. They should be ashamed of publishing it as it makes them out to be devoid of any in-depth knowledge of the history of automobiles and internal combustion engines. Many of my individual alternative fuel editorials destroy their accusations and innuendoes. There is no indication of who specifically wrote their story, but I'd be willing to travel anywhere to debate any single person or team of their people in live public event. By the way, last summer I engaged in an online debate with Michael Lynch (considered to be an energy expert). It was moderated by Robert Bradley (who is also considered an energy expert). Links to the 2-part debate can be found by CLICKING HERE.

Your very next link goes to a November 2019 story on TheAtlantic.com written by Frank Loyola, titled "Stop The Ethanol Madness." A couple of days after that story was published, I wrote and published a rebuttal titled "Stop the Anti-Ethanol Ridiculousness." You can find it by CLICKING HERE.

Paul, the last item on your list is a link to a chapter of the "Workshop Summary - Roundtable on Environmental Health Sciences, Research, and Medicine..." It sure sounds very impressive.

While the summary (and I presume the entire roundtable) dances around true factual information, it veers off into fantasy for what appears to make the entire event just a tool for pushing an erroneous extreme green agenda.

For instance, under CASE STUDIES, the summary addresses the "ethical issues stemming from corn ethanol production in the United States...on food prices and food security." This is the old food vs. fuel argument.

In my initial reply to you, Paul, I covered the issue of "food vs. fuel." I described how the issue first took flight (from an incorrect report published by The World Bank), soared through the rarified air of the global media because of API financial support, and then crash landed two years later after The World Bank retracted the conclusions of the report (sadly, the crash was rather silent as the media chose not to make as big a fuss of the correction as they did of the original faulty claim).

By the time that this summary of the Roundtable on Environmental Health Sciences, Research, and Medicine was being prepared for publication, it had already been publicly known for at least four years that The World Bank report on food vs. fuel was wrong. Incidentally, in the summer of 2010, I delivered a presentation at the American Coalition of Ethanol national conference that included details and links to The World Bank retraction.

There is no excuse for the august body that staged the Roundtable on Environmental Health Sciences, Research, and Medicine to not have had access to the same information I had years earlier. And if they had it, then it means they intentionally hid it from their audience because it didn't fit their agenda.

The CASE STUDIES section goes on to state that Alena Buyx, a senior research associate at the School of Public Policy at University College London, noted that "some calculations show that biofuels production actually makes the greenhouse gas problem worse than simply using gasoline." Indeed, some calculations, such as the debunked calculations presented in Pimental-Patzek studies do show this. In the absence of any referenced research information indicating otherwise, I'll presume that Ms. Buyx was relying on some form of the Pimentel-Patzek misinformation as the basis of her comments.

More contemporary ethanol bashers like Mark Jacobson, a professor at Stanford University, claim that biofuel (ethanol) production makes the GHG problem worse than using gasoline. Ms. Buyx was wrong and Professor Jacobson is wrong. Continuous credible studies from universities and government laboratories over the years show that ethanol is significantly cleaner than gasoline.

Another part of the CASE STUDIES section looks at Brazil and the near universal panic that has ensued over the destruction of the country's critical rain forests in order to turn them into sugar cane crop fields. The problem with this near universal panic is that sugar cane is cultivated in the central and southern areas of Brazil, while the Amazon rain forest is located in the north-western area of Brazil. This issue, like most of the extreme green and AGW positions are wild exaggerations that don't deserve consideration or panic. SEE:

An environmental policy writer named Michael Shellenberger (a Time Magazine "Hero of the Environment") recently published a book titled "Apocalypse Never." On pages 29-31, he describes how photographs and films of cleared crop fields in the south are used to fraudulently present worrisome imagery of rain forest deforestation.

The Workshop Summary refocuses on the United States with concerns over water and land issues, presenting the case that too much land and water is used to grow ethanol crops. In fact, in the years since the adoption of the Renewable Fuel Standard, water and land usage for corn crops has been at the same or lower levels than in the years leading up to the passage of the RFS program and increased national use of ethanol-gasoline blends. Regardless of the reduced amount of land and water, there have been enormous increases in corn yield. The increases are due to improvements in farming techniques, not wasteful natural resource usage. SEE:

The Workshop Summary includes an exhaustive amount of additional information designed to beat down the advantages and benefits of biofuels. The summary includes events and circumstances in Malaysia, Columbia, and other parts of Latin America. It would be virtually impossible for me or almost anyone else to deflate each and every instance set forth in a timely manner. Fortunately, I don't have to expend that much effort because even if some or all of the disturbing instances are correct, they are not anywhere near as horrendous as the societal, health, and safety disasters caused by the petroleum oil industry. Furthermore, in many instances the growing of ethanol crops isn't even as environmentally damaging as the total effects caused by the creation and deployment of wind generators and solar farms, or in the mining and production of elements and materials needed to produce batteries and electric vehicles.

The bottom line is that ethanol fuel represents the most efficient and economical solution to the world's energy problems, and it is available right now. Ethanol shouldn't be thought of as "the fuel of the future," it should be "The Fuel of Today That Meets the Needs of Tomorrow!"

With this in mind, I present you with one more editorial to be considered: "Ethanol is the SAVIOR of the Oil Industry, Convenience Store Industry, Automotive Supply Chain Industry and Much More!".

*NEAT - National Ethanol Action Team - a subsidiary of The Auto Channel.com

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Plumbing the Depths of Ethanol Ignorance - The Auto Channel