Ethanol

Biofuels like ethanol can help reduce global warming and create jobs for the rural poor, but the benefits may be undone by serious environmental problems and higher food prices, the U.N. has concluded in its first major report on bioenergy. The report raised alarms about the potential negative effect of biofuels, just days after a climate conference in Bangkok said the world had the money and technology to stabilize global warming.

Re "Why ethanol backfires," Opinion, May 17 Colin A. Carter and Henry I. Miller present a false argument regarding biofuels. Current fluctuations in food prices do not represent an irreconcilable competition between fuel and food. Biotechnology-based improvements in producing ethanol from corn are already helping to meet the current rapid growth in demand for biofuel -- ethanol yields have increased 20% since 2000. The United States can produce half its transportation fuel needs from agricultural resources, reducing our dependence on imported oil while maintaining an abundant and affordable food supply.

In the 2 1/2 years since Gordon Ommen co-founded US BioEnergy Corp., the company has quietly grown into one of the country's top ethanol producers, with plans to double in size this year and grow its capacity to 1 billion gallons a year by 2009. But Ommen knows there are challenges ahead for both his company and the rapidly growing ethanol industry.

With Congress and the White House pushing to increase the use of biofuels such as ethanol, the oil industry is scaling back its plans to expand refineries -- which could keep gasoline prices high. President Bush has called for a 20% decline in gasoline use by 2017 and the Senate is debating legislation for huge increases in the use of ethanol as a motor fuel. So oil companies see a growing uncertainty about future gasoline demand and less need to increase refinery capacity to make more gasoline.

As a chief advocate for corn farmers around the country, Rob Litterer will be working the halls of Congress this fall to push for increased ethanol production. But he's facing stiff opposition from what on the surface seems an unlikely source -- the farm lobby. The burgeoning ethanol industry is creating a wave of prosperity for rural towns throughout the Midwest, but the energy bonanza is also pitting farming groups against each other.

batatais, brazil -- As dawn cracks over seemingly endless fields of sugar cane, a ragged army of men and women sharpen their machetes to harvest the raw material for Brazil's "white gold." With machine-like precision, the cane cutters gather five 8-foot-tall stalks in the crook of one arm, bend over and cut them down with three swift machete whacks -- a process they will repeat over and over again for as long as 12 hours a day.

With oil prices in record territory, presidential candidates stumping for votes in corn-centric Iowa, and congressional Democrats anxious to pass an energy bill to cut the nation's dependence on Mideast oil, this should be the right moment for ethanol. But a plan to dramatically increase ethanol production has become a major sticking point in congressional negotiations to complete work on the bill.

Chevron Corp. plans to begin selling fuel made mostly from ethanol in California this summer to test demand among motorists who pay the highest gasoline prices in the continental U.S. Chevron, which produces almost a fifth of California's gasoline, will build three filling stations to pump E85, a motor fuel made from 85% ethanol and 15% gasoline, Gregory Vesey, president of the company's alternative fuels business, said Thursday.

First oil, now this: The price of raw sugar in New York futures markets reached a 24-year high Monday, as traders bet that near-record oil prices would mean increasing demand for alternative fuels, including ethanol made from sugar cane. Raw sugar prices have nearly doubled in the last year as Brazil, the biggest exporter of sugar, has converted more of its cane crop to cope with soaring gasoline prices. In Brazil, ethanol is cheaper than gasoline.

A new study by California researchers challenges claims that substituting ethanol for gasoline consumes more energy than it creates -- an argument that has dogged ethanol programs and their supporters for more than a decade. However, the report also concludes that while ethanol made from corn -- the type that dominates the market today -- can sharply reduce overall petroleum use, it provides little reduction in greenhouse gas emissions compared with regular gasoline.