PrairiePundit

 The Hill: A new study is casting doubt on the climate benefits of using ethanol as a fuel, finding that it may actually contribute more to global warming than gasoline. Researchers found that emissions from changes in land use to account for the growing demand for corn make corn-based ethanol no cleaner than gasoline. In fact, they determined that these changes likely make ethanol’s emissions at least 24 percent higher than those for gasoline, according to their study , which was published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. A 2005 law established what’s known as the “Renewable Fuel Standard” requiring a certain quantity of biofuels, a category that includes ethanol, to be blended into gasoline. ... I have long opposed the ethanol requirement.  It makes engines less efficient meaning they burn more fuel.  It is also destructive for many small engines from lawnmowers to chain saws. It has never been clear to me why you have to pay more for fuel withou...

  Jazz Shaw: The Renewable Fuel Standard may be about to go on steroids   Ethanol is a poor substitute for fossil fuels.  It is a disaster for small engines from chainsaws to lawnmowers.  It does not benefit autos that are required to use it. The corn farmers appear to be the only real beneficiary.  The requirement for blending it with gas should be ended.

 Breitbart: Corn growers feeding the ethanol gasoline market are unhappy with President Joe Biden’s push for electric vehicles. Ethanol producers would get “only a tiny slice of the funds proposed in the infrastructure package, despite Biden’s assurances that he views them as key to reducing dependence on fossil fuels,”  Politico   reported . “To not see [biofuels] listed as part of an infrastructure piece, I’m hoping is just an oversight and a misunderstanding — because I know that there’s support for it,” Rep. Cindy Axne, Iowa’s lone Democrat in Congress, said. Via  Politico: Rob Walther, vice president of federal advocacy at biofuels producer POET, said that based on continuing conversations with congressional allies and leadership, the company is confident “the plan was an opening bid in order to set the vision of bold climate action.” “You could take away that it was very electric-vehicle driven,” Walther told POLITICO. “On the other hand, we have a solution for...

Eric Peters: Ethanol Finds Its Market … Reluctantly It’s not people looking for affordable, efficient gasoline. ... At the pump — and down the road, because ethanol-laced fuel doesn’t take your car as far as gasoline will. A gallon of not-quite-gas contains less energy than a gallon of gas, and so you burn more go the same distance. There’s a weird irony in that because the main rationale for the force-feeding of ethanol to the public has been to reduce energy consumption. But ethanol increases energy consumption — by lowering fuel efficiency by about 2 to 3 mpg. There is also increased energy consumption on the production side, where it takes more energy to turn corn into ethanol than to refine gasoline from oil. But the racket continues because ethanol has powerful friends. Powerful corn state friends, who apply pressure on political candidates — especially at the national level — to genuflect before the Corn Kahuna, in order to line the pockets of those who couldn’t oth...

Ned Ryun: Now Is a Good Time to Scrap the Renewable Fuel Standard Ethanol is not needed and makes engines less efficient.  Ethanol production needs to be used to produce hand sanitizer instead.

Bloomberg/Fuel Fix: The American ethanol industry is cutting production like never before as coronavirus lockdowns keep drivers off the roads, crushing demand for fuel. Output of corn-based biofuel plunged by a record 20% to an average daily rate of 672,000 barrels. That’s the lowest rate since the Energy Information Administration began publishing weekly data in mid-2010. Stockpiles jumped to a record 27 million barrels, underscoring the demand struggles. Federal regulations mandate nearly every gallon of gasoline sold in the U.S. contain about 10% ethanol. However, after the virus helped drive down oil prices amid a dispute between Russia and Saudi Arabia over production levels, ethanol producers can no longer profitably make the fuel. Dozens of plants have idled or slowed, including top producer POET, which said Tuesday it was idling three facilities in Iowa and South Dakota. ... The ethanol makers need to switch to providing ethanol for hand sanitizers which are still in gr...

Fuel Fix: Crude oil prices are not the only thing falling amid a global supply glut and weakened demand attributed to the coronavirus outbreak. U.S. ethanol prices have hit lowest point in more than a decade, according to new figures from global energy research firm S&P Global Platts. Ethanol trading on Chicago's Argo Terminal closed at 99 cents per gallon on Tuesday, the lowest price for the corn-based fuel since 2003 and the first time its assessed value has dropped below the $1 per gallon mark. ... It can cost as much as $30 a liter to be mixed with aloe gel right now.  Such is the run on hand sanitizers because of the Chicom Bat Soup virus.

Bloomberg/Fuel Fix: The oil industry and its Capitol Hill allies are pressing the Trump administration to defend its decision to exempt oil refineries from requirements they blend biofuels into gasoline and diesel. The administration has until the end of next Monday to request the full 10th Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals rehear a decision that threatens to curtail the use of waivers. Republican senators from states with large oil-refining interests, including Ted Cruz of Texas, John Barrasso of Wyoming and James Inhofe of Oklahoma have made entreaties to the White House or the Environmental Protection Agency in recent days, warning that if the decision is applied nationwide, it could strain refineries, hike gasoline prices and jeopardize jobs. The senators’ efforts were described by three people familiar with the matter who asked not to be named detailing private conversations. At issue are requirements to use renewable fuels, such as corn-based ethanol and soy-based biodiesel. ...

Bloomberg/Fuel Fix: BP Plc and Royal Dutch Shell Plc are exploring adding more ethanol in gasoline in top corn state Iowa to take advantage of how cheap the biofuel has become. The oil majors are gauging driver interest at a small number of stations in 15% ethanol blends, up from the current state standard of 10%, after the Trump administration in May allowed an increase nationwide. Adding more ethanol to gasoline may help Midwest farmers who have been struggling to find markets for corn after biofuels demand plateaued last year. Ethanol futures slumped to the lowest in more than a decade in 2019, making it unprofitable to make the biofuel that accounts for about a third of demand for the U.S. corn crop. But cheap ethanol won’t save drivers much money: At current prices, filling up a Ford-F150 would only cost about a quarter less. The BP-branded Elliott Oil Co. has for about two weeks been selling some E15 in the small town of Osceola, CEO Andrew Woodard said. BP spokesman Mich...

Bloomberg/Fuel Fix: ... Thanks to booming shale production, the U.S. reduced shipments from the Persian Gulf to a 30-year low last year. Still, Middle East crude makes up more than 10% of U.S. imports. With new oil production records being set in the Permian Basin, the country’s energy growth engine, America’s thinning reliance on Middle East crude isn’t about to reverse course. Before the “shale revolution,” as American drillers call it, Gulf coast refiners invested millions of dollars to process relatively cheap heavy oil from the Middle East and Latin America. At the same time, shale oil is much lighter and lower in sulfur compared with supply from the Persian Gulf, and not ideal for most American refineries. ... One of the problems is that refiners are having to waste money on ethanol requirements that could be used to switch their operation completely to the light crude being produced here.  They are still diluting the heavy crude with the light and using more than they...

Fuel Fix: A group of oil-state senators including Texas's Ted Cruz and John Cornyn met with President Donald Trump Thursday to argue against increasing the volume of ethanol U.S. refineries are required to blend into the fuel supply. Following the meeting, Sen. Bill Cassidy, R-La., tweeted, "the president is very engaged on the issue, and feels as if we can work towards a solution which protects jobs." Trump has been working to increase ethanol demand, a valuable market for Midwestern corn farmers that are expected to be a key voting block in the 2020 presidential election. But refining companies have been pushing back, arguing their facilities are being put at risk. "Increases in biofuel mandates are likely to come from imported fuel and could increase the price at the pump," a group of 60 refinery managers representing companies including Phillips 66 and Valero wrote to Trump this week. "Regulatory costs would increase and second, the fuels our ...

Rigzone: U.S. oil demand over the past decade has remained in the 19-21 million b/d range. Crude oil production, meanwhile, has soared 150 percent to ~12.3 million b/d. As such, it would seem safe to assume that U.S. oil imports have plummeted in the shale-era since 2008. Interestingly though, this has not exactly been the case. Although declining, the U.S. still imports huge amounts of oil. In 2018, for instance, the U.S. imported 9.9 million b/d of crude oil and petroleum products from nearly 90 countries, albeit down from ~13 million b/d in 2008. Imports of crude over that time have fallen from 10 million b/d to 7 million b/d so far this year. So despite domestic production continuing to break records, the U.S. still imports 10 percent of the world’s total oil consumption. There are a variety of reasons why the U.S. still imports high volumes of petroleum. The primary reason is that the U.S. shale oil boom has yielded loads of high-quality, light, and sweet oil that has a highe...

Washington Examiner Editorial: Markets thrive on competition. Unfortunately, this doesn’t just apply to real economic markets. It also applies to markets for bad ideas and political pandering. With approximately 200 Democrats now running for president (we lost count a few weeks ago), the bidding to bribe Iowa caucusgoers is becoming intense. This is unfortunate not just because it is unseemly but also because the offers are coming at the expense of the nation’s well-being and the environment’s health. The worst pander so far comes from Sen. Amy Klobuchar, D-Minn. When she is not privately belittling her staff in ALL CAPS 4 a.m. emails, Klobuchar is attempting to gain traction in Iowa by fattening the wallets of ethanol barons. Her specific plan is to stop granting waivers to small refiners that let gasoline producers out of a small part of the requirement that they mix their product with large volumes of ethanol, which is economically unnecessary and environmentally harmful. Th...

Washington Examiner: The oil and ethanol industries showed Tuesday that they are eager to renew hostilities with each other over the Environmental Protection Agency’s renewable fuel program and ethanol mandate, no matter that the government is closed. American Petroleum Institute CEO Mike Sommers kicked things off while presenting the first State of American Energy report he's published as head of the oil and natural gas industry's lead trade group. In the recommendations for the EPA’s Renewable Fuel Standard, the report called for sunsetting the ethanol mandate. For the oil industry, it is simple: The program, which mandates that they blend billions of gallons of corn ethanol in gasoline and costs them billions of dollars, is “outdated and broken,” while placing consumers at risk. Therefore, the program should be either killed off or "significantly overhauled,” the report said. The mandate has been a point of contention between the industries, lawmakers, and even ...

Washington Examiner: In 2007, at the urging of President George W. Bush, Democrats and Republicans together created a massive new mandate for the production and sale of biofuels. It was environmental folly. The public is familiar with that part of the renewable fuel mandate about ethanol, the politically favored, wasteful, and environmentally destructive product that is blended into gasoline thanks to federal law. But the biodiesel side of this business is less well-known. It has, though, produced an environmental catastrophe in East Asia, the defilement of tens of millions of acres of rainforest, and increased net carbon emissions, the New York Times reported this week . The 2007 measure stimulated worldwide manufacture of vegetable oils for biodiesel because it created huge new and artificial demand for soy oil and then palm oil, which is even cheaper. These crops required farmland in suitable climates, which meant tens of millions of acres of jungle in Malaysia and Indonesia were...

Fuel Fix: Anticipation is building around President Donald Trump's visit to Iowa on Tuesday. After months of hinting that he would lift restrictions limiting the sales of E-15 - a type of gasoline with a higher concentration of ethanol - the White House is signalling the president is going ahead. Reuters reported Monday Trump would make the announcement in Washington Tuesday, as part of a strategy to boost Republican candidates in the Midwest ahead of the midterm elections, citing sources familiar with the president's plans. Expanded E-15 sales pose a threat for Gulf Coast oil refineries, which have already watched U.S. gasoline demand plateau with the roll out of more efficient vehicles. A group of 20 Republican and Democrat senators, including Sen. John Cornyn, R-Texas, wrote to Trump last week urging him not to lift restrictions on ethanol sales. "We are concerned that doing so would do nothing to address the policies impacting refinery jobs, could hurt mill...

Fuel Fix: More than 15 billion gallons of ethanol flows into the U.S. fuel supply each year, big business for midwestern corn farms and a drag on oil refineries in Texas. But with the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency now exempting smaller refineries from the federal mandate they blend ethanol into the fuel supply, farmers and ethanol producers are arguing ethanol demand could be in decline. "The waivers have resulted in a significant decline in demand for biofuels and have cost U.S. corn growers, ethanol producers, and ethanol blenders more than $5 billion in economic losses," the Renewable Fuel Association said in a statement last weekend. Now with the EPA scheduled to finalize the ethanol requirement for 2019 in a few months time, ethanol lobbyists are pressing the government to increase the mandate above the 15 billions gallons the agency proposed earlier this year to account for the exemptions. ... Oil and gas lobbyists are fighting any move to raise the man...

Jazz Shaw: ... The bigger surprise is the fact that ethanol production and combustion significantly increases the production of nitrous oxides (Nox). This combines with oxygen in the atmosphere when exposed to sunlight, producing ozone. Now, when we have ozone far up in the atmosphere it helps shield the planet from the sun’s natural radiation, which is a good thing. But ground-level ozone produces no such benefit and actually contributes to the formation of smog and leads to respiratory ailments for many people. ... Ethanol really sucks for small engines such as lawn equipment and boat motors.  I recently had to spend over $100 to get my lawn mower running again.  I recently found a local station that sells non ethanol gas and even though it cost 50 percent more it is worth to avoid the costly repairs.  Ethanol was supposed to reduce US dependency on foreign oil, but in fact, it is now increasing it because refineries are having to buy RIN's rather ...

Washington Examiner: Pruitt gets hit from all sides over ethanol mandate I am not in the refinery business or the corn business. I am a consumer and I hate ethanol with a passion. It continually ruins tools and causes repair expenses.  Remove the mandate and let it compete like other products.   While it was originally touted as a means to reduce reliance on imported oil, it is having the opposite effect now because the RINs expenses are diverting money that could be used for investing in equipment changes to refine the abundant shale light crude.  Because the US does not have adequate refining capacity for light crude it is exporting it while continuing to import heavy crude.   What looked logical at the time it was passed looks nuts today unless you are on teh side of the rent seeking agribusinesses.

Bloomberg/Fuel Fix: A tentative deal to revamp U.S. biofuel policy appeared to collapse Tuesday when the White House indefinitely delayed an expected announcement of the planned changes, according to three people familiar with the move. The postponement of a directive outlining the deal may mark the end of the latest effort to overhaul the American renewable fuel mandate with an eye on lowering costs for refiners forced to blend biofuels into gasoline, said the people, who asked not to be named to discuss internal deliberations. Despite months of negotiations, the Trump administration has struggled to find a balance on a contentious issue that divides two of the president’s key constituencies: Midwest farmers and refiners in Pennsylvania. On the campaign trail in 2016, Donald Trump promised to support ethanol, a pledge embraced by farmers who grow the corn used to produce it. Senator Chuck Grassley, a Republican from Iowa who threatened to call for Environmental Protection Agen...