Strange Bedfellows Unite to Pressure Oil Giants

WASHINGTON - Americans — from nonprofit groups to the Rockefeller family — are starting to fight back against the petroleum industry, which is earning record profits as consumers face spiraling gas prices.

Co-Op America, with around 70,000 members, has launched a campaign aimed at forcing ExxonMobil to invest more of its profits into exploring alternative energy sources, while another group seeks to change the priorities of the powerful American Petroleum Institute.

Ahead of this month’s ExxonMobil stockholders meeting, 66 of 78 adult heirs of John D. Rockefeller, who founded the company’s predecessor, Standard Oil, supported four resolutions aimed at making the oil giant hew a more environmentally friendly and forward-looking line.

Exxon saw a record $40.6 billion profit in 2007, and is headed in the same direction for 2008, earning over $10 billion during the first quarter. It plans to spend $25 billion on research and exploration of carbon-based fuels.

“We think a few of those billions should go towards looking to the future and the kind of energy we might need,” Neva Rockefeller Godwin, an economist and great-granddaughter of John D. Rockefeller, stated at a May 1 press conference.

The unlikely alliance that sprung up to grab the attention of ExxonMobil CEO Rex Tillerson at the May shareholder meeting also includes other institutional investors, such as state pension funds in California and Connecticut whose managers fear that the company’s refusal to look beyond carbon fuels could lead to its downfall.

One of the shareholder resolutions called on Tillerson to step down as chairman and hand this role to an outsider. According to Co-Op America, this would “create more independent oversight of the company and its role in climate change.” Rockefeller Godwin complained that Exxon treats shareholders as “pesky” annoyances who “act as if they own the company.”

While the resolutions are not binding, support from shareholders is significant. Last year 31 percent of Exxon’s shareholders supported a resolution asking the company to reduce its greenhouse gas emissions, which had risen by 5 percent in 2006. Some 40 percent supported changes in ExxonMobil’s management structure. Other resolutions called for greater investment in research into alternative energy and climate change.

Similar pressure is now being brought to bear on the American Petroleum Institute (API), whose largest member is ExxonMobil. The Washington, D.C.-based group Earthworks launched a campaign today demanding that API forgo a planned multi-million dollar public relations campaign in favor of investment in alternative energy sources.

Earthworks President Bruce Baizel told API in a letter: “The best public relations your industry could buy would be to take the funds you have earmarked for this campaign and spend them, starting today, to create and bring to market renewable, sustainable energy sources.”

Like Co-Op America, which has asked consumers around the country to send a letter to ExxonMobil, Earthworks‘ “No Dirty Energy” campaign will rely on consumers to put pressure on oil companies. The campaign also intends to “expose irresponsible corporate behavior” while highlighting companies that “simultaneously advance their corporate interest and the public good,” Baizel stated in a Wednesday press release.

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43 Comments so far

willybill May 15th, 2008 12:46 pm

Sure..they already raked in OBSCENE profits via the bush’s policies and NOW we are going to ask them to give a crap about the environment. PULLLEEASSSE!

Paul Revere May 15th, 2008 1:01 pm

Exxon: this is just pure, P.R., BS! The only thing that would make a real difference, would be a world wide boycott of Exxon-Mobile.

Pojer May 15th, 2008 1:34 pm

I am discouraged that Co-op America put out this anti-ethanol article: http://www.coopamerica.org/about/newsroom/editorials/fuels0807.cfm

The advisory board of the Institute for Ecological Agriculture all agree that ethanol and its byproducts are THE way to build a sustainable future. Here is why:

1. Almost every country can become energy-independent. Anywhere that has sunlight and land can produce alcohol from plants. Brazil, the fifth largest country in the world imports no oil, since half its cars run on alcohol fuel made from sugarcane, grown on 1% of its land.

2. We can reverse global warming. Since alcohol is made from plants, its production takes carbon dioxide out of the air, sequestering it, with the result that it reverses the greenhouse effect (while potentially vastly improving the soil). Recent studies show that in a permaculturally designed mixed-crop alcohol fuel production system, the amount of greenhouse gases removed from the atmosphere by plants—and then exuded by plant roots into the soil as sugar—can be 13 times what is emitted by processing the crops and burning the alcohol in our cars.

3. We can revitalize the economy instead of suffering through Peak Oil. Oil is running out, and what we replace it with will make a big difference in our environment and economy. Alcohol fuel production and use is clean and environmentally sustainable, and will revitalize families, farms, towns, cities, industries, as well as the environment. A national switch to alcohol fuel would provide many millions of new permanent jobs.

4. No new technological breakthroughs are needed. We can make alcohol fuel out of what we have, where we are. Alcohol fuel can efficiently be made out of many things, from waste products like stale donuts, grass clippings, food processing waste-even ocean kelp. Many crops produce many times more alcohol per acre than corn, using arid, marshy, or even marginal land in addition to farmland. Just our lawn clippings could replace a third of the autofuel we get from the Mideast.

5. Unlike hydrogen fuel cells, we can easily use alcohol fuel in the vehicles we already own. Unmodified cars can run on 50% alcohol, and converting to 100% alcohol or flexible fueling (both alcohol and gas) costs only a few hundred dollars. Most auto companies already sell new dual-fuel vehicles.

6. Alcohol is a superior fuel to gasoline! It’s 105 octane, burns much cooler with less vibration, is less flammable in case of accident, is 98% pollution-free, has lower evaporative emissions, and deposits no carbon in the engine or oil, resulting in a tripling of engine life. Specialized alcohol engines can get at least 22% better mileage than gasoline or diesel.

7. It’s not just for gasoline cars. We can also easily use alcohol fuel to power diesel engines, trains, aircraft, small utility engines, generators to make electricity, heaters for our homes—and it can even be used to cook our food.

8. Alcohol has a proud history. Gasoline is a refinery’s toxic waste; alcohol fuel is liquid sunshine. Henry Ford’s early cars were all flex-fuel. It wasn’t until gasoline magnate John D. Rockefeller funded Prohibition that alcohol fuel companies were driven out of business.

9. The byproducts of alcohol production are clean, instead of being oil refinery waste, and are worth more than the alcohol itself. In fact, they can make petrochemical fertilizers and herbicides obsolete. The alcohol production process concentrates and makes more digestible all protein and non-starch nutrients in the crop. It’s so nutritious that when used as animal feed, it produces more meat or milk than the corn it comes from. That’s right, fermentation of corn increases the food supply and lowers the cost of food.

10. Locally produced ethanol supercharges regional economies. Instead of fuel expenditures draining capital away to foreign bank accounts, each gallon of alcohol produces local income that gets recirculated many times. Every dollar of tax credit for alcohol generates up to $6 in new tax revenues from the increased local business.

11. Alcohol production brings many new small-scale business opportunities. There is huge potential for profitable local, integrated, small-scale businesses that produce alcohol and related byproducts, whereas when gas was cheap, alcohol plants had to be huge to make a profit.

12. Scale matters—most of the widely publicized potential problems with ethanol are a function of scale. Once production plants get beyond a certain size and are too far away from the crops that supply them, closing the ecological loop becomes problematic. Smaller-scale operations can more efficiently use a wide variety of crops than huge specialized one-crop plants, and diversification of crops would largely eliminate the problems of monoculture.

13. The byproducts of small-scale alcohol plants can be used in profitable, energy-efficient, and environmentally positive ways. For instance, spent mash (the liquid left over after distillation) contains all the nutrients the next fuel crop needs and can return it back to the soil if the fields are close to the operation. Big-scale plants, because they bring in crops from up to 45 miles away, can’t do this, so they have to evaporate all the water and sell the resulting byproduct as low-price animal feed,which accounts for half the energy used in the plant.

The advisory board consists of:

The Advisory Board to the International Institute for Ecological Agriculture helps us develop programs to meet the growing needs of our students and our planet.

Daniel Claudio Martinez Carrera, Ph.D.
President Institute of Applied Neotropical Mycology
Editor, International Applied Mycology Magazine
Professor of Mycology, University of Mexico, Puebla Campus

William (Bill) C. Holmberg
Lt.Col. USMC (Ret.)
Chair, New Uses Council
Pushing Frontiers of the Biobased Economy

Héctor Sáez, Ph.D.
Environmental Program and Community Development and Applied Economics
University of Vermont

Jeannette Diaz-Veizades, Ph.D.
Co-Director, Harvest for Haiti
Executive Faculty, Saybrook Graduate School

Gar Smith
Editor Emeritus, Not Man Apart
Friends of the Earth

Ernest Callenbach
Author—Ecotopia & Ecotopia Emerging
Editor Emeritus, University of California Press

Bob Theis A.I.A.
Architect/ Permaculture Designer

Joe Jordan Ph.D.
Researcher/educator
NASA Ames Research Center

Noah Owusu-Takyi Ph.D.
President
Insitute of Tropical Agriculture-Ghana

Larry Korn
Editor/Translator
Author— One Straw Revolution

David Sutton Ph.D.
Ecological Biologist
President-The Antaeus Organization

Ryan Sarnataro
Treasurer/ ED emeritus
Ecologicial Farming Association

Felipe Montoya-Greenheck Ph.D.
Founder/Director —MILPA Foundation-Costa Rica

Daniel Robin
President Integrated Investments Intl.

Deborah Mytels
Outreach Director —Foundation for Global Community

You can learn more of the truth here

PaulLoeb May 15th, 2008 1:49 pm

Excellent campaign, but not actually that strange bedfellows, more ironic ones, since that generaton of Rockefellers, like Neva Goodwin, actually tend to support a lot of good environmental and progressive causes.

Hollow point May 15th, 2008 2:13 pm

Pojer May:
great points you passed on. Brazil and CUBA grow cane for fuel but even take the sugar out before making alcohol. People will jump on saying it takes up the place of food. What we need are the numbers of litres/Gal per acre sugarcane can produce then.

All this simple solution and the Canadian Gov is trying to allow ESSO/Exxon to drain thousands of sq miles of swamps and bogs to allow open pit tar sand mining. Enviro groups are fighting it. Grow cane and leave the stuff in the ground forever.

curmudgeon99 May 15th, 2008 2:29 pm

Pojer,

What is the guarantee that sufficient food crops will be grown, and not have all arable land turned over to making fuel?

Did you guys miss the food riots in at least 36 countries that have taken place in recent days?

Arvy May 15th, 2008 2:43 pm

Americans — from nonprofit groups to the Rockefeller family — are starting to fight back against the petroleum industry …

Is it just my imagination, or is CD’s choice of lead articles becoming more superficial lately.

The “stange bedfellows” notion makes for a cute headline, but readers might want to examine the Rockefeller family involvement just a little more closely before drawing any premature conclusions about their supporting role in this “fighting back” scenario. As Sharon Smith has pointed out elsewhere:

[T]he indignation of today’s generation of Rockefellers—who inherited their own exorbitant wealth from Standard Oil, Exxon-Mobil’s parent corporation—is aimed more at ensuring the continued financial health of the family’s trust funds than concern for the future of the world’s population. As Peter O’Neill, great-great-grandson of John D. Rockefeller, commented at the press conference, “I have a world of respect for what the company has done well. In fact, if the next 20 years of the energy business were just going to be about oil and gas, we probably wouldn’t be here today.”

AnguselheimStudios May 15th, 2008 3:29 pm

Curmudgeon99 has a point. Ethanol is a great idea, but in addition we need to reduce our dependency on fuel altogether. More people need to start carpooling, taking mass transit, and walking (could curb Amerika’s obesity problem too). If we could convince the majority of the world to conserve energy, we might even be able to get by completely off what we throw away.

pcsmith May 15th, 2008 3:39 pm

Pojer,
There are a couple things wrong with the alcohol as fuel idea:
1) How many crops can be planted and harvested before the soil is too depleted to grow anything? Brazil may soon find out, since most, if not all of its sugarcane is planted on cleared rain forest, which is actually not very good soil. Propping up the soil with petroleum-based fertilizers is self-defeating.

2) To stop Global Warming, ultimately, all our power will have to be produced without burning ANYTHING. Wind, solar, hydro-electric, tidal, geo-thermal. These are the only truly sustainable sources of power - and in a non-gluttonous society, they should be enough.

liberal with an attitude May 15th, 2008 4:01 pm

pojer.

one comment you made i take issue with. its too far gone. if the world as a whole began this campaign during the 70’s during Carters Presidency then i would say theres hope. but at this point if every human did everything they can, it wouldnt help. i’ve studied man, alot, and the more i study the more i am convinced that mans evolution is to his own extinction. everything about man who is at the top of the evolutionary ladder is meant to phase himself out. he consumes yet doesnt replenish. but thats another topic, look as an individual I have replaced every lightbulb in my house with earth bulbs, I have hi efficiency heating and air equipment, both my wife and i drive hybrids, we recycle, we use green products aroind the house, we wear hemp clothing, we do everything we can think of. but every single human being on the face of the earth needs to be doing these things right now, not tomorrow, and all of these things like alternative fuels and cafe standards, for these things to go into effect it will take a decade, well guess what? the cafe standards need to be 40 mpg right now not ten years from now, and there shouldnt be any car on the road right now except for hybrids and alt fuel, and SUV’s should be illegal immediately no exceptions, and so on and so on….

So you see by the time these things happen its relatively meaningless, if you follow James Lovelocks theories as I do, Florida is history and Philadelphia is beach front property in our lifetime, not in 100 years but more like in 35-40 years, most of the scientists that met in London in what was it 02 or 04 have pretty much said its too far gone, we subscribe to Scientific American and the condition of the Artic Icecap is terrifying, its all blue, meaning full of water and melted from the inside out, the sea is going to rise substantially within the next several years, all of NYC is history, the crab population in the pacific northwest is already dead from the oceans getting too cold and a lack of vegetation on the floor….So its already happening and for the most part irreversable, but that doesnt mean we shouldnt try everything we can, being moral towards mother earth is never wrong

liberal with an attitude May 15th, 2008 4:06 pm

oh and btw, alot of the remedies that are now being considered are chock full of problems, there was a great article in Mother Jones about ethanol, unless they figure something out between the amount of energy and fossil fuels it takes to produce ethanol and the worldwide food shortage that will be caused by ethanol production, its not a viable option. start thinking about garbage fuels and waste product fuels…..the world is already facing a food crisis

Dem02020 May 15th, 2008 4:20 pm

EVERBODY HAS HEARD the anecdote, that when the famous bank robber Willie Sutton was asked “Why do you rob banks?”

He responded “Because that’s where the money is”.

It’s a ridiculous waste of time, and a foolish leap of a wild imagination, to think for even one minute that the corporate officers and principal stockholders of Exxon-Mobil, care in the least about complaints and petitions and whatever… they’re not about to look at the fabulous sums of money they are accumulating, and at the fabulously wealthy lifestyles they can afford as a result, and say “yeah, I guess we’ll turn our backs on all of this money, because of those complaints and petitions”… and Exxon-Mobil’s (and Chevron’s at al) lobby in Washington D.C., the American Petroleum Institute, feels about the same way.

Want to know where to focus and direct your complaints and petitions in this matter?

To the U.S. Congress, and for that matter, to the Legislature of your State.

“Why complain and petition the Legislature in this matter?”

“Because that’s where the Laws are made.”

larchlion May 15th, 2008 4:24 pm

this is on all of us as much as it is on anyone. we have to reduce demand. and to do that, we have to 1) change our lifestyles 2) get money out of politics, PARTICULARLY the road lobby and 3) rebuild our cities to be multi-modal.

www.carfreeinbigd.blogspot.com

good2go May 15th, 2008 4:39 pm

Pojer is probably wondering why the three other bloggers who addressed him here didn’t read the post and didn’t go to the website.
Here’s another chance.
http://www.alcoholcanbeagas.com?bid=2&aid=CD8&opt=

Demonstorm May 15th, 2008 4:56 pm

Ethanol isn’t the answer. It is like putting bubblegum on a hole in a dam - it might slow the destruction of the dam, but it certainly won’t prevent it long-term. What we need is some REAL investment in R & D on RENEWABLES. Ethanol still uses petroleum. We need to get OFF the black goo and go to 100% renewable energy. We have the technology already: solar, wind, hydro-electric, hydrogen, etc. More in this direction and less on petroleum and all other carbon-based forms of energy is the only direction we should be moving on. This includes the infrastructure planning. Electric cars charged by solar panels on the roof are already available, but still too expensive for the average joe. And even ethanol-based fuels contribute to global warming.

This is just a half-assed measure that doesn’t fix the problem. If we’re going to fix it, let’s do it right and let’s do it all the way.

The only way Americans will EVER finally start screaming for change in earnest will be when gas and home-heating energy cost so much that they really feel a severe pain in the pocketbook. We ain’t there yet, folks. $3.75-$4.00/gallon hurts, but not enough. I want to see $10.00/gallon gas and $800/month home utility bills. THAT will finally jumpstart the move in the right direction, because in America, the only time most people give a rat’s ass about anything is when it hurts their wallets.

kaimu May 15th, 2008 5:17 pm

ALOHA !!

Who is the single largest global consumer of not only oil but many other resources? THE US MILITARY …

Who is one of the single biggest global polluters? THE US MILITARY …

Which country is the single most largest consumer of the Earth’s resources … THE USA!!

How many of you here posting today have iPods and computers and SUVs and houses and a crap load of junk that the average African won’t see in a lifetime yet EXXON is the problem! PLEASE-E-E indeed!

Look in the mirror then look at the two party aristocracy that has been in control of the US EMPIRE for over 100 years running all sorts of global threats and wars on your behalf to SPEND and SHOP!!

My main concern is not how much profit EXXON makes but what the US government is doing with those profits they tax to make government BIGGER and BIGGER and our military BIGGER and BIGGER! The US and State governments profit from oil and gas taxes far more than EXXON does. How much has the US government spent to find oil? How much profits does the US government make? The US government and the State of California make 100% profit from taxes that grow larger and larger every day yet they are still broke and trying to find new ways to tax the hell out of anything with a pulse 25/8! Doesn’t matter if its Bush or Obama! They are both tax and spend jugernauts making the USA the CONSUMPTION KING it has been for 100 years now!

If you live in the USA you are a CONSUMER period! Even in your little Prius you are still a CONSUMER, chewing up tons of resources to pay for your bloated lifestyle supported by your bloated government you keep voting into power every four years. It does not matter which party you vote for you are voting for MASS CONSUMPTION on a scale that would cause the ROMANS great shame!

The EMPIRE will fall … the sooner the better in my book!

joseph paquette May 15th, 2008 5:27 pm

We should all join the Ralph Nader movement.
Oil should become a Utility as it has become
a neccessity…

bbr-001 May 15th, 2008 5:32 pm

Pojer May: I’ve read the 1% of Brazil’s area sugarcane thing before. I’d like to know if its true and how much it actually amounts to. Corn based ethanol as practiced in the US is a total loser (except for those who get subsidies and inflated prices), and it would die the day after Washington pulls the money. It yields how many gallons per acre? Or was it acres per gallon?

Dow Chemical just announced a big investment in cellulosic ethanol. I think they want to find a one step bug that ferments cellulose. Converting cellulose to something fermentable must still have some problems.

Talking about pressure, Big Oil wants us to “Cry Uncle” folks. Add up ANWR, Chuckchi Sea and the other area(s)in Alaska and there is maybe 20 years worth of oil and gas. Cal Thomas (well known “conservative thinker”) says 30. Its also something for Big Oil to do besides hook up the tankers in Saudi Arabia, fill ‘em up, and drive the crude home. Do we sell out for Big Oil price extortion?

bbr-001 May 15th, 2008 5:46 pm

Aloha yourself Kaimu!

You’re right. Fossil fuel has enabled our country to go from 150 million people with farmers and villages in the country and city folk in row homes with fewer than one car per family to 250 million and the unsustainable suburban sprawl we have today. We all like our toys, too. We are spoiled and getting back to the simplicity of 100 years ago won’t be easy for many of us.

And we all share in the reponsibility for the neocons trying to grab Iraq’s oil to sustain what can’t be sustained.

randolfski May 15th, 2008 7:13 pm

Demonstorm……..right on brother. Pojer, i would be willing to bet
you work in either a lobbying firm representing the corn industry, or you
are a PR flack for Cargill or ConAgra. Your argument holds up only if you agree
a certain number of people must starve to death so you can continue
driving your hummer as far and as fast as you wish. You really swallowed
the “blue pill” hook, line and sinker i think. Try the red one next time.

From “The Matrix”

The blue pill will leave us as we are, in a life consisting of habit, of things we
believe we know. We are comfortable, we do not need truth to live. The blue pill
symbolises commuting to work every day, or brushing your teeth.

The red pill is an unknown quantity. We are told that it can help us to find the truth.
We don’t know what that truth is, or even that the pill will help us to find it.
The red pill symbolises risk, doubt and questioning. In order to answer the question,
you can gamble your whole life and world on a reality you have never encountered.

whatfools May 15th, 2008 8:10 pm

Perhaps corn based ethanol is the solution after all. We call this product ‘Burbon’ and as little as one gallon will keep most drivers off the road for a whole month. A single SUV full will do a person for two years and save the cost of gas, tyres, car repairs and new cars. There will be no more traffic jams either.

bob2274 May 15th, 2008 9:23 pm

Kaimu, wow.

Look what we are doing right now is only the short term answer. Whatever happened to looking towards the future? We all know biofuel won’t last forever. We are tearing down rainforests to do it, and on top of that it’s not so the poorest people on the earth might have a little more food, it’s so Americans can feel more secure about what their car is putting into the air. Biofuel is only making a small difference. Put your eyes on the bid picture.

There are three main reasons why we find ourselves in a pickle that DO NOT involve our government or the Saudis. (1) millions of other things we own are putting out emmissions and doing harm to the enviroment
(2) in third world countries, people don’t have even access to new biofuels and energy-efficient stuff. they run on whatever they have, even if it’s horrible for the planet.
(3) we are not doing enough in the R & D sector. we say we’ll research these biofuels first, then the next step, etc. we can’t afford to do that. we need to go all out to get anything done in a reasonable amount of time.

Basically, one little lab in a scientific-research dept. isn’t going to save the world. WE have to. Americans have to give up some of their toys. Even the poverty line in the U.S. is richer than most of the world. We’ll live. Next, we have to carry our share of the load by helping others. No more armchair enviromentalism. If the rest of the world doesn’t get on the same eco page as us, they’ll always be lagging behind. We have to support the world up. We live in one of the most powerful countries in the world. It’s our responsibility to do this.

A key to fixing the enviromental problem is to fix other problems, like food shortages. The better off the quality of life is, the more efficient we can become. By raising all countries to a global standard, we can do this.

If you work towards this one goal, you begin to find out that a lot of problems even begin to fix themselves…

abuelito May 15th, 2008 10:19 pm

Pojer-
Don’t ever try to tell us to feed corn to cars. All the available land we have is needed for food. Too many people in the Global South have already been kicked off their farms by agribusiness multinationals driven only be greed, as usual, and not a thought or concern about our hungry fellow humans.

Kaimu is right about our excessive consumption. We need to invest more time and effort into designing a sustainable economy for our planet. It will NOT be global captitalism, and it will not keep on using more and more fuel to make more products. We really have no other choice than to stop consuming so much of our planet year after year.

look at this:
http://www.monbiot.com/archives/2007/11/06/an-agricultural-crime-against-humanity/

feed people not cars!

Maplefudge May 15th, 2008 11:21 pm

When I read a buncha passionate smarty-pants types debating this stuff I am duty bound to present this link:

http://www.earth-policy.org/Books/PlanB_contents.htm

A lot of the heavy lifting has been done already. Please check it out. It’s chock full of hope and logic! Let’s get on with putting PLAN B into effect!

Cuzz Plan A is business as usual and it sucks the farts out of dead seagulls.

mikepeters May 15th, 2008 11:53 pm

If we could get the American KIA in Iraq to be buried with flags over their coffins emblazened with Exxon’s Logo, that might help provoke thought.

And keep updated-daily body counts of our KIA at all gas stations posted next to the gas prices.

earthbound May 16th, 2008 12:13 am

It takes a lot of good clean ground water to produce all those biofuels. This may be a major problem with disastrous results.

kitty_tc May 16th, 2008 1:14 am

“Feed people not cars!”…

…STRAW MAN, and a stupid one at that. What makes you think if biofuels and meat production stopped tomorrow that the excess grain would find it’s way to the poor? What fantasy world does that happen in? In the real world, supply and demand are carefully gamed to ensure maximum profits, and if there is not enough demand to sustain “acceptable” prices, then supply is constricted. Production is cut, surpluses are destroyed or left to rot, but what does NOT happen is it gets passed around to the poor hungry masses free of charge. Again, what fantasy world does this happen in? To the capitalists running food production, “demand” means paying customers, not hungry mouths without means to pay. If biofuels and meat production didn’t exist, agribusiness would find another way to maintain the prices they want. They always have, and until and unless the system changes they always will.

That’s not even getting into the fact that much of the increase in food prices is due to the price of oil, which increases the cost of petroleum-based farming chemicals, cost of fuel to run farm machinery, and fuel costs in transportation / shipping.

But nah, let’s nitpick anything that comes along and keep on using oil until we’re all extinct. Great idea.

PaulMagillSmith May 16th, 2008 4:17 am

Corn is not the answer (except as food), but hemp and even switchgrass could be. There are about 40,000 miles of interstates in the US and it could be grown in the medians & hundred foot strips leading to the fence on either side of the road. This displaces no farmland used for food crops, and road crews wouldn’t waste all the fuel for useless aesthetic trimming, only several times a year at harvest time. This also takes care of the problem Pojer mentions about efficiency by keeping the crop close to the processing plant. Hemp also provides more oil per acre than any other crop, and folks, even with ethanol as fuel some form of oil is necessary for lubrication.

While I’m a major adherent of geothermal (it’s in all 50 states BTW) for heating homes, and generating electricity where possible, wave/tidal, solar, & wind (for electricy) seem the ‘greenest’ sustainable completely renewable avenues. I’m also realistic enough to realize we need a transition fuel until we can go almost fully electric; corn ethanol & nuclear don’t work in a fully sustainable ‘people friendly’ manner. Ethanol might work FOR AWHILE, but ultimately we should wean ourselves from burning anything for fuel (including uranium, which is a finite resource just like oil) especially coal, and particularly tar sand or shale, which takes massive energy to extract from, and is very very polluting. Where once fossil fuels were a boon to get civilization advancing, they are now a bane unless our wish is to eradicate ourselves as a species. Nuclear is in the same passe category.

We must crawl before we walk, walk before we run, and run before we can drive, but one thing is for certain; if we stand here and constantly argue we get nowhere. For awhile we will likely need multiple systems to wean ourselves from our fossil fuel addiction, sort through them, weed out the duds, and strive for economies of scale that will really work. Another vital place we need work is reaching ZPG (Zero Population Growth), another related issue, but crucial nonetheless.

bill May 16th, 2008 5:43 am

Here is a solution: Free Public Transit
.
http://frepubtra.blogspot.com
.

hedology May 16th, 2008 6:55 am

A large part of every dollar of carbon profit, should be donated or grabbed as necessary, for the abatement of the effects of burning that carbon, or replacing the need to burn it. Any other policy is global suicidal madness. While development and growth of alternatives proceeds, switchover from carbon dependency requires scarcity and high cost of coal/oil , and high investment in what should be much cheaper alternatives, considering the long term cost.

WmC May 16th, 2008 9:04 am

Pojer et. al.

Do calculation of opportunity costs, and you’ll realize the folly of ethanol.

I live in SW Florida and did some quick calculations: If a Florida farmer converts an acre of sugar cane to ethanol, he can produce approximately 870 gallons a year or 66 million BTU’s worth. On the other hand, if he “farms” an acre of PV solar collectors operating at slightly under 20% efficiency (thus yielding 1 kwh/sq.m/day) he can generate 5 trillion BTU’s per acre per year. Seventy-five times (!) the energy of sugar cane ethanol with no soil depletion, no water, fertilizer, pesticide or herbicide use and no labor–either his own or illegal aliens’.

It’s worth noting that sugar cane yields twice the ethanol that corn does, but it requires 4600 units of water to produce 1 unit of ethanol, and 3 BTU’s of energy to raise, process and transport 4 BTU’s worth of corn ethanol.

Government should get out of the business of subsidizing/mandating ethanol and into the business of subsidizing solar and wind farms.

WmC May 16th, 2008 9:09 am

Here’s a blogger who used a different set of calculations that yielded essentially the same answer that I came up with.

http://fatknowledge.blogspot.com/2006/03/sugar-cane-vs-solar-panels.html

jclientelle May 16th, 2008 9:23 am

pcsmith said it for me.
1. We should be developing wind, solar, hydro-electric, tidal and geothermal power.

2. Those with bloated consumption habits should cut back.

3. We should respect and cherish food and the soil to grow food and not become profligate for a quick fix and an easy dollar.

We have spent lots of $$$ to build an enormous network of highways, paved over so much land, hemmed ourselves in so we have no choice but use cars. Now people have good ideas about how to re-purpose parts of this gigantic investment. Wow! I’m excited.

I have seen so many creative ideas for using highway medians and right of way on Common Dreams: Bicycle paths, mono-rails, growing non-food sources of ethanol such as hemp or switchgrass. (Giving credit where it is due, Lady Bird Johnson was one of the first, growing wild Texas blue bonnets rather than lawn grass.)

good2go - puleeeeez stop telling us to read books and go to sites sponsored by the corn growers. I have done it and I am still not at all convinced that ethanol is a good idea.

good2go May 16th, 2008 10:16 am

jclientelle, the site is not sponsored by a corn grower, it has an endorsement of the book from its president. Also, do some homework, please read who American Corn Growers Assn are. They are a progressive force in farming, not the same as NCGA. They are aware Mr. Blume does NOT think corn is the best crop to use. Or did you read that far?
What exactly did you read that did not convince you? Or are you just saying the book is too much work and you don’t want to learn more?
The points 2 and 3 that PCsmith makes are correct. It’s in the book. Now, have a closer look, will you?
Biofuels are the ONLY path to reverse global warming. Yes, you heard right.
http://www.biopact.com/2006/12/carbon-negative-biofuels-from.html
http://biopact.com/2007/12/report-finds-revenues-from.html
http://biopact.com/2008/03/scientists-discover-genetics-of.html

Happy reading! (the whole book, if you please) THEN you can dissect and criticize.

kelmer May 16th, 2008 10:49 am

If people have to choose between food and fuel for cars, they fudge it, but if they had to choose between booze for them or as fuel for cars, suddenly you would hear about the benefits of walking.

jclientelle May 16th, 2008 11:17 am

good2go - you are soooo arrogant. Nobody else on Common Dreams argues that someone has to plow through a particular reading list, in its entirety, (”the whole book please”) in order to have an opinion. I have looked at some of your sites, thank you. Perhaps the sites are not “sponsored” by the ethanol industry, but it sure looks that way from the content. If it walks like a duck….

Excuse me for saying so (you have annoyed me so much) but I understand science and chemistry, and will not be bullied. For the most part, turning plants into alcohol for burning is a gimmick that has horrible impacts of food supply and land use. It is a distraction from good energy solutions which is promoted by those who can profit in the immediate future.

Jim Glover May 16th, 2008 11:22 am

When things loosen up, We will grow hemp (save the buds for medical emergencies) and use the leftover for Paper, clothes and of course fuel… waste not.

Bio fuel is not all bad, just like alcohol but we don’t have to use anything that is also food. Alcohol can be made from most trash that is polluting the planet…but making it from corn grains is dumb and will raise food prices much higher.

good2go May 16th, 2008 11:37 am

jclientelle, I think the pot is calling the kettle black!
I believe I asked you to read one book and a few articles. How “arrogant” is that?
You understand biology? Fine. It doesn’t show. Try again to convince me you do. Tell me permaculture is ridiculous.
The people who will profit from the program Mr. Blume lays out are you and me and small communities. Not big energy corporations who will do their damndest to control wind (see Boone Pickens) , solar, geothermal, you name it. Anyone can make ethanol. Not everyone can build solar panels or wind turbines, clean though they are.
You see clearly biopact.com is not sponsored by the ethanol industry. You must have spent three seconds looking at those pieces which would indicate maybe you don’t know much about science after all or were too intimidated.
Bullied? I thought encouraging knowledge and seeking out information was a boon, not a curse. I believe the word is “convinced” and what you are saying is you will not be convinced. Instead
I would encourage you to keep an open mind. You have fallen prey to many stereotypes about ethanol and intelligent people should always be questioning stereotypes, look beneath the surface and see what’s there. Did you know there is a concentrated PR campaign taking place to blame ethanol for all the world’s food problems? Gee, i wonder who would do that… maybe those who would profit from it in the immediate future, as you put it?

For those who keep insisting corn prices are the reason for masses starving, please note that there are no shortages of starch in the world. Protein and digestible fiber are what we need more of.

No, Virginia, Dave Blume does not have a Santa Claus in the ethanol industry. He is a radical loner, behooven to no one. To his detriment, probably. Please note the list of endorsers by Pojer in the earlier post. Not what I’d call people who look to profit in the immediate future from ethanol.

awegweiser May 16th, 2008 11:59 am

As has been said before - ethanol from corn is pure crap.
Perhaps a few independent farmers come out ahead but the majority of the prize goes to ADM, ConAgra and the other corporate guys - and with the help of our generous subsidies for a bogus substitute for petroleum.
Thanks to the Senators from Iowa, Nebraska and Kansas for their generous support of such a worthy cause.
Perhaps if the GOP gets their ass kicked in November, we may start growing food again while remaining grateful to Bush, Cheney and their oil company buddies for keeping gas prices up there.

iammyself May 16th, 2008 12:02 pm

Demonstorm

“The only way Americans will EVER finally start screaming for change in earnest will be when gas and home-heating energy cost so much that they really feel a severe pain in the pocketbook. We ain’t there yet, folks. $3.75-$4.00/gallon hurts, but not enough. I want to see $10.00/gallon gas and $800/month home utility bills. THAT will finally jumpstart the move in the right direction, because in America, the only time most people give a rat’s ass about anything is when it hurts their wallets.”

As much as I hate to admit it, I agree - though, I really don’t want to see $10/gallon gas - at least, not yet. As always, the poorer suffer first and mostly. We need to build some infrastructure to absorb the shock.

Having said that, Americans have proven, without a shadow of a doubt, that we finally act when we personally absolutely have to. Our wallets rule and that is, sadly, what dictates much change in our society. So, yes, bring on the higher prices, but hopefully we’ll have time to adjust. If our economy collapses, so does that of the rest of the world.

As for boycotting Exxon - haven’t touched their gas (oh, once I had to) since the Exxon Valdez crime.

jim_murray May 16th, 2008 1:57 pm

Arrogant? that’s what I call statement ” if our economy fails so does the whole world”

The only thing keeping Amerika afloat are the decay produced gases bloating the whole rotten carcass.

bbr-001 May 16th, 2008 6:15 pm

America is the heartbeat of the world economy.

Chevy is the heartbeat of America.

Atherosclerosis has set in.

kaimu May 17th, 2008 4:41 am

ALOHA !!

The heartbeat of the US economy is “debt”!!!

The American Dream is nothing but “debt” … How is it we Americans can have so much debt per capita?

DEBT has set in!

willybill May 15th, 2008 12:46 pm

Sure..they already raked in OBSCENE profits via the bush’s policies and NOW we are going to ask them to give a crap about the environment. PULLLEEASSSE!
Paul Revere May 15th, 2008 1:01 pm

Exxon: this is just pure, P.R., BS! The only thing that would make a real difference, would be a world wide boycott of Exxon-Mobile.
Pojer May 15th, 2008 1:34 pm

I am discouraged that Co-op America put out this anti-ethanol article: http://www.coopamerica.org/about/newsroom/editorials/fuels0807.cfm

The advisory board of the Institute for Ecological Agriculture all agree that ethanol and its byproducts are THE way to build a sustainable future. Here is why:

1. Almost every country can become energy-independent. Anywhere that has sunlight and land can produce alcohol from plants. Brazil, the fifth largest country in the world imports no oil, since half its cars run on alcohol fuel made from sugarcane, grown on 1% of its land.

2. We can reverse global warming. Since alcohol is made from plants, its production takes carbon dioxide out of the air, sequestering it, with the result that it reverses the greenhouse effect (while potentially vastly improving the soil). Recent studies show that in a permaculturally designed mixed-crop alcohol fuel production system, the amount of greenhouse gases removed from the atmosphere by plants—and then exuded by plant roots into the soil as sugar—can be 13 times what is emitted by processing the crops and burning the alcohol in our cars.

3. We can revitalize the economy instead of suffering through Peak Oil. Oil is running out, and what we replace it with will make a big difference in our environment and economy. Alcohol fuel production and use is clean and environmentally sustainable, and will revitalize families, farms, towns, cities, industries, as well as the environment. A national switch to alcohol fuel would provide many millions of new permanent jobs.

4. No new technological breakthroughs are needed. We can make alcohol fuel out of what we have, where we are. Alcohol fuel can efficiently be made out of many things, from waste products like stale donuts, grass clippings, food processing waste-even ocean kelp. Many crops produce many times more alcohol per acre than corn, using arid, marshy, or even marginal land in addition to farmland. Just our lawn clippings could replace a third of the autofuel we get from the Mideast.

5. Unlike hydrogen fuel cells, we can easily use alcohol fuel in the vehicles we already own. Unmodified cars can run on 50% alcohol, and converting to 100% alcohol or flexible fueling (both alcohol and gas) costs only a few hundred dollars. Most auto companies already sell new dual-fuel vehicles.

6. Alcohol is a superior fuel to gasoline! It’s 105 octane, burns much cooler with less vibration, is less flammable in case of accident, is 98% pollution-free, has lower evaporative emissions, and deposits no carbon in the engine or oil, resulting in a tripling of engine life. Specialized alcohol engines can get at least 22% better mileage than gasoline or diesel.

7. It’s not just for gasoline cars. We can also easily use alcohol fuel to power diesel engines, trains, aircraft, small utility engines, generators to make electricity, heaters for our homes—and it can even be used to cook our food.

8. Alcohol has a proud history. Gasoline is a refinery’s toxic waste; alcohol fuel is liquid sunshine. Henry Ford’s early cars were all flex-fuel. It wasn’t until gasoline magnate John D. Rockefeller funded Prohibition that alcohol fuel companies were driven out of business.

9. The byproducts of alcohol production are clean, instead of being oil refinery waste, and are worth more than the alcohol itself. In fact, they can make petrochemical fertilizers and herbicides obsolete. The alcohol production process concentrates and makes more digestible all protein and non-starch nutrients in the crop. It’s so nutritious that when used as animal feed, it produces more meat or milk than the corn it comes from. That’s right, fermentation of corn increases the food supply and lowers the cost of food.

10. Locally produced ethanol supercharges regional economies. Instead of fuel expenditures draining capital away to foreign bank accounts, each gallon of alcohol produces local income that gets recirculated many times. Every dollar of tax credit for alcohol generates up to $6 in new tax revenues from the increased local business.

11. Alcohol production brings many new small-scale business opportunities. There is huge potential for profitable local, integrated, small-scale businesses that produce alcohol and related byproducts, whereas when gas was cheap, alcohol plants had to be huge to make a profit.

12. Scale matters—most of the widely publicized potential problems with ethanol are a function of scale. Once production plants get beyond a certain size and are too far away from the crops that supply them, closing the ecological loop becomes problematic. Smaller-scale operations can more efficiently use a wide variety of crops than huge specialized one-crop plants, and diversification of crops would largely eliminate the problems of monoculture.

13. The byproducts of small-scale alcohol plants can be used in profitable, energy-efficient, and environmentally positive ways. For instance, spent mash (the liquid left over after distillation) contains all the nutrients the next fuel crop needs and can return it back to the soil if the fields are close to the operation. Big-scale plants, because they bring in crops from up to 45 miles away, can’t do this, so they have to evaporate all the water and sell the resulting byproduct as low-price animal feed,which accounts for half the energy used in the plant.

The advisory board consists of:

The Advisory Board to the International Institute for Ecological Agriculture helps us develop programs to meet the growing needs of our students and our planet.

Daniel Claudio Martinez Carrera, Ph.D.
President Institute of Applied Neotropical Mycology
Editor, International Applied Mycology Magazine
Professor of Mycology, University of Mexico, Puebla Campus

William (Bill) C. Holmberg
Lt.Col. USMC (Ret.)
Chair, New Uses Council
Pushing Frontiers of the Biobased Economy

Héctor Sáez, Ph.D.
Environmental Program and Community Development and Applied Economics
University of Vermont

Jeannette Diaz-Veizades, Ph.D.
Co-Director, Harvest for Haiti
Executive Faculty, Saybrook Graduate School

Gar Smith
Editor Emeritus, Not Man Apart
Friends of the Earth

Ernest Callenbach
Author—Ecotopia & Ecotopia Emerging
Editor Emeritus, University of California Press

Bob Theis A.I.A.
Architect/ Permaculture Designer

Joe Jordan Ph.D.
Researcher/educator
NASA Ames Research Center

Noah Owusu-Takyi Ph.D.
President
Insitute of Tropical Agriculture-Ghana

Larry Korn
Editor/Translator
Author— One Straw Revolution

David Sutton Ph.D.
Ecological Biologist
President-The Antaeus Organization

Ryan Sarnataro
Treasurer/ ED emeritus
Ecologicial Farming Association

Felipe Montoya-Greenheck Ph.D.
Founder/Director —MILPA Foundation-Costa Rica

Daniel Robin
President Integrated Investments Intl.

Deborah Mytels
Outreach Director —Foundation for Global Community

You can learn more of the truth here
PaulLoeb May 15th, 2008 1:49 pm

Excellent campaign, but not actually that strange bedfellows, more ironic ones, since that generaton of Rockefellers, like Neva Goodwin, actually tend to support a lot of good environmental and progressive causes.
Hollow point May 15th, 2008 2:13 pm

Pojer May:
great points you passed on. Brazil and CUBA grow cane for fuel but even take the sugar out before making alcohol. People will jump on saying it takes up the place of food. What we need are the numbers of litres/Gal per acre sugarcane can produce then.

All this simple solution and the Canadian Gov is trying to allow ESSO/Exxon to drain thousands of sq miles of swamps and bogs to allow open pit tar sand mining. Enviro groups are fighting it. Grow cane and leave the stuff in the ground forever.
curmudgeon99 May 15th, 2008 2:29 pm

Pojer,

What is the guarantee that sufficient food crops will be grown, and not have all arable land turned over to making fuel?

Did you guys miss the food riots in at least 36 countries that have taken place in recent days?
Arvy May 15th, 2008 2:43 pm

Americans — from nonprofit groups to the Rockefeller family — are starting to fight back against the petroleum industry …

Is it just my imagination, or is CD’s choice of lead articles becoming more superficial lately.

The “stange bedfellows” notion makes for a cute headline, but readers might want to examine the Rockefeller family involvement just a little more closely before drawing any premature conclusions about their supporting role in this “fighting back” scenario. As Sharon Smith has pointed out elsewhere:

[T]he indignation of today’s generation of Rockefellers—who inherited their own exorbitant wealth from Standard Oil, Exxon-Mobil’s parent corporation—is aimed more at ensuring the continued financial health of the family’s trust funds than concern for the future of the world’s population. As Peter O’Neill, great-great-grandson of John D. Rockefeller, commented at the press conference, “I have a world of respect for what the company has done well. In fact, if the next 20 years of the energy business were just going to be about oil and gas, we probably wouldn’t be here today.”
AnguselheimStudios May 15th, 2008 3:29 pm

Curmudgeon99 has a point. Ethanol is a great idea, but in addition we need to reduce our dependency on fuel altogether. More people need to start carpooling, taking mass transit, and walking (could curb Amerika’s obesity problem too). If we could convince the majority of the world to conserve energy, we might even be able to get by completely off what we throw away.
pcsmith May 15th, 2008 3:39 pm

Pojer,
There are a couple things wrong with the alcohol as fuel idea:
1) How many crops can be planted and harvested before the soil is too depleted to grow anything? Brazil may soon find out, since most, if not all of its sugarcane is planted on cleared rain forest, which is actually not very good soil. Propping up the soil with petroleum-based fertilizers is self-defeating.

2) To stop Global Warming, ultimately, all our power will have to be produced without burning ANYTHING. Wind, solar, hydro-electric, tidal, geo-thermal. These are the only truly sustainable sources of power - and in a non-gluttonous society, they should be enough.
liberal with an attitude May 15th, 2008 4:01 pm

pojer.

one comment you made i take issue with. its too far gone. if the world as a whole began this campaign during the 70’s during Carters Presidency then i would say theres hope. but at this point if every human did everything they can, it wouldnt help. i’ve studied man, alot, and the more i study the more i am convinced that mans evolution is to his own extinction. everything about man who is at the top of the evolutionary ladder is meant to phase himself out. he consumes yet doesnt replenish. but thats another topic, look as an individual I have replaced every lightbulb in my house with earth bulbs, I have hi efficiency heating and air equipment, both my wife and i drive hybrids, we recycle, we use green products aroind the house, we wear hemp clothing, we do everything we can think of. but every single human being on the face of the earth needs to be doing these things right now, not tomorrow, and all of these things like alternative fuels and cafe standards, for these things to go into effect it will take a decade, well guess what? the cafe standards need to be 40 mpg right now not ten years from now, and there shouldnt be any car on the road right now except for hybrids and alt fuel, and SUV’s should be illegal immediately no exceptions, and so on and so on….

So you see by the time these things happen its relatively meaningless, if you follow James Lovelocks theories as I do, Florida is history and Philadelphia is beach front property in our lifetime, not in 100 years but more like in 35-40 years, most of the scientists that met in London in what was it 02 or 04 have pretty much said its too far gone, we subscribe to Scientific American and the condition of the Artic Icecap is terrifying, its all blue, meaning full of water and melted from the inside out, the sea is going to rise substantially within the next several years, all of NYC is history, the crab population in the pacific northwest is already dead from the oceans getting too cold and a lack of vegetation on the floor….So its already happening and for the most part irreversable, but that doesnt mean we shouldnt try everything we can, being moral towards mother earth is never wrong
liberal with an attitude May 15th, 2008 4:06 pm

oh and btw, alot of the remedies that are now being considered are chock full of problems, there was a great article in Mother Jones about ethanol, unless they figure something out between the amount of energy and fossil fuels it takes to produce ethanol and the worldwide food shortage that will be caused by ethanol production, its not a viable option. start thinking about garbage fuels and waste product fuels…..the world is already facing a food crisis
Dem02020 May 15th, 2008 4:20 pm

EVERBODY HAS HEARD the anecdote, that when the famous bank robber Willie Sutton was asked “Why do you rob banks?”

He responded “Because that’s where the money is”.

It’s a ridiculous waste of time, and a foolish leap of a wild imagination, to think for even one minute that the corporate officers and principal stockholders of Exxon-Mobil, care in the least about complaints and petitions and whatever… they’re not about to look at the fabulous sums of money they are accumulating, and at the fabulously wealthy lifestyles they can afford as a result, and say “yeah, I guess we’ll turn our backs on all of this money, because of those complaints and petitions”… and Exxon-Mobil’s (and Chevron’s at al) lobby in Washington D.C., the American Petroleum Institute, feels about the same way.

Want to know where to focus and direct your complaints and petitions in this matter?

To the U.S. Congress, and for that matter, to the Legislature of your State.

“Why complain and petition the Legislature in this matter?”

“Because that’s where the Laws are made.”
larchlion May 15th, 2008 4:24 pm

this is on all of us as much as it is on anyone. we have to reduce demand. and to do that, we have to 1) change our lifestyles 2) get money out of politics, PARTICULARLY the road lobby and 3) rebuild our cities to be multi-modal.

www.carfreeinbigd.blogspot.com
good2go May 15th, 2008 4:39 pm

Pojer is probably wondering why the three other bloggers who addressed him here didn’t read the post and didn’t go to the website.
Here’s another chance.
http://www.alcoholcanbeagas.com?bid=2&aid=CD8&opt=
Demonstorm May 15th, 2008 4:56 pm

Ethanol isn’t the answer. It is like putting bubblegum on a hole in a dam - it might slow the destruction of the dam, but it certainly won’t prevent it long-term. What we need is some REAL investment in R & D on RENEWABLES. Ethanol still uses petroleum. We need to get OFF the black goo and go to 100% renewable energy. We have the technology already: solar, wind, hydro-electric, hydrogen, etc. More in this direction and less on petroleum and all other carbon-based forms of energy is the only direction we should be moving on. This includes the infrastructure planning. Electric cars charged by solar panels on the roof are already available, but still too expensive for the average joe. And even ethanol-based fuels contribute to global warming.

This is just a half-assed measure that doesn’t fix the problem. If we’re going to fix it, let’s do it right and let’s do it all the way.

The only way Americans will EVER finally start screaming for change in earnest will be when gas and home-heating energy cost so much that they really feel a severe pain in the pocketbook. We ain’t there yet, folks. $3.75-$4.00/gallon hurts, but not enough. I want to see $10.00/gallon gas and $800/month home utility bills. THAT will finally jumpstart the move in the right direction, because in America, the only time most people give a rat’s ass about anything is when it hurts their wallets.
kaimu May 15th, 2008 5:17 pm

ALOHA !!

Who is the single largest global consumer of not only oil but many other resources? THE US MILITARY …

Who is one of the single biggest global polluters? THE US MILITARY …

Which country is the single most largest consumer of the Earth’s resources … THE USA!!

How many of you here posting today have iPods and computers and SUVs and houses and a crap load of junk that the average African won’t see in a lifetime yet EXXON is the problem! PLEASE-E-E indeed!

Look in the mirror then look at the two party aristocracy that has been in control of the US EMPIRE for over 100 years running all sorts of global threats and wars on your behalf to SPEND and SHOP!!

My main concern is not how much profit EXXON makes but what the US government is doing with those profits they tax to make government BIGGER and BIGGER and our military BIGGER and BIGGER! The US and State governments profit from oil and gas taxes far more than EXXON does. How much has the US government spent to find oil? How much profits does the US government make? The US government and the State of California make 100% profit from taxes that grow larger and larger every day yet they are still broke and trying to find new ways to tax the hell out of anything with a pulse 25/8! Doesn’t matter if its Bush or Obama! They are both tax and spend jugernauts making the USA the CONSUMPTION KING it has been for 100 years now!

If you live in the USA you are a CONSUMER period! Even in your little Prius you are still a CONSUMER, chewing up tons of resources to pay for your bloated lifestyle supported by your bloated government you keep voting into power every four years. It does not matter which party you vote for you are voting for MASS CONSUMPTION on a scale that would cause the ROMANS great shame!

The EMPIRE will fall … the sooner the better in my book!
joseph paquette May 15th, 2008 5:27 pm

We should all join the Ralph Nader movement.
Oil should become a Utility as it has become
a neccessity…
bbr-001 May 15th, 2008 5:32 pm

Pojer May: I’ve read the 1% of Brazil’s area sugarcane thing before. I’d like to know if its true and how much it actually amounts to. Corn based ethanol as practiced in the US is a total loser (except for those who get subsidies and inflated prices), and it would die the day after Washington pulls the money. It yields how many gallons per acre? Or was it acres per gallon?

Dow Chemical just announced a big investment in cellulosic ethanol. I think they want to find a one step bug that ferments cellulose. Converting cellulose to something fermentable must still have some problems.

Talking about pressure, Big Oil wants us to “Cry Uncle” folks. Add up ANWR, Chuckchi Sea and the other area(s)in Alaska and there is maybe 20 years worth of oil and gas. Cal Thomas (well known “conservative thinker”) says 30. Its also something for Big Oil to do besides hook up the tankers in Saudi Arabia, fill ‘em up, and drive the crude home. Do we sell out for Big Oil price extortion?
bbr-001 May 15th, 2008 5:46 pm

Aloha yourself Kaimu!

You’re right. Fossil fuel has enabled our country to go from 150 million people with farmers and villages in the country and city folk in row homes with fewer than one car per family to 250 million and the unsustainable suburban sprawl we have today. We all like our toys, too. We are spoiled and getting back to the simplicity of 100 years ago won’t be easy for many of us.

And we all share in the reponsibility for the neocons trying to grab Iraq’s oil to sustain what can’t be sustained.
randolfski May 15th, 2008 7:13 pm

Demonstorm……..right on brother. Pojer, i would be willing to bet
you work in either a lobbying firm representing the corn industry, or you
are a PR flack for Cargill or ConAgra. Your argument holds up only if you agree
a certain number of people must starve to death so you can continue
driving your hummer as far and as fast as you wish. You really swallowed
the “blue pill” hook, line and sinker i think. Try the red one next time.

From “The Matrix”

The blue pill will leave us as we are, in a life consisting of habit, of things we
believe we know. We are comfortable, we do not need truth to live. The blue pill
symbolises commuting to work every day, or brushing your teeth.

The red pill is an unknown quantity. We are told that it can help us to find the truth.
We don’t know what that truth is, or even that the pill will help us to find it.
The red pill symbolises risk, doubt and questioning. In order to answer the question,
you can gamble your whole life and world on a reality you have never encountered.
whatfools May 15th, 2008 8:10 pm

Perhaps corn based ethanol is the solution after all. We call this product ‘Burbon’ and as little as one gallon will keep most drivers off the road for a whole month. A single SUV full will do a person for two years and save the cost of gas, tyres, car repairs and new cars. There will be no more traffic jams either.
bob2274 May 15th, 2008 9:23 pm

Kaimu, wow.

Look what we are doing right now is only the short term answer. Whatever happened to looking towards the future? We all know biofuel won’t last forever. We are tearing down rainforests to do it, and on top of that it’s not so the poorest people on the earth might have a little more food, it’s so Americans can feel more secure about what their car is putting into the air. Biofuel is only making a small difference. Put your eyes on the bid picture.

There are three main reasons why we find ourselves in a pickle that DO NOT involve our government or the Saudis. (1) millions of other things we own are putting out emmissions and doing harm to the enviroment
(2) in third world countries, people don’t have even access to new biofuels and energy-efficient stuff. they run on whatever they have, even if it’s horrible for the planet.
(3) we are not doing enough in the R & D sector. we say we’ll research these biofuels first, then the next step, etc. we can’t afford to do that. we need to go all out to get anything done in a reasonable amount of time.

Basically, one little lab in a scientific-research dept. isn’t going to save the world. WE have to. Americans have to give up some of their toys. Even the poverty line in the U.S. is richer than most of the world. We’ll live. Next, we have to carry our share of the load by helping others. No more armchair enviromentalism. If the rest of the world doesn’t get on the same eco page as us, they’ll always be lagging behind. We have to support the world up. We live in one of the most powerful countries in the world. It’s our responsibility to do this.

A key to fixing the enviromental problem is to fix other problems, like food shortages. The better off the quality of life is, the more efficient we can become. By raising all countries to a global standard, we can do this.

If you work towards this one goal, you begin to find out that a lot of problems even begin to fix themselves…
abuelito May 15th, 2008 10:19 pm

Pojer-
Don’t ever try to tell us to feed corn to cars. All the available land we have is needed for food. Too many people in the Global South have already been kicked off their farms by agribusiness multinationals driven only be greed, as usual, and not a thought or concern about our hungry fellow humans.

Kaimu is right about our excessive consumption. We need to invest more time and effort into designing a sustainable economy for our planet. It will NOT be global captitalism, and it will not keep on using more and more fuel to make more products. We really have no other choice than to stop consuming so much of our planet year after year.

look at this:
http://www.monbiot.com/archives/2007/11/06/an-agricultural-crime-against-humanity/

feed people not cars!
Maplefudge May 15th, 2008 11:21 pm

When I read a buncha passionate smarty-pants types debating this stuff I am duty bound to present this link:

http://www.earth-policy.org/Books/PlanB_contents.htm

A lot of the heavy lifting has been done already. Please check it out. It’s chock full of hope and logic! Let’s get on with putting PLAN B into effect!

Cuzz Plan A is business as usual and it sucks the farts out of dead seagulls.
mikepeters May 15th, 2008 11:53 pm

If we could get the American KIA in Iraq to be buried with flags over their coffins emblazened with Exxon’s Logo, that might help provoke thought.

And keep updated-daily body counts of our KIA at all gas stations posted next to the gas prices.
earthbound May 16th, 2008 12:13 am

It takes a lot of good clean ground water to produce all those biofuels. This may be a major problem with disastrous results.
kitty_tc May 16th, 2008 1:14 am

“Feed people not cars!”…

…STRAW MAN, and a stupid one at that. What makes you think if biofuels and meat production stopped tomorrow that the excess grain would find it’s way to the poor? What fantasy world does that happen in? In the real world, supply and demand are carefully gamed to ensure maximum profits, and if there is not enough demand to sustain “acceptable” prices, then supply is constricted. Production is cut, surpluses are destroyed or left to rot, but what does NOT happen is it gets passed around to the poor hungry masses free of charge. Again, what fantasy world does this happen in? To the capitalists running food production, “demand” means paying customers, not hungry mouths without means to pay. If biofuels and meat production didn’t exist, agribusiness would find another way to maintain the prices they want. They always have, and until and unless the system changes they always will.

That’s not even getting into the fact that much of the increase in food prices is due to the price of oil, which increases the cost of petroleum-based farming chemicals, cost of fuel to run farm machinery, and fuel costs in transportation / shipping.

But nah, let’s nitpick anything that comes along and keep on using oil until we’re all extinct. Great idea.
PaulMagillSmith May 16th, 2008 4:17 am

Corn is not the answer (except as food), but hemp and even switchgrass could be. There are about 40,000 miles of interstates in the US and it could be grown in the medians & hundred foot strips leading to the fence on either side of the road. This displaces no farmland used for food crops, and road crews wouldn’t waste all the fuel for useless aesthetic trimming, only several times a year at harvest time. This also takes care of the problem Pojer mentions about efficiency by keeping the crop close to the processing plant. Hemp also provides more oil per acre than any other crop, and folks, even with ethanol as fuel some form of oil is necessary for lubrication.

While I’m a major adherent of geothermal (it’s in all 50 states BTW) for heating homes, and generating electricity where possible, wave/tidal, solar, & wind (for electricy) seem the ‘greenest’ sustainable completely renewable avenues. I’m also realistic enough to realize we need a transition fuel until we can go almost fully electric; corn ethanol & nuclear don’t work in a fully sustainable ‘people friendly’ manner. Ethanol might work FOR AWHILE, but ultimately we should wean ourselves from burning anything for fuel (including uranium, which is a finite resource just like oil) especially coal, and particularly tar sand or shale, which takes massive energy to extract from, and is very very polluting. Where once fossil fuels were a boon to get civilization advancing, they are now a bane unless our wish is to eradicate ourselves as a species. Nuclear is in the same passe category.

We must crawl before we walk, walk before we run, and run before we can drive, but one thing is for certain; if we stand here and constantly argue we get nowhere. For awhile we will likely need multiple systems to wean ourselves from our fossil fuel addiction, sort through them, weed out the duds, and strive for economies of scale that will really work. Another vital place we need work is reaching ZPG (Zero Population Growth), another related issue, but crucial nonetheless.
bill May 16th, 2008 5:43 am

Here is a solution: Free Public Transit
.
http://frepubtra.blogspot.com
.
hedology May 16th, 2008 6:55 am

A large part of every dollar of carbon profit, should be donated or grabbed as necessary, for the abatement of the effects of burning that carbon, or replacing the need to burn it. Any other policy is global suicidal madness. While development and growth of alternatives proceeds, switchover from carbon dependency requires scarcity and high cost of coal/oil , and high investment in what should be much cheaper alternatives, considering the long term cost.
WmC May 16th, 2008 9:04 am

Pojer et. al.

Do calculation of opportunity costs, and you’ll realize the folly of ethanol.

I live in SW Florida and did some quick calculations: If a Florida farmer converts an acre of sugar cane to ethanol, he can produce approximately 870 gallons a year or 66 million BTU’s worth. On the other hand, if he “farms” an acre of PV solar collectors operating at slightly under 20% efficiency (thus yielding 1 kwh/sq.m/day) he can generate 5 trillion BTU’s per acre per year. Seventy-five times (!) the energy of sugar cane ethanol with no soil depletion, no water, fertilizer, pesticide or herbicide use and no labor–either his own or illegal aliens’.

It’s worth noting that sugar cane yields twice the ethanol that corn does, but it requires 4600 units of water to produce 1 unit of ethanol, and 3 BTU’s of energy to raise, process and transport 4 BTU’s worth of corn ethanol.

Government should get out of the business of subsidizing/mandating ethanol and into the business of subsidizing solar and wind farms.
WmC May 16th, 2008 9:09 am

Here’s a blogger who used a different set of calculations that yielded essentially the same answer that I came up with.

http://fatknowledge.blogspot.com/2006/03/sugar-cane-vs-solar-panels.html
jclientelle May 16th, 2008 9:23 am

pcsmith said it for me.
1. We should be developing wind, solar, hydro-electric, tidal and geothermal power.

2. Those with bloated consumption habits should cut back.

3. We should respect and cherish food and the soil to grow food and not become profligate for a quick fix and an easy dollar.

We have spent lots of $$$ to build an enormous network of highways, paved over so much land, hemmed ourselves in so we have no choice but use cars. Now people have good ideas about how to re-purpose parts of this gigantic investment. Wow! I’m excited.

I have seen so many creative ideas for using highway medians and right of way on Common Dreams: Bicycle paths, mono-rails, growing non-food sources of ethanol such as hemp or switchgrass. (Giving credit where it is due, Lady Bird Johnson was one of the first, growing wild Texas blue bonnets rather than lawn grass.)

good2go - puleeeeez stop telling us to read books and go to sites sponsored by the corn growers. I have done it and I am still not at all convinced that ethanol is a good idea.
good2go May 16th, 2008 10:16 am

jclientelle, the site is not sponsored by a corn grower, it has an endorsement of the book from its president. Also, do some homework, please read who American Corn Growers Assn are. They are a progressive force in farming, not the same as NCGA. They are aware Mr. Blume does NOT think corn is the best crop to use. Or did you read that far?
What exactly did you read that did not convince you? Or are you just saying the book is too much work and you don’t want to learn more?
The points 2 and 3 that PCsmith makes are correct. It’s in the book. Now, have a closer look, will you?
Biofuels are the ONLY path to reverse global warming. Yes, you heard right.
http://www.biopact.com/2006/12/carbon-negative-biofuels-from.html
http://biopact.com/2007/12/report-finds-revenues-from.html
http://biopact.com/2008/03/scientists-discover-genetics-of.html

Happy reading! (the whole book, if you please) THEN you can dissect and criticize.
kelmer May 16th, 2008 10:49 am

If people have to choose between food and fuel for cars, they fudge it, but if they had to choose between booze for them or as fuel for cars, suddenly you would hear about the benefits of walking.
jclientelle May 16th, 2008 11:17 am

good2go - you are soooo arrogant. Nobody else on Common Dreams argues that someone has to plow through a particular reading list, in its entirety, (”the whole book please”) in order to have an opinion. I have looked at some of your sites, thank you. Perhaps the sites are not “sponsored” by the ethanol industry, but it sure looks that way from the content. If it walks like a duck….

Excuse me for saying so (you have annoyed me so much) but I understand science and chemistry, and will not be bullied. For the most part, turning plants into alcohol for burning is a gimmick that has horrible impacts of food supply and land use. It is a distraction from good energy solutions which is promoted by those who can profit in the immediate future.
Jim Glover May 16th, 2008 11:22 am

When things loosen up, We will grow hemp (save the buds for medical emergencies) and use the leftover for Paper, clothes and of course fuel… waste not.

Bio fuel is not all bad, just like alcohol but we don’t have to use anything that is also food. Alcohol can be made from most trash that is polluting the planet…but making it from corn grains is dumb and will raise food prices much higher.
good2go May 16th, 2008 11:37 am

jclientelle, I think the pot is calling the kettle black!
I believe I asked you to read one book and a few articles. How “arrogant” is that?
You understand biology? Fine. It doesn’t show. Try again to convince me you do. Tell me permaculture is ridiculous.
The people who will profit from the program Mr. Blume lays out are you and me and small communities. Not big energy corporations who will do their damndest to control wind (see Boone Pickens) , solar, geothermal, you name it. Anyone can make ethanol. Not everyone can build solar panels or wind turbines, clean though they are.
You see clearly biopact.com is not sponsored by the ethanol industry. You must have spent three seconds looking at those pieces which would indicate maybe you don’t know much about science after all or were too intimidated.
Bullied? I thought encouraging knowledge and seeking out information was a boon, not a curse. I believe the word is “convinced” and what you are saying is you will not be convinced. Instead
I would encourage you to keep an open mind. You have fallen prey to many stereotypes about ethanol and intelligent people should always be questioning stereotypes, look beneath the surface and see what’s there. Did you know there is a concentrated PR campaign taking place to blame ethanol for all the world’s food problems? Gee, i wonder who would do that… maybe those who would profit from it in the immediate future, as you put it?

For those who keep insisting corn prices are the reason for masses starving, please note that there are no shortages of starch in the world. Protein and digestible fiber are what we need more of.

No, Virginia, Dave Blume does not have a Santa Claus in the ethanol industry. He is a radical loner, behooven to no one. To his detriment, probably. Please note the list of endorsers by Pojer in the earlier post. Not what I’d call people who look to profit in the immediate future from ethanol.
awegweiser May 16th, 2008 11:59 am

As has been said before - ethanol from corn is pure crap.
Perhaps a few independent farmers come out ahead but the majority of the prize goes to ADM, ConAgra and the other corporate guys - and with the help of our generous subsidies for a bogus substitute for petroleum.
Thanks to the Senators from Iowa, Nebraska and Kansas for their generous support of such a worthy cause.
Perhaps if the GOP gets their ass kicked in November, we may start growing food again while remaining grateful to Bush, Cheney and their oil company buddies for keeping gas prices up there.
iammyself May 16th, 2008 12:02 pm

Demonstorm

“The only way Americans will EVER finally start screaming for change in earnest will be when gas and home-heating energy cost so much that they really feel a severe pain in the pocketbook. We ain’t there yet, folks. $3.75-$4.00/gallon hurts, but not enough. I want to see $10.00/gallon gas and $800/month home utility bills. THAT will finally jumpstart the move in the right direction, because in America, the only time most people give a rat’s ass about anything is when it hurts their wallets.”

As much as I hate to admit it, I agree - though, I really don’t want to see $10/gallon gas - at least, not yet. As always, the poorer suffer first and mostly. We need to build some infrastructure to absorb the shock.

Having said that, Americans have proven, without a shadow of a doubt, that we finally act when we personally absolutely have to. Our wallets rule and that is, sadly, what dictates much change in our society. So, yes, bring on the higher prices, but hopefully we’ll have time to adjust. If our economy collapses, so does that of the rest of the world.

As for boycotting Exxon - haven’t touched their gas (oh, once I had to) since the Exxon Valdez crime.
jim_murray May 16th, 2008 1:57 pm

Arrogant? that’s what I call statement ” if our economy fails so does the whole world”

The only thing keeping Amerika afloat are the decay produced gases bloating the whole rotten carcass.
bbr-001 May 16th, 2008 6:15 pm

America is the heartbeat of the world economy.

Chevy is the heartbeat of America.

Atherosclerosis has set in.
kaimu May 17th, 2008 4:41 am

ALOHA !!

The heartbeat of the US economy is “debt”!!!

The American Dream is nothing but “debt” … How is it we Americans can have so much debt per capita?

DEBT has set in!

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