Ethanol 'the answer,' auto execs tell Bush (AP/CNN)

[eppur_se_muova]

WASHINGTON (AP) -- President Bush, seeking to rev up support for his energy plan, praised domestic automakers Monday for building more "flexible fuel" vehicles capable of running on ethanol and biodiesel blends.

"That's a major technological breakthrough for the country," Bush said. "If you want to reduce gasoline usage like I believe we need to do so for national security reasons as well as for environmental concerns, the consumer has got to be in a position to make a rational choice."

Bush said he appreciated "that American automobile manufacturers recognize the reality of the world in which we live in and are using new technologies to use the consumers different options."

Bush met with General Motors Corp. chairman and chief executive Rick Wagoner, Ford Motor Co. chief executive Alan Mulally and DaimlerChrysler AG's Chrysler Group chief executive Tom LaSorda. They discussed Bush's support for flex-fuel vehicles and his administration's proposal to reduce gas consumption by 20 percent in 10 years.

The three auto executives reiterated their commitment to double their production of flexible fuel vehicles to about 2 million a year by 2010.
***
more: http://www.cnn.com/2007/TECH/03/26/bush.automakers.ap/index.html

Well, that's it ... discussion over! :eyes: Never mind that the quotes in the article emphasize the need for exploring a variety of solutions, and maintaining flexibility. "Ethanol is the answer" makes for a much grabbier headline!

[phantom power]

1. These are the same geniuses who think SUVs with 4-liter engines are still "the anwer" too

[yellowcanine]

2. Someone is really blowing smoke if they actually said that. Ethanol may be part of the

answer, particularly digested biomass ethanol (probably NOT corn based ethanol over the long term), but it is certainly not THE answer and I would think auto execs would know that.

[msongs]

3. ethanol is a welfare scam for the corn industry - only a minor future player

the only thing good ethanol can do is replace a small amount of imported oil and that is all.

corn based ethanol raises the price of all corn FOOD products.

From what I have read in many sources,it is energy inefficient, has a high cost for the return.

rather than given welfare to corporate farmers, we should be promoting alternatives.

Msongs
www.msongs.com

[GliderGuider]

4. These are just "don't spook the horses" noises.

These kinds of statements are intended purely for public consumption, to keep Joe and Jane Sixpack from panicking. Nobody who knows anything believes this crap, and these guys are plenty well informed.

[sam sarrha]

5. i heard it takes almost a yearof food corn for an african to make an SUV tank full of ethanol

sorry that was so hard to say

[louis-t]

6. Didn't dumbass say hydrogen was the answer?

[GliderGuider]

7. Hydrogen is sooo last year....

[Kolesar]

15. And long after battery powered cars were abandoned...eom

[Javaman]

8. Answer to what? all his monetary needs? nt

[Nihil]

11. The answer to all his questions

... or should it be ...

[Javaman]

16. LOL nt

[Ready4Change]

9. "the answer"=Least costly for car manufacturers.

It has nothing to do with effectiveness of fuel production, use of cropland, sustainability, etc...

It's purely because gasoline engines can be converted to burn ethanol with inexpensive modifications on the assembly line, for which customers can be overcharged.

And cars get bad milage on ethanol, which means big sales for fuel providers.

[hatrack]

10. Shouldn't that be "Ethanol 'The Straw'" - as in "the one at which we can grasp"?

:rofl:

[razzleberry]

12. anything with an internal combustion engine ...

would be OK with the auto execs.

Big Oil hates ethanol, btw.
ethanol displaces gasoline in the 'blend', E85, E10, whatever.

[eppur_se_muova]

13. They've always hated it, all the way back to the earliest days of automobiles.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=115&topic_id=51906&mesg_id=52158

"Ordinary alcohol--ethanol--easily made from agricultural crops such as corn, provided a possible solution because it could boost efficient fuel burning, but it would take up about 10 percent of the volume of a gas tank. Furthermore, ethanol could not be patented, nor could its production or price be controlled by the car and fuel companies."

The entry at the link describes some of the dire consequences of big oil's aversion to ethanol.

[ramapo]

14. Makes no sense

Probably that's why it is seen as our savior

[Eclipsenow]

17. Even the AMA gets it!

Even the Australian Medical Association (AMA) raised humanitarian concerns in their submission to the Federal Senate Committee on peak oil. They write:

Whilst the AMA supports the use of ethanol and biodiesal from a human health perspective we recognise the potentially prohibitive environmental costs and conflict between land use for food and that for fuel particularly in so-called developing countries. Hence although we support the use of both ethanol and biodiesal great care is needed to ensure it is produced in an environmentally sustainable fashion and does not compete with food production capacity in developing countries. See Submission 88

http://www.aph.gov.au/Senate/committee/rrat_ctte/oil_supply/submissions/sublist.htm

What about this quote?

One tankful of the latest craze in alternative energy could feed one person for a year, Lester Brown tells Fortune.

"We are facing an epic competition between the 800 million motorists who want to protect their mobility and the two billion poorest people in the world who simply want to survive. In effect, supermarkets and service stations are now competing for the same resources.

This year cars, not people, will claim most of the increase in world grain consumption. The problem is simple: It takes a whole lot of agricultural produce to create a modest amount of automotive fuel.

The grain required to fill a 25-gallon SUV gas tank with ethanol, for instance, could feed one person for a year. If today's entire U.S. grain harvest were converted into fuel for cars, it would still satisfy less than one-sixth of U.S. demand."

Lester R. Brown is president of the Earth Policy Institute and author of "Plan B 2.0: Rescuing a Planet Under Stress and a Civilization in Trouble."

http://money.cnn.com/magazines/fortune/fortune_archive/2006/08/21/8383659/index.htm