Time exposes the biofuel scam

Time has a good article called The Clean Energy Scam on how the currently-politically-correct biofuel movement is exasperating environmental, economic, and social issues, not fixing them.

Meanwhile, by diverting grain and oilseed crops from dinner plates to fuel tanks, biofuels are jacking up world food prices and endangering the hungry. The grain it takes to fill an SUV tank with ethanol could feed a person for a year. Harvests are being plucked to fuel our cars instead of ourselves. The U.N.’s World Food Program says it needs $500 million in additional funding and supplies, calling the rising costs for food nothing less than a global emergency. Soaring corn prices have sparked tortilla riots in Mexico City, and skyrocketing flour prices have destabilized Pakistan, which wasn’t exactly tranquil when flour was affordable.

And let’s not forget – politicians don’t lead, they follow whatever is politically popular, which is why all of the politicians, in spite of the evidence, pander to Iowa.

If biofuels are the new dotcoms, Iowa is Silicon Valley, with 53,000 jobs and $1.8 billion in income dependent on the industry. The state has so many ethanol distilleries under construction that it’s poised to become a net importer of corn. That’s why biofuel-pandering has become virtually mandatory for presidential contenders. John McCain was the rare candidate who vehemently opposed ethanol as an outrageous agribusiness boondoggle, which is why he skipped Iowa in 2000. But McCain learned his lesson in time for this year’s caucuses. By 2006 he was calling ethanol a “vital alternative energy source.”

Good article. Read it.