I thought I would start a new thread specific for the use of ethanol.

The development and use of ethanol is clearly not the answer to foreign dependency on oil. It would surely raise the economic standards in this country to alarming rates. Think about it...what do we use corn for? Bread, milk, meat, eggs...it is endless. In this country we can barely afford ourselves now, with taxes, insurance and gas/oil prices. And now it will be corn and anything associated with it. Which is everything! The old 'supply and demand' will be the rule.

Not to mention the added cost for our auto industry to make the previsions for engines to preform as well as they do with gasoline. And will the foreign automakers, bow to our needs for ethanol running engines?

We need to watch this unfold very closely and see which direction our politicians are going in.

I think that they are going too fast with this ethanol. There should be more research done first since it will hurt the economy in differently than the oil.

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I think that they are going too fast with this ethanol. There should be more research done first since it will hurt the economy in differently than the oil.

You got that right....how about the government subsidizing horses with feed for 5 years per household, and of course depending on how many people need one....keep the buses for school but give all those workers a horse to get to work....if there are folks offened then give them a bike(change your own tires)........

Ethanol isn't the cure all that they think it is. Using it as an additive will help but not burning all alcohol in the gas tank. Alcohol has less power than gas does therefore you'll burn more ethanol and get worse mileage than with gas. The answer may be hybrids if they can make them dependable.

Has anybody brought up that the production of ethanol actually puts more pollutants into the atmosphere than the production and use of gasoline?

http://www.dailygazette.com

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SCHENECTADY
Corn-based ethanol push puts toll on dairy prices
BY JASON SUBIK Gazette Reporter

   Most pizza lovers are not in the habit of ordering corn as a topping, but corn is driving up the cost of every slice nonetheless.
   Fireside Pizzeria manager Eli Nahass said he’s been in the business of pizza for 29 years. He said this past year has seen the most rapid surge in cheese prices of his career.
   “It’s gone up and down before, but never like this,” he said. According to the U.S. Department of Agriculture, the local wholesale cheese price in June was $1.85 per pound, up more than 50 percent from last year, when it was $1.21 per pound.
   Nahass said he blames cheese costs on the federal government’s push for greater ethanol fuel production. Ethanol fuel in the United States is primarily made from corn, which is also the major source of dairy cattle feed. The USDA expects corn use for ethanol to double in 2007 over 2005 levels. More than 4 billion bushels — nearly a third of the total U.S. corn harvest — could be going toward ethanol production by 2009.
   “I would assume that greater use of corn for ethanol is increasing the costs for corn and grains and that raises costs for dairy farmers and that gets passed onto us,” Nahass said. “We basically just have to deal with it because you can’t keep raising prices [but] at some point down the line, [pizza] prices may have to be adjusted again.”
   Corn futures prices have been trading at the Chicago Mercantile Exchange at more than $3 a bushel the last several months, up from the $2 range this time last year. Paul Lichorat, the owner of Geppetto’s Restaurant, said he has been forced to spend more time at his restaurant as a full-time cook to mitigate rising overhead from increases in cheese and gasoline prices that have been eating away at his profit margins.
   “We’ve been just biting the bullet on this,” Lichorat said. “You don’t want to raise prices or mix [cheese] blends. People remember when you do that.”
   Milk prices also continue to rise. The federally regulated milk price per hundred weight for the Boston area, which includes the New York Capitol Region, is $24.16, up from $21.09 in June and $19.17 in May. USDA statistician Kathleen Kelly said part of the increase in dairy prices is because of slower growth in production. She said last year production levels rose at 5 or 6 percent some months, but have slowed to 1 to 2 percent in 2007 despite rising demand.
   “Cow feed is expensive in part because there is less corn available because of increased ethanol production, also regional concerns about growth hormones in milk have discouraged production,” she said.
   Kelly said consumer concerns about synthetic recombinant bovine growth hormone, which stimulates greater milk production, have led many farmers to stop using it. The push for purely organic milk production has roots in possible links between the synthetic growth hormone and obesity and cancer rates in people. There are also fewer dairy farmers, according the New York Farm Bureau, a lobbying organization for farmers, which estimates that between 2005 and 2006, New York lost 460 dairy farms, a 7.2 percent decline. Christopher Galen, National Milk Producers Federation vice president of communications, said both supply-side costs and increasing demand-side pressure have led to rising dairy prices.
   “A lot of [the increased prices] are because of the global bull market for milk,” he said.
   The NMPF estimates that U.S. export of dairy products has increased 75 percent in the last five years, to now account for 9.3 percent of total dairy production. Galen attributed the gains to Asian consumers westernizing their diets and a persistent drought in Australia, which has hurt agricultural production for that traditional supplier of dairy to Asia. He said normally, increased demand would stimulate greater production, but the cost of cow feed has taken away much of the gain for dairy farmers from higher prices.
   “We’ve got to have a more rational approach to renewable fuels than just focusing on corn-based ethanol,” Galen said.
   Galen said the NMPF, which lobbies Congress, favors more cellulosebased ethanol production to reduce demand for feed commodities like soy beans and corn. He said milk prices will likely taper off after August, according to the predictions made by dairy futures traders.

Now this is what we've been saying all along! We are not ready nor are we equiped to produce more ethanol. And unfortunatly, we know that and so do the Saudi's! Whether it be oil or ethanol...we're gonna be paying through the nose!

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Kelly said consumer concerns about synthetic recombinant bovine growth hormone, which stimulates greater milk production, have led many farmers to stop using it. The push for purely organic milk production has roots in possible links between the synthetic growth hormone and obesity and cancer rates in people.

Would you give the hormone(something like it,,,the human version) to breast feeding mother??? Essentially that is what milk from a cow is-----breast milk...only we call them teets.......

Many pediatricians are saying that these growth hormones are causing 'little girls' to 'develop sooner than they normally would. Now, I don't call that something I'd want to give my kids. And organic, can be just as bad. It's a buyer beware thing!

Maybe Mr. Nahass over at the Fireside Pizzeria should reinvest all the money he's making selling video crack (A.K.A. QuickDraw) into cheese.  Just roll it up.  My wife and I used to enjoy going there the couple times that we did years ago.  Think we went twice, looking to have a nice meal.  First time was great.  Second time, they had the video crack in every corner of the store and we decided that we wouldn't go back.  My wife couldn't stand it being there, and it was right in the corner of my eye where I just couldn't ignore it.  Too bad.  It was really good food and from what I remember, there were OK prices, but I don't have to worry about that anymore.

That video crack pervades everywhere in NYS.....the taxpayers must be duped somehow.....we think we are getting something for our hard earned $$ being poured down the belly of "the beast"......yet we complain about our taxes.....BTW...where does all that 'extra' cash go??????

Gee...the government is so concerned about lack of farmers...well what the hell...they allow other countries to sell them to this country. The government outsourced our farmers!!!!

http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20070720/lf_nm/brazil_cane_cutter_dc

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Ethanol boom transforms work in Brazil cane fields
By Inae Riveras

PRADOPOLIS, Brazil (Reuters) - Melquiades Soares, with a sixth grade education, became a cane cutter in Brazil's center-south at age 16, following in the footsteps of his mother, a 40 year veteran of Sao Paulo's cane fields.

Cane cutting, an exhausting job once done by slaves, has been among the only means for survival for young Brazilians with little education. But Soares' prospects changed a few years ago, when he was trained to operate a mechanized harvester.

"I get a little more money and am more comfortable now," said Soares, 35.

Experts say turnarounds like his are becoming more common, as demand for sugar cane from the booming ethanol industry is forcing Brazil's cane sector to abandon outdated practices.

World demand for ethanol as a fossil fuel substitute has brought the biggest expansion in Brazil's cane production since the beginning of its ethanol program in the 1970s.

With the boom in cane planting, environmental and health concerns have come into focus, pressuring the industry to stop the practice of burning cane fields to clear foliage and pests for manual cutting.

"I don't have a crystal ball but the reduction in manual cutting is the trend given the move toward mechanization," said Remigio Todeschini, president of Fundacentro, a Labor Ministry foundation that oversees working conditions.

UNEMPLOYMENT FEARS

The impact of mechanized harvesting on labor was a big obstacle to phasing out manual cutting, as it could lead to massive unemployment in certain regions. One machine can do the work of 87 cutters, according to Unica, the Sugar Cane Industry Union.

In the main center-south cane region, with about 85 percent of the national crop, 70 percent of the harvest remains manual. There are 260,000 cane cutters in the region, about 160,000 in Sao Paulo state alone.

Poor education complicates the problem. Workers spend only 4.2 years on average in the public education system, well below the national average. State governments are pushing for change.

In Sao Paulo, which concentrates more than 65 percent of the national cane crop, the government and mills signed an accord last month that will move up the end of cane burning by seven years to 2013 for flat areas, and by 14 years to 2017 for fields on hillsides.

NEW HOPE

The sector's growth could make the process smoother. The industry, which expects to receive investments of $12 billion by 2013 in new mills and expansions, has a growing need for workers in other areas.

"You have to always look at those two aspects when talking about cane cutters' prospects: the sector's growth and mechanization," Unica consultant Iza Barbosa said.

"It's not only cutting the cane and selling ethanol and sugar. There are many simple tasks that can be taken by cane cutters if they are properly trained," she added.

Barbosa said mills have started to see the scarcity of workers as a future threat, and in the last few years they have shown more interest in investing to train employees.

Unica estimates 300,000 jobs will be created in the next five years, ranging from truck drivers to managers.

"The new posts are always offered first to the mill's employees. They normally are the best prepared people to take them," said Carlos Rene do Amaral, human resources manager of Sao Martinho mill.

EXPERIENCED WORKERS NEEDED

Sao Martinho group was among the first to begin a regular training program, about 10 years ago, and since then has promoted about 250 cane cutters. Most now work as operators of agricultural machines and industrial equipment.

The need for experienced workers is even greater in frontier regions of Brazil's cane expansion. Amaral said the group, which is building a mill in Goias in central Brazil, took 20 employees from Sao Paulo to work there.

Although Soares' story is still an exception, it has fueled hopes for the future.

"I always tell my two boys to study, so they do not become cane cutters as I used to be. Undeniably, it's a hard job."

Still, from the air-conditioned cab where he spends eight hours a day, he worries about his mother.

"She continues working because her colleagues are like a family to her. But she was very glad when I stopped... working under the sun, rain, cold. She knows well how hard it is."

http://www.dailygazette.com

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Farmers growing more corn, outpacing storage capacity
Trying to meet ethanol demand
BY SHELLY BANJO The Wall Street Journal

   NEVADA, Iowa — Farmers are up to their ears in corn and scrambling for places to store it.
   With demand for ethanol soaring, farmers around the country have planted more acres of corn this year than at any time since World War II. The U.S. Department of Agriculture predicts the fall harvest will yield 12 to 13 billion bushels of the grain, enough to fill 183,000 Olympic-sized swimming pools — a far greater quantity than currently available storage capacity.
   It’s a worrisome situation for farmers, who typically choose among selling their grain right away, paying elevators to store it or storing it in silos on their farms. Stashing it gives farmers more fl exibility to play the market to their advantage. Last year, some farmers who sold their grain early came to regret it as rising demand for ethanol pushed the price of corn from $2.25 or so a bushel to well past $3.
   But the cloud over the farmers has a silver lining for those in the storage business. Storage facilities have more business than they can handle, and manufacturers of silos and storage equipment are stepping up production.
   Silos are more than just cylindrical towers that hold grain. Walk-in doors, zinc-coated walls and axial fans and heaters are just some possible add-on features. In recent years, silos have increased up to seven times in size from the old standard of the 100,000-bushel bin to silos that can hold 700,000 bushels of grain. To keep up with the pace of growers, silos now require stirring machines to speed-dry the grain or sweep-away systems to quickly empty the bins. Silos can cost as much as $2 a bushel of capacity, with an expected 30-year life span.
   Since 2000, the U.S. Department of Agriculture has awarded farmers across the country $485 million in loans to build on-farm storage. But Roger Fray, executive vice president of the West Central Cooperative in Ralston, Iowa, says storage remains a problem. “There has been an industrywide need [for storage] since the 2004 crop, and we are trying to catch up,” he says.
DEMAND FOR SILOS
   A recent visit to the Heart of Iowa cooperative here in Nevada (the town pronounces it Nah-VAYDah), showed the catch-up in action. Nestled in the heart of corn country where eight-foot-tall corn stalks stretch along highways, the co-op began last month to unload five shiny semitrucks full of steel bin, roof and leg parts to build 700,000 additional bushels of much-needed storage space. The seven-location, 8.9-million-bushel operation serves 800 farmers and supplies 100 percent of the grain needed to fuel Lincolnway Energy, the neighboring ethanol plant.
   “With prices for concrete and steel rising, we are doing what we can afford right now . . . but we have plans of doubling the entire size of the cooperative,” says Scott Stabbe, Heart of Iowa grain division manager, while checking his computer every few minutes for flashing corn prices displayed by the Chicago Board of Trade. Story County, where Nevada is located, alone looks to produce 32 million bushels of corn and farmers predict a five-million bushel shortage in storage capacity.
   At Scafco Corp., a silo maker in Spokane, Wash., sales manager Dennis Queen says sales are up 20 percent in the past year. Brock Grain Systems in Milford, Ind., a subsidiary of Berkshire Hathaway Co., has added extra weekly shifts and is now running 24 hours a day, says district manager John Tuttle. Demand for silos is so high that months-long backlogs have developed. Farmer Sam Spellman of Woodward, Iowa, just witnessed the completion of a silo he ordered last December.
   His supplier, Menz Construction Co. in Perry, Iowa, doubled its production last year but stopped taking orders in December. John Copple, district sales manager for the agriculture/industrial division of Chief Industries in Grand Isle, Neb., tripled his work crews this year.
   “This business is either feast or famine,” he says. “In the past we could hardly give a grain bin away and now we have a 25 million bushel backlog.”
   Howard Shepard, program coordinator at the Iowa Grain Quality Initiative, says bin manufacturers as a whole are running about three years behind the demand. The companies that erect the silos are also in huge demand, and there aren’t enough workers to provide the labor needed.
   Farmers within 50 miles of ethanol facilities are particularly concerned. That’s because many ethanol plants want to buy corn directly from nearby farmers to guarantee necessary speed and quality. “Ethanol factories only hold about 10 days’ worth of corn but need enough corn to run 24 hours a day, every day,” says David Zimmerman, commodities manager at Lincolnway Energy.
   About 40 miles away from Lincolnway Energy, Dewayne Berg eagerly anticipates the completion of his new silo. Monitoring the progress of his bin builders, he wipes away “bees-knees” — what farmers call corn residue that falls from the tall bins like snow — from his face. “We realized it was a whole new ball game out there and we needed to keep up and add more storage. It’s a bit scary,” he says. The 122,000-bushel bin will cost Berg $80,000 to construct. But he predicts that even if a summer drought occurs, he’ll pay off the cost of the bin within two years.  

  
  
  

Perhaps we can help them here in Rotterdam, and store some of their corn in the existing and newly proposed storage facility.

All kidding aside...we knew the push for corn would be a-comin' and here it is. And did you notice how it went from$2.25/bushel to over $3.00/bushel? I believe that this will be just the beginning folks!