Impact of ethanol

Your editorial “Ethanol’s Mixed Reviews” (BDN, Jan. 30), raised some good points but did not go far enough. Ethanol can be made most efficiently from sugar cane, where the left-over fiber (bagasse) can be burned to power the distillery. That’s how Brazil produces the ethanol on which 80 percent of its flex-fuel auto fleet runs. It didn’t happen overnight. Brazil worked for two decades developing its alternative fuel system.

Here, the corn lobby does not want us to even think about importing ethanol. Currently, the tariff on ethanol keeps it from being competitive. If we imported ethanol instead of oil, there would be all the environmental benefits coming from a renewable energy source that reduces global warming. And which countries produce sugar cane – some of the poorest countries in the world. If we invested in ethanol and bio-diesel (another alternative fuel), and at the same time helped to raise the standard of living in developing countries, our money would be much better spent than it is now supporting oil sheiks.

So yes, the technology may be “hugely expensive” as your expert said, but so is oil technology. The difference is the impact on the environment and people’s lives.

Diana Page

Blue Hill