Federal Ethanol Policy: Bad for the Planet, Good for Lobbyists

The federal government's push for greater ethanol production, carried out in the name of saving the planet, has done great harm to the environment. What's more, it has caused the release of far more carbon dioxide — the gas that is blamed for alleged global warming — into the atmosphere than the burning of ethanol could ever hope to save.

"The consequences are so severe that environmentalists and many scientists have now rejected corn-based ethanol as bad environmental policy," the Associated Press wrote in a lengthy report. "But the Obama administration stands by it, highlighting its benefits to the farming industry rather than any negative impact."

Washington has long encouraged the production of ethanol as a "green" alternative to fossil fuels, but the policy got a big boost in 2007 when Congress passed and President George W. Bush signed a law mandating the blending of ethanol into gasoline. The law was supported wholeheartedly by then-Sen. Barack Obama.

Once in the White House, Obama set about implementing the law. His "team at the EPA [Environmental Protection Agency] was sour on the ethanol mandate at the start," according to the AP.

Please continue reading from Federal Ethanol Policy: Bad for the Planet, Good for Lobbyists | shared via feedly mobile