Bush Seeks Ethanol Alliance With Brazil

[LaoSexMachine]

Bush Seeks Ethanol Alliance With Brazil

Bush Seeks Ethanol Alliance With Brazil, Which Has Turned Itself Into Renewable Energy Leader

By ALAN CLENDENNING

The Associated Press

SAO PAULO, Brazil - Just an hour's drive outside this traffic-choked metropolis where President Bush kicks off a Latin American tour Thursday, sugar cane fields stretch for hundreds of miles, providing the ethanol that fuels eight out of every 10 new Brazilian cars.
In only a few years, Brazil has turned itself into the planet's undisputed renewable energy leader, and the highlight of Bush's visit is expected to be a new ethanol "alliance" he will forge with Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva.
The deal is still being negotiated, but the two leaders are expected to sign an accord Friday to develop standards to help turn ethanol into an internationally traded commodity, and to promote sugar cane-based ethanol production in Central America and the Caribbean to meet rising international demand.
Across Latin America's largest nation, Brazilian media are billing the Bush-Silva meeting as a bid to create a new two-nation "OPEC of Ethanol," despite efforts by Brazilian and American officials to downplay the label amid concerns that whatever emerges would be viewed as a price-fixing cartel.
Meanwhile, political and energy analysts warn that any agreements reached between Brazil and the United States are unlikely to have short-term effects. And the deal itself could end up largely symbolic because of reluctance by Washington to address a key point of friction: A 54 cent-per-gallon U.S. tariff on Brazilian ethanol imports.
"For the Brazilians, the tariff has utmost priority," said Cristoph Berg, an ethanol analyst with Germany's F.O. Licht, a commodities research firm. "They will agree with developing biofuel economies around the world, but the first thing they will say is 'We want to do away with that tariff.'"
No one is expecting Bush to give ground on the tariff. The politically sensitive issue essentially subsidizes American corn growers who are rapidly ramping up ethanol production amid Washington's encouragement of renewable biofuels to ease U.S. dependence on imported petroleum.
But the visit will help Bush and Silva join forces to promote the politically popular issue of renewable energy simply by gathering in a place where ethanol is king.
At every gas station in this city of 18 million, drivers can fill up with gasoline or ethanol. Ethanol came courtesy of a 1970s decision by Brazil's former military dictators to subsidize production and require distribution at the pumps.
A 1980s Brazilian fad with cars that ran only on ethanol petered out when oil prices fell in the early 1990s. But the fuel came back into vogue in 2003 when automakers started rolling out cars "flex-fuel" cars that run on gasoline, ethanol or any combination of the two.
With international oil prices reaching record highs, Brazilian drivers turned to the cars; most choose ethanol, because it costs about half the price of gas.
The ethanol industry is now making profits like never before amid heavy foreign investment. Just last week, Brazil's state-run oil firm, Japan's Mitsui & Co. and a Brazilian construction firm signed a memorandum of interest to study the construction of a pipeline in Brazil that would be used to help export ethanol to Japan.
Brazil is the world's top exporter, though U.S. ethanol production still surpasses Brazil. But Brazil has an edge over the United States for future production because ethanol can be produced more cheaply with sugar cane than the corn used by U.S. farmers to make ethanol.
And increased use of corn for ethanol is prompting international corn price increases, prompting Silva to tell reporters last week he would tell Bush, "Why make ethanol out of corn? Why don't we feed the corn to the chickens."
Bush has set a goal of 35 billion gallons a year of ethanol and other alternative fuels, such as soybean-based biodiesel, by 2017 a fivefold increase over current requirements.
But production of ethanol from U.S. corn is expected to fall far short of meeting such an increase, and experts doubt even land-rich Brazil would be able to fill the gap along with help from Central America and the Caribbean. So Bush envisions a major speedup of research into production of "cellulosic" ethanol made from wood chips, switchgrass and other feedstocks.
Ethanol proponents hope Bush and Silva will nonetheless come up with a framework to sharply boost ethanol production in the nations between Brazil and the United States, encouraging more foreign investment.
And coming up with technical standards to define quality levels for ethanol is key to turn it into a commodity that could be traded like oil.
"I think its Brazilian know how and American know how, there's a lot of cross fertilization that can take place," said Brian Dean, executive director of the Interamerican Ethanol Commission.
The commission counts among its directors Florida Gov. Jeb Bush, the president's brother, as well as former Brazilian agriculture minister Roberto Rodrigues and Luiz Moreno, president of the Inter-American Development Bank.
Increasing ethanol production in the region is also expected to be a major topic in Guatemala later this month when the bank holds its annual meeting, Latin America's top yearly economic gathering.
"We see a marketplace in ethanol that can create an enormous amount of economic growth and prosperity in the United States and the rest of the world," Dean said.



http://abcnews.go.com/Business/wireStory?id=2922673

[schwarz]

Noooooo, now the Mexicans will definitely run out of tortillas.

[Ordie]

Noooooo, now the Mexicans will definitely run out of tortillas.

And more may be pushed up North as a result.

[AZRON]

It's a good thing.

As of now the U.S. taxpayers are being ripped off by the corn ethanol lobby . Corn farmers and agra-business are getting rich as corn is price supported by about $.50 a bushel and improrted ethanol taxed at $.54 a gallon.
This is supported by congress critters on both sides of the aisle.

However American hog farmers , Mexican farmers and other alternative fuel types are getting screwed along with we the taxpayers and consumers.
Mexico had protests 3 weeks ago about the high price of corn . So we put the Mexican farmer out of business and he comes up here.
We sell our subsidized corn in Mexico under pricing less subsidized Mexican farmers.

Opening up to sugar ethanol will create more alternative sources and help other farmers , plus maybe we can even stop subsidizing the sugar industry.

I don't think we should subsidize any farmers , the Aussies don't. Nor tarriffs on imported alternative fuels.

[Ordie]

However American hog farmers , Mexican farmers and other alternative fuel types are getting screwed along with we the taxpayers and consumers.
Mexico had protests 3 weeks ago about the high price of corn . So we put the Mexican farmer out of business and he comes up here.
We sell our subsidized corn in Mexico under pricing less subsidized Mexican farmers.
.

ADM owns 20% of GRUMA, the Mexican corn flour monopoly in Mexico.
They can control the price of corn for both fuel and food markets. The people that gets screwed are your average Mexicans who consume up to 1 kilo of tortilla each day.

Ethanol is bad for our neighbors in the south. If the price of torillas goes up, expect calls for nationalization.

[Notlim]

Again half mesures! Bush is such an amateur i believe the fastes his two year term finish the better!
Where in the life? are we taught that we must sacrifice our lives to make sure we have energy resources? Humans think and create so everyday life is easy, maybe for a country wich has a lot of resources, and wich corn is not the basic meal, but for the third world these is not possible , Brazil has a energy policy wich obliges any goverment in power not to depend in big oil corporations! and not to be at the mercy of oil price changes.

I predict that as soon as Bush comes back he would have a new eye opening, how to start a new bussines for him and his buddies! he will buy all the tortilla production and get the monopoly smart men!!

[shocker1]

Great idea! Lets cut down more rain forest to grow sugar cane and corn. So we will cut down the trees that scrub CO2 from the atmosphere in order to make fuel that reduces our CO2 output. Then every savy farmer will grow corn for fuel as it will be worth more money than the feed corn. Leaving Mexico with a huge corn deficit and a tortillia shortage. Then my damn grits will cost twice what they are worth.

[Kilo]

It's a good thing.

As of now the U.S. taxpayers are being ripped off by the corn ethanol lobby . Corn farmers and agra-business are getting rich as corn is price supported by about $.50 a bushel and improrted ethanol taxed at $.54 a gallon.
This is supported by congress critters on both sides of the aisle.

However American hog farmers , Mexican farmers and other alternative fuel types are getting screwed along with we the taxpayers and consumers.
Mexico had protests 3 weeks ago about the high price of corn . So we put the Mexican farmer out of business and he comes up here.
We sell our subsidized corn in Mexico under pricing less subsidized Mexican farmers.

Opening up to sugar ethanol will create more alternative sources and help other farmers , plus maybe we can even stop subsidizing the sugar industry.

I don't think we should subsidize any farmers , the Aussies don't. Nor tarriffs on imported alternative fuels.


good post


Brazil's ethanol is from sugar cane

in the United States, you use corn to make ethanol

sugar cane is relatively efficient, corn is not

[Kilo]

Great idea! Lets cut down more rain forest to grow sugar .......

you don´t need to cut down the rainforest to grow sugar cane in Brazil...



Published on Taipei Times (http://www.taipeitimes.com/)
(http://www.militaryphotos.net/forums/)http://www.taipeitimes.com/News/bizfocus/archives/2007/02/26/2003350145
Brazil to increase output of ethanol by 1,500 percent


`BRAZILIAN PROJECT': South America's rising economic giant could produce enough ethanol to replace 10 percent of world gasoline in 20 years

AFP, SAO PAULO
Monday, Feb 26, 2007, Page 11

Brazil, South America's economic heavyweight, could produce enough ethanol to replace 10 percent of world gasoline demand in the next 20 years, according to a recently unveiled project. News of the renewable energy project comes amid growing concern about greenhouse gases caused by burning fossil fuels that are blamed for global warming.
The Brazilian project, developed with the participation of the government and state-owned oil giant Petrobas, would multiply by 15 times the country's current production of ethanol from sugar cane.


Ramp-up
The ramp-up would push Brazilian ethanol exports to 200 billion liters in the coming 20 years, up from the roughly 3 billion liters currently exported, Rogerio Cesar Cerqueira Leite, a professor emeritus at Campinas University, told reporters.
Cerqueira Leite presented the project on Feb. 9 to the Sao Paulo State Business Federation.
The project would need investments of up to 20 billion reals (US$10 billion) a year for the first four or five years, after which the need was expected to diminish.



Amazon rainforest

"During the final seven to eight years, the return [on investment] should cover the amounts invested," Cerqueira Leite said.
He said that Brazil, the continent's biggest country, could drastically increase ethanol production without destroying the Amazon rainforest or encroaching on farmland.
"Brazil has an enormous quantity of available land. We don't need to go into the Amazon or compete with food growing," he said.
"The project can be done by occupying a small part of the available land in Brazil, to the exclusion of the virgin forest, the protected areas," he said.
According to him, only 10 percent of the available land would be needed.
The project was developed from ethanol technologies currently in use in Brazil, without resorting to more sophisticated techniques.
"To produce these quantities using hydrolysis would require barely a third of the hectares," he said.


Sugar cane

Under the project, sugar cane would be grown in practically all regions of Brazil, and local distilleries would be built to produce process it into ethanol.
Besides being the world's top exporter of ethanol, Brazil is also a leading producer of the fuel, along with the US, which extracts it from corn rather than sugar cane.
Underpinning the country's success has been the mass-marketing since 2003 of hybrid-fuel cars, which consume either pure ethanol or a five-to-one mix of gasoline and ethanol. There are now more than 2.6 million such vehicles in the domestic market.

[shocker1]

you don´t need to cut down the rainforest to grow sugar cane in Brazil...
Satillite photos clearly show deforestation in the Amazon basin. Cattle, sugar cane and many other crops are grown in these new areas. When the native farmers in the back forty of the Amazon learn of the increased demand. Who will stop them from clear cutting and setting up a sugar plantation. The article is nothing more than politicians sugar coating the idea while we clearly know money drives this. The avalible land the article speaks of is deforested land that was cut down before. Just look at the Amazon basin on Google Earth, it is plain to see.

Ethanol is nothing more than a band aid on the problem of energy. Our present distribution system cannot pipe ethanol like we do gasoline. We need to get away from internal combustion methods and go for a pure electric drive system in our vehicles. Centralized energy production to power plants where emmissions can be more controlled. The technology is here now, but we have big energy companies "oil" looking for a way to survive. They want to keep the power over energy distribution to line their pockets. THey know their fate if everybody plugs in.

[Kilo]

Satillite photos clearly show deforestation in the Amazon basin.

yes, it´s true...but the reason behind it´s not sugar cane plantations


"DEFORESTATION IN BRAZIL: 60-70 percent of deforestation in the Amazon results from cattle ranches while the rest mostly results from small-scale subsistence agriculture. Despite the widespread press attention, large-scale farming (i.e. soybeans) currently contributes relatively little to total deforestation in the Amazon. Most soybean cultivation takes place outside the rainforest in the neighboring cerrado grassland ecosystem and in areas that have already been cleared. Logging results in forest degradation but rarely direct deforestation. However, studies have showed a close correlation between logging and future clearing for settlement and farming."

http://www.mongabay.com/brazil.html

http://photos.mongabay.com/06/braz_defor_88-05-lrg.jpg




Ethanol is nothing more than a band aid on the problem of energy. Our present distribution system cannot pipe ethanol like we do gasoline

In the USA, specially if you keep using corn, but in Brazil, ethanol ( from sugarcane) works:

"Presently the use of ethanol as fuel by Brazilian cars - as pure ethanol and in gasohol - replaces gasoline at the rate of about 27,000 cubic metres per day, or about 40% of the fuel that would be needed to run the fleet on gasoline alone."

remember that Brazil started this change back in the 70´s



We need to get away from internal combustion methods and go for a pure electric drive system in our vehicles. Centralized energy production to power plants where emmissions can be more controlled. The technology is here now, but we have big energy companies "oil" looking for a way to survive.

the internal combustion engine has been around fore decades, a "new engine" would change all if this, but it will take time

there are already good solutions, but still they face some limitations, in particullary the life cycle of the batteries and their replacement cost


I like the Tesla ( one of the guys behind is Elon Musk, PayPal founder and chairman of Tesla Motors


http://www.teslamotors.com/


http://www.teslamotors.com/images/nav/home_r1_c1.jpg

[annihilation]

Great idea! Lets cut down more rain forest to grow sugar cane and corn. So we will cut down the trees that scrub CO2 from the atmosphere in order to make fuel that reduces our CO2 output. Then every savy farmer will grow corn for fuel as it will be worth more money than the feed corn. Leaving Mexico with a huge corn deficit and a tortillia shortage. Then my damn grits will cost twice what they are worth.

I was thinking the same thing, who needs the rainforest.

[shocker1]

Kilo, I am not gona take the time to bring up web articles. I am in no way putting down Brazil's fantastic energy solutions. However they are not gonna work here. The US market if turned into an ethanol economy the price of the commodities used to make the fuel will sky rocket. Which IMO will drive more deforestation when dollars signs come into play. Man tends to forget about enviromental issues in lue of the buck.

I have worked in the EV industry for years with defense contractors and electric/hybrid vehicle manufacturers. Also involved with the maintenance and institution of public transit electric buses and hybrid buses. As well as a Master mechanic, electrical engineer. As you say the main draw back is battery life and cost. True if there were no ways to drasticly extend the life and amount of batteries for a system. There are capacitor bank power flow controls that store regen energy and smooth out the current flow from the batteries. Thereby decreasing stress, temp and drasticly improving performance. I would upload drawings and PROE test results but agreements prohibit me from doing so.

There are forces that inhibit development and distribution of new technologies. I have seen new companies with big ideas get swallowed up by DARPA red tape. Trust me somebody wants us at the pump no matter what is pumping out so longs as the BIG BOYS survive(OIL COMPANIES)

[Durandal]

It's a good thing.

Ah, I see...

Its a good thing.


Of course it is.

A) Brazil doesn't have enough corn or sugar to influence anything in scale.

B) The U.S. simply trades one form of reliance on foreign sources for another(assuming we did this with multiple nations rather than doing it ourselves) when it should be looking for independence.

C) Its less about fuel sources and economies and more about moving chess pieces around Hugo Chavez.

D) As a corn (and soybean) farmer I can speak firsthand about subsidies (or lack there of). The ONLY thing the U.S> subsidizes on the corn and soybean markets (ethanol and bio-diesel) is the building of ethanol plants and a low price guarantee (if market prices fall below a certain U.S. $ amount the federal government guarantees a minimum prices). Pricing of the grain is a world market and impacted by futures investment, mother nature and trade regulation (the U.S. LOVES to trade its grain, but plenty of markets poo-poo GM crops...silliness). Since market prices for both corn and soybean are through the roof this subsidy is irrelevant and will be for QUITE some time (if ever).

I personally get money from the Federal "soil-bank" but that is a subsidy to prevent over farming and I actually have to reduce the amount of land I use to farm on. It amounts to about the same as a family gets in tax subsidies for having a single child. I don't get anything if I am farmer 100% of my farmable land (which I do a lot since its on a flood plain).

People are going to start bitching because a commodity that has normally been kept (deliberately) at a low price for consumer purposes is now as valuable as crude oil. Unfortunately that item (corn) is also used in just about as many things as petroleum. Same thing with Sugar...

[Ordie]

In reality there is "no free lunch".

For the amount of money being poured into the Ethanol projects, it would be more effective and better spent to give free bikes and transit passes to every American household. Tax credits and other incentives should be given for households living within 3/4 of a mile of a public transit station or central business district.

[Jobu]

I think it's a good idea. Our reliance on foreign oil will not be solved with one "super" alternative, it will be a combination of alternatives which lessen oil's stranglehold on the energy market. If ethanol can take even a small piece of the pie away from the Arabs, Persians, and Chaveses, that's A-OK with me.

[Ordie]

I think it's a good idea. Our reliance on foreign oil will not be solved with one "super" alternative, it will be a combination of alternatives which lessen oil's stranglehold on the energy market. If ethanol can take even a small piece of the pie away from the Arabs, Persians, and Chaveses, that's A-OK with me.

Or you may create more Chavezes.

When you mess with a staple food item for much of the America's and raise prices, you create fodder for people who are against the United States.

Unlike the M.E. which is far away from North America as possible, Central and South America is Next Door.

ADM is an American Company that has the production and distribution capacity to manipulate corn prices. If the price of Corns goes up, riots and discontent will follow next door. They will either make a bee line over the border for a better life, or the US Embassy with molokov cocktails.

[Jobu]

Or you may create more Chavezes.

When you mess with a staple food item for much of the America's and raise prices, you create fodder for people who are against the United States.

Unlike the M.E. which is far away from North America as possible, Central and South America is Next Door.

ADM is an American Company that has the production and distribution capacity to manipulate corn prices. If the price of Corns goes up, riots and discontent will follow next door. They will either make a bee line over the border for a better life, or the US Embassy with molokov cocktails.

Begun, the corn wars have.

[Durandal]

In reality there is "no free lunch".

For the amount of money being poured into the Ethanol projects, it would be more effective and better spent to give free bikes and transit passes to every American household. Tax credits and other incentives should be given for households living within 3/4 of a mile of a public transit station or central business district.

Yeah, there you go. Literally THROW money away, especially in the U.S. where most people own cars and use them to commute to work.

Ordie, what happens when EVERYONE decides to do this at once? Use a public mass transit system designed for a fraction of their number?

Or try to move within a 3/4 diameter of an urban population center with an infrastructure designed to handle a fraction of the people? Property values rise, rent rises, only the rich can afford to live there, or worse, the only people that live there are the poor with population densities like that of New Delhi...

Its ok to subsidize the bike companies, corporations like the rest, because the end justifies the means.

Why not give everyone tax breaks for vehicles that get 44 miles to the gallon or more?

Oh wait, that would be too smart.

See, like you, our politicians are idiots and decided to give tax breaks to a bunch of vehicles that get less than 30 miles to the gallon....because they are "hybrids". I can make a hybrid with a MPG of 10 miles to the gallon that gets WORSE efficiency than a Hummer if I want...Hybrid means nothing, just like your suggestions mean nothing because no thought goes into the details of the proposal. Your proposals end up cost us MORE...

[exarmyguard]

Noooooo, now the Mexicans will definitely run out of tortillas.

Let them eat cake.p-)

[Bandeirante]

AGRICULTURAL TRADE: Brussels and Washington are in retreat on the subsidies they extend to their primary producers - as a result of the assertiveness of a developing country determined to make more use of its vast arable land area, writes Alan Beattie
By ALAN BEATTIE

A tapestry hangs on the wall in the capacious office of Celso Amorim, Brazil's foreign minister. Based on a chart drawn by a 15th-century Italian explorer, it shows an inverted map of the world - the southern hemisphere is on top.

Brazil's farmers, backed by a pugnacious diplomatic and legal campaign by business and political leaders such as Mr Amorim, are similarly turning the world of agricultural trade on its head. The European Union this week proposed deep cuts in the price it guarantees its own sugar farmers. The US is due by the end of next week to announce reduced support for cotton growers. Both retreats follow actions initiated by Brazil at the World Trade Organisation.

While farm products are a small part of the picture - 10 per cent of global merchandise trade - the vast numbers of farmers among the WTO's largely developing-country membership, combined with the highly contentious issue of rich nations' agricultural subsidies, make Brazil a pivotal nation in the future of world trade.

Brazil is to agriculture what India is to business offshoring and China to manufacturing: a powerhouse whose size and efficiency few competitors can match. Despite facing one of the highest agricultural tariffs in the western hemisphere - an average 30 per cent is levied by the nations that import its produce - the country is the world's largest or second largest exporter of sugar, soyabeans, orange juice, coffee, tobacco and beef and is rapidly building a strong position in products such as cotton, chicken and pork.

Brazil has the largest agricultural trade surplus in the world - Dollars 34bn or 5 per cent of national income last year, an amount that was singlehandedly responsible for putting the country's overall net trade in surplus. For a country struggling to pay down its large debt burden, agricultural export earnings have been a godsend. Carlo Lovatelli, head of the Brazil Agribusiness Association, says: "Our aims are to consolidate Brazil as one of the world's top agricultural exporters, expand further in areas like cotton and continue to demand access."

There is certainly scope for expansion. On top of its 62m hectares (153m acres) of arable land, Brazil has an estimated 170m hectares more in potential - about the same as the entire US cropland currently under cultivation.

The land along Brazil's coast has been farmed for generations. But the future for Brazilian farms lies inland, in places such as the vast central state of Mato Grosso. As recently as 30 years ago, thousands of square miles of thinly populated cerrado, or savannah, spread from the Bolivian border to the south to the Amazon basin in the north. Now the state's plateaux have been invaded by vast emerald fields of cotton and soyabean plants and occasional stands of eucalyptus trees grown for pulp. The resemblance to US prairie states invites a comparison invoked frequently by Mato Grosso's large-scale farmers, many of them relatively new arrivals from elsewhere in Brazil or overseas. "What is happening here now is what happened in the American Midwest of the 1800s," says Chris Ward, a New Zealander who has farmed in Mato Grosso for 20 years. "People came here not to stand still but to win."

Much of Brazil's soil is in fact rather poor in nutrients, requiring heavy fertilisation: one local saying has it that its only function is to hold the crops upright. But the country has a near-perfect climate, especially in the central area - months of soaking rain in the southern summers, followed by dry, warm winters. It also has a huge river system, low land prices and a big reserve of cheap labour arising from large inequities of landholding and income among its 180m population.

These traditional advantages have combined with rising investment and government support for technology in recent years to create fearsomely efficient farms. In sugar, for example, estimates by Brazil's national sugarcane institute suggest that, while the production costs of its main export rivals have remained around Dollars 250 a tonne for a decade, average costs in Brazil have fallen by more than one-third to Dollars 158 a tonne. It has doubled its share of world sugar exports to more than one-third in the last 10 years. With increasing international interest in sugar-based ethanol as a clean biofuel for engines, output is projected to increase by another 25 per cent in the next five years.

The production of soyabeans, Brazil's biggest export and an important feedstuff for pigs and chickens, has grown even more quickly amid a rapid globalisation of the soyabean market. The recent legalisation of genetically modified soya in Brazil - farmers say the industry was riddled with GM seeds smuggled in from Argentina in any case - is likely to mean further gains in output and profitability.

By no means everything is in the farmers' favour. They face high interest rates, a rising currency and, for many, tortuous journeys along thousands of kilometres of rutted roads for their produce to reach the coastal ports.

Carlos Augustin, the owner of a 30,000-hectare cotton and soyabean farm in the heart of Mato Grosso, says that Brazilian cotton farmers can achieve a yield as good as or better than their American counterparts, while adding: "You may have lower land and machinery prices on one side but you have higher freight, travel and finance costs on the other." These extra burdens, he reckons, lose him 9-15 cents of the 60 cents a pound his cotton gets on world markets, bringing it perilously close to the break-even price.

If Brazil's government succeeds in bringing down interest rates through its fiscal stringency, and finds enough money to update infrastructure, its farmers will be even more competitive.

However good its productivity, no country, certainly not one as populous as Brazil, is going to become rich growing and exporting nothing but basic commodities - especially since their prices tend to be in long-term relative decline. Even Mato Grosso's astonishing rise in output has left it contributing a little over 1 per cent to national income. But Brazil is also beginning to move up the value chain.

Osler Desouzart, a former executive in the chicken industry and now with OD Consulting, which advises poultry exporters, says: "There is no money in producing animal protein. But there is lots of money in marketing and distributing animal products."

In Europe, the destination for one-third of Brazil's chicken exports, many food companies have sourced from and invested in Brazilian production. More and more of the value added in the production chain is going to Brazil, helped by an unusual EU tariff structure that imposes import taxes of around 75 per cent on raw chicken but only about 10 per cent on cooked or processed chicken. The chicken tikka masala that is sold in UK supermarkets often has its spices added on site in Brazil before being deep-frozen and shipped.

Brazil's traditional commodity exports and its newer value-added produce are creating tensions around the world. As has happened with Chinese manufactured goods and particularly textiles, the rapid rise of a low-cost competitor raises cries of unfair competition from elsewhere. In a study of Brazil's trade policy published late last year, the WTO concluded that government support to agriculture was modest. But that is not the view of its embattled competitors, particularly those in the rich countries.

Luther Markwart, chairman of the American Sugar Alliance, says that, contrary to the WTO's assessment, Brazil's success is based on unfair competition. "Brazil used subsidies, a government-run ethanol programme and appallingly low labour and environmental standards to become the world's largest sugar producer," he says. Mr Markwart reckons that Brazilian regulatory backing for ethanol - all cars in Brazil run on either pure ethanol or an ethanol-petrol mixture - is worth about Dollars 1bn a year.

In Europe, farmers have similar complaints. Peter Bradnock, chief executive of the British Poultry Council, says that lower Brazilian environmental and labour standards contribute to its poultry being about half the price of that produced in Europe. "Technologically we can raise chickens as well as they can," he says. "But they are lower cost, and a part of that reflects the regulatory standards within which we have to operate."

Mr Bradnock says that officials and regulators in countries such as Brazil and Thailand have an "export vocation": they will do everything they can, he maintains, to ensure that regulation does not get in the way of pumping out yet more exports.

But he admits it is almost impossible to argue that these advantages violate WTO rules. Complaints about unfair competition meanwhile go unheeded by the strong Brazilian political consensus in favour of expanding farm trade.

Nowhere is the alliance between politics and agribusiness more evident than in Mato Grosso, where a clique of large farmers and politicians dominates the state. Mato Grosso's governor is Blairo Maggi, scion of Maggi Group, a large agribusiness. In the face of criticism that farming in such areas benefits only the rich, Mr Maggi argues that Mato Grosso has no alternative to the model of big farms that pump out cheap commodities.

"Small properties in Mato Grosso do not have economic viability," he says. "This has to be a scale economy, like the automotive industry. You cannot plant corn, soyabeans or cotton without large properties that can be competitive on the world market. Globalisation has occurred in world farming."
http://www.mre.gov.br/portugues/imprensa/artigos/financial230605.asp

[Ordie]

Let them eat cake.p-)

Oddly enough ADM and GRUMA have a joint venture in the production of wheat flour. Therefore still maintaining a monopoly within Mexico.

[Ordie]

Yeah, there you go. Literally THROW money away, especially in the U.S. where most people own cars and use them to commute to work.


Public transit ridership in the US is rising. It makes more sense to invest and further develop transit systems than screw with the food supply of the poor.

You are correct about the capacity issue. This is the result of years of neglect by the Federal and State governments in providing needed funds for public transit. Instead we see local and regional governments promoting auto dependant low density suburban spawl and edge cities development.

I agree with your proposal for tax break on cars over 44 mpg.


Drivers switch to public transitUpdated 4/25/2006 2:56 PM ET
By Barbara Hagenbaugh, USA TODAY
WASHINGTON — Soaring gas prices appear, once again, to be leading some drivers to park their cars.
Public transit systems across the USA are seeing an increase in ridership. Although it's difficult to directly link the gains to higher gasoline prices, officials say rising prices at the pump are at least partly responsible.
Nationwide, the average price of a gallon of regular gasoline was $2.90 Sunday, up 1.6 cents from Saturday and 39.1 cents higher than a month ago, according to AAA. Statewide averages were $3 a gallon or higher in Hawaii, California, Washington, D.C., and New York.
Among mass transit systems:
•Washington, D.C. Thursday was the sixth-busiest day in history on Metrorail, the area's train system, while Tuesday was the ninth busiest. There were no special events in the area to explain the higher ridership. "We think gas prices had something to do with it," Washington Metropolitan Area Transit Authority spokeswoman Candace Smith says.
•Salt Lake City. Ridership is up 50% on the 19-mile, light-rail system in Salt Lake City from a year ago. The Utah Transit Authority has added 10 used rail cars it bought from San Jose, Calif., to meet demand. But in some cases, cars are becoming so packed that the doors are dragging on the platforms at stops because of the increased weight, spokesman Justin Jones says.
Riders responding to onboard polling increasingly are saying they are motivated to take public transportation because of higher gas prices, Jones says.
•Tulsa. Tulsa Transit's March ridership was the highest since August 2003. For the fiscal year, which began in July, trips on the bus system are up 28% from the prior year.
•San Francisco. After taking a "nosedive" in recent years, ridership on Bay Area Rapid Transit is up 4.1% this fiscal year, which began July 1, spokesman Linton Johnson says. He attributes the gain to heavier traffic and higher gas prices.
The increase in ridership, or number of trips, is similar to last year when gasoline prices hit record levels, William Millar, of the American Public Transportation Association, says. The number of trips nationwide was up 5% in August and September compared with the same months in 2004. "It looks like history is repeating itself," he says. "The spike in gas prices is causing many people to look for ways to beat the high cost, and trying transit is one of the things they are doing."
Gasoline prices are climbing largely because oil prices have reached record levels, not adjusted for inflation. Oil, which closed at $75.17 a barrel Friday, accounts for about half the cost of gasoline.
Also boosting the cost of gasoline has been the conversion from additive MTBE to ethanol in many gasoline blends. Although ethanol production has been ramping up, there are concerns that there won't be enough ethanol at the right place and the right time.
There have been reports of East Coast gasoline stations shutting down temporarily in recent days as their suppliers close to make the switch to ethanol.


Here's another article



Public Transportation Reduces U.S. Foreign Oil Dependence

Using conservative assumptions, the study found that current public transportation
usage reduces U.S. gasoline consumption by 1.4 billion gallons each year. In concrete
terms, that means:

�� 108 million fewer cars filling up – almost 300,000 every day.

�� 34 fewer supertankers leaving the Middle East – one every 11 days.

�� Over 140,000 fewer tanker truck deliveries to service stations per year.

�� A savings of 3.9 million gallons of gasoline per day.
These savings result from the efficiency of carrying multiple passengers in each vehicle,
the reduction in traffic congestion from fewer automobiles on the roads, and the varied
sources of energy for public transportation.
Public transportation also saves energy by enabling land use patterns that create shorter
travel distances, both for transit riders and drivers. We hope to estimate these savings in
future research, but were not able to include them in this report.

Significant Household Savings

Households who use public transportation save a significant amount of money. A twoadult
“public transportation household” saves an average $6,251 every year, compared
to an equivalent household with two cars and no access to public transportation service.
We define “public transportation household” as a household located within ¾ mile of
public transportation, with two adults and one car.
To put these household savings in perspective, we compared them to other household
expenditures:

• The average U.S. household spent $5,781 on food in 2004.

• The average U.S. homeowner with a mortgage spent $6,848 on mortgage interest
and fees in 2004, and paid off $3,925 in mortgage principal.

Public Transportation and Petroleum Savings in the U.S.
Page 2

These savings are attributable to three factors:

• Driving less. The average household in which at least one member uses public
transportation on a given day drives 16 fewer miles per day compared to a
household with similar income, residential location and vehicle ownership that do not
use public transit – a savings of hundreds of dollars a year.

• Walking more. The 2001 National Household Transportation Survey reveals that
households living near public transportation facilities tend to drive less in general,
independent of their own public transportation use. That is because these areas tend
to have characteristics allowing people to walk more, drive shorter distances when
they do drive, and walk between destinations such as stores and workplaces.

• Owning fewer cars. The American Automobile Association (AAA) estimated the
annual average cost of operating a vehicle in 2006 was $5,586, including vehicle
depreciation, insurance, finance fees and standard maintenance.

Expanding Public Transportation Would Double Petroleum Savings

The dramatic increase in ridership over the past decade demonstrates Americans’ clear
desire for more public transportation options. So what would happen if public
transportation services were expanded so that ridership doubled? Total national fuel
savings from public transportation would double to 2.8 billion gallons per year, or more if
improved coordination between land use plans and public transportation could replace
even more car travel.


Source:http://www.apta.com/research/info/online/documents/apta_public_transportation_fuel_savings_final_010807.pdf

[annihilation]

Thats all great about public transportation if you live near a city that offers it. I live in CT and unless you are heading to NYC, the public transportation is useless. Going to Bridgeport or Stamford is semi ok, but the bus service is shady.

[Durandal]

Thats all great about public transportation if you live near a city that offers it. I live in CT and unless you are heading to NYC, the public transportation is useless. Going to Bridgeport or Stamford is semi ok, but the bus service is shady.

Yeah, and lets be honest, those numbers are completely bogus or meaningless in the long run.

300k in vehicles per day.

That is the number of commuters in the Cincinnati area.

300K, daily. We are not even in the top 50 cities in the U.S. for population. Most of our commuters are from outside the city. Where there is no bus, no taxi, and no light rail.

Now, imagine IF we had to bring light rail or metro to each of those people to make, not driving, convenient.

Where would the savings be?

As to the cash savings per person...I drive a Ford Explorer (17 MPG), I commute about 90 miles per day and I consume in a week around 45.00 USD in gas. At 52 weeks in a year, that works out to: 2, 350.00 USD dollars saved per year. Except , assuming I could arrange for a bus (which I cannot) it would cost me 3.00 (1.50 each way) because we have the new (and expensive) bio-diesel buses and the cost of diesel has remained higher (to sate the needs of the voters for some retarded reason). So, 3.00 dollars a day, 5 days a week, 52 days a year...comes out to: 2, 340 USD per year, not including the cost of time wasted because it took me longer and I had to wait for the schedule, not mine.

But hey, I get to save 10.00 USD per year. I'll take that out of my ammo budget.

[socom6]

LOL u just cant please anybody. As far as I see it there will be a combination of celullose, sugars, and corn waste to make ethanol. I want to see more non traditional gas stations or "energy centres" springing up where one can buy biodiesel, E85, E90, and even regular unleaded or premium unleaded for their vehicles. Its time the US gets off oil, ofcourse it wont happen over night but as technolgies evolve we will see the change.

[Ordie]

The key for making public transit work is a combination of transit oriented devlopment and frequency of service. In suburban areas a system of park & rides and direct, high frequency service to the urban core can be done within minimal capital costs.

Portland Oregon is a good example on how land use development is tied in with transportation planning.

In sum

Frequency trumps mode everytime.

[Kilo]

good article:

Report: Brazilian Ethanol is Sustainable (http://www.theoildrum.com/story/2006/10/10/171011/86)

http://www.theoildrum.com/story/2006/10/10/171011/86



Implications for the U.S.

The reason the Netherlands commissioned this study is that they want to transition to fuels that are produced in a sustainable manner. If Brazil or other tropical countries can produce enough fuel for export, it will benefit the U.S. just like it will benefit the Netherlands. However, the U.S. does have an import tariff in place that penalizes Brazilian ethanol in order to protect (unsustainable) homegrown corn ethanol.
One way the Brazilian example does not benefit the U.S. is in providing a template for success. As I have argued previously, Brazil's particular situation is not applicable in the U.S. As I wrote in an article for World Energy Source (http://www.worldenergysource.com/wemr/opinions.cfm?ci=19&pid=9), the U.S. uses 7 times the energy per capita that Brazil does. Our supply/demand imbalance gap is 16.9 barrels per person per year. Theirs was 0.2 barrels per person last year, prior to the opening of a new Petrobras platform (http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=5358623) earlier in the year (immediately after which they declared energy independence). Furthermore, we rely on a crop (corn) in the U.S. that is much less energy efficient, and has ten times the soil erosion of sugarcane production. Finally, we are not in a tropical climate, and therefore have a much shorter growing season than does Brazil.


Brazilian ethanol expert Milton Maciel, has echoed these arguments (http://energybulletin.net/21064.html):
Sugar cane ethanol from Brazil is NOT a realistic target or a comparable model for USA ethanol from corn. It is very easy to replace all gasoline when you would only need 8 billion gallons per year and you have a generous plant that thrives rain-fed under tropical conditions, occupying less than 1% of a country's arable land, to produce alcohol to replace 50% of all that gasoline. However, this cannot be extrapolated for USA's conditions, neither for corn, not even for sugar cane in Southern states. So, realistically, let's understand that sugar cane ethanol in Brazil is mangoes and corn ethanol in USA is apples.


What's the EROEI?

One the issue of sugarcane ethanol EROEI, which has been debated here a great deal, the study mentioned two different literature reports. The first was by Oliveira et al. in 2005, and it concluded that the EROEI was between 3.1 and 3.9. The second report was by Macedo et al. in 2004 and it concluded that the EROEI was between 8.3 and 10.2. (Note that the "bad" EROEI was still over double the EROEI of corn ethanol.) Due to the huge disparity between the two papers, the authors took a look at the underlying numbers, and concluded that the discrepancy involved the amount of diesel used in the agricultural operations process. They ultimately tracked down another paper that agreed with the Macedo study, so they reasoned that the diesel consumption numbers used by Oliviera were erroneous. They therefore concluded that an EROEI between 8.3 and 10.2 was legitimate.
Not surprisingly, the greenhouse gas (GHG) emission reduction for sugarcane ethanol was estimated to be >80%. EROEI and GHG emissions are very closely related, such that a renewable energy source possessing a high EROEI should demonstrate a high level of GHG emission reduction.

[Durandal]

Its time the US gets off oil, ofcourse it wont happen over night but as technolgies evolve we will see the change.

I do not think any of us disagree with this, but the process needs to be well planned AND a economical alternative.

If not it will not be supported by the people.

One of the reasons why ethanol is a better alternative right is that I can pull up and pay a mere 1.89 for E85 as opposed to he 2.55 for normal gas.

Gasoline is the big killer here. THe only part of our society that uses it are the consumers, not the economy (transport, farming, shipping, aviation). It takes more energy, labor, and time to produce.

We need to cut gasoline out of our transportation diet.

By going diesel and diesel hybrid (I am talking about efficient TDIs here), production becomes much less of an issue. There are no longer 4 or 5 or 8 grades of fuel/diesel, and E products, just one, and everything in the above quote that I was critical about happens and the only change is the type of engine in the car.

The other alternative that I prefer is to start building nuke plants by the baker's dozen (tell Nevada to shut the ƒuck up about Yucca Mountain and build the damn nuke waste depository and crystalize nuke waste for transport, making it safe to take by truck if need be). Nukes are about as efficient as you can get without going to a light weight system like solar or wind (great, environmentally, but the dollar per Kwh is silly). Nuke plants, lots of them are super efficient, provide a LOT of cheap power, and allow you to do stuff like heat a city with electricity or use hordes of electric vehicles for inner city travel (till something like that happens, electric cars simply change where we are dumping our carbon emissions)

The nuke plants are probably the most simple. You have a VERY clean power source that does not rely on the best weather conditions. Its cheap in the long run and if you want to start using electricity to do other things those things remain clean (I mean, who cars if you are charging your car off the power grid in most of the power is coming from a coal fired plant).

Just some stuff to think about.

The key to making things work in the U.S. is to make Americans THINK they have a choice while at the same time providing an infrastructure for them to take advantage of IF they want to.

That could also be done by coaxing them along with a 1 to 4 dollar per gallon gasoline tax.