Cornell critic of subsidies for corn-based ethanol renews charges about high costs, inefficiency and environmental harm

Contact: Roger Segelken
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E-Mail: hrs2@cornell.edu

Pimentel Copyright © Cornell University Click on the image for a high-resolution version (947 x 1424 pixels, 614K)

ITHACA, N.Y. -- The U.S. Senate passed an energy-policy bill July 31 that would double amounts of corn-based ethanol in American gasoline. At the same time, a Cornell University agricultural ecologist has renewed his criticism of what many believe is a renewable fuel.

He claims that drivers who fill their tanks with gasohol (a blend of gasoline and corn-based ethanol) are paying three ways for a product that, he says, is both inefficient and environmentally harmful: once at the pump, once in taxes to fund government subsidies and once in higher food prices.

Cornell Professor of Ecology David Pimentel makes the claim in the latest issue of the journal Natural Resources Research (Vol. 12, No. 2). The dubious economics of corn-based ethanol, Pimentel writes, are threefold:

• In general gasohol is priced higher at the pump than gasoline yet yields poorer mileage per gallon.

• Taxpayers are the source of $1.4 billion a year in subsidies that help make ethanol production profitable for agribusiness firms.

• In addition to paying tax dollars for ethanol subsidies, says Pimentel, consumers can be expected to pay significantly higher food prices in the market place. Why? He cites the National Center for Policy Analysis' 2002 estimate that ethanol production is adding more than $1 billion to the cost of beef production. This, he says, is because producing the required corn feedstock for ethanol reduces the overall corn supply, adding about 2 cents a bushel to the price farmers receive for their corn, by his calculation. "Because about 70 percent of the corn grain is fed to U.S. livestock, doubling or tripling ethanol production can be expected to increase corn prices further for beef and livestock production and ultimately increase costs for the consumer," Pimentel states.

"Most of us wouldn't mind paying a premium for a homegrown fuel that's truly efficient, environmentally friendly and renewable," Pimentel said in an interview. "But ethanol from corn is none of those." Making a gallon of ethanol from corn, he calculates, requires about 29 percent more energy -- from fossil fuels -- than a gallon of ethanol can provide. At the same time, he said, ethanol has only two-thirds the energy content of the same volume of gasoline.

Also, he noted, "Corn farming takes a terrible toll on the environment -- it causes more soil erosion and requires more insecticides, herbicides and nitrogen fertilizer than any other crop. And every gallon of ethanol produced results in 13 gallons of effluent pollution." Said Pimentel, "I can't call that renewable."

Ethanol by the Numbers

2.5 1.7 billion 2.2 billion 0.9 5.4 million 54 million

gallons of ethanol derived from a bushel of corn (56 pounds) gallons of ethanol produced annually in the United States gallons of oil equivalents required to produce 1.7 billion gallons of ethanol percent of U.S. automobile fuel produced annually from ethanol acres of U.S. land currently growing corn for ethanol acres of U.S. land devoted to corn if ethanol automobile fuel production rises to 10 percent, as some advocates suggest

Source: "Ethanol Fuels: Energy Balance, Economics, and Environmental Impacts are Negative," by David Pimentel, Natural Resources Research (Vol., 12, No. 2).

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