Peak Oil Task Force Report - City of Bloomington - State of Indiana

Biofuels
Some believe that it will be possible to make up for the decline in oil production by
resorting to the large scale production of biofuels – petroleum substitutes made from
plants. The story of biofuel production in the U.S. has been, up to this point, largely the
story of corn‐based ethanol. By 2005, the U.S. consumed 3.9 billion gallons of ethanol
(compared to 136.9 billion gallons of gasoline). 15 By 2008, ethanol production was
predicted to reach some 9 billion gallons. This growth in production was achieved in large
part due to lavish federal subsidies, which in 2007 amounted to 76% of all federal subsidy
money going to renewable energy. 16 The utility of corn ethanol production has been widely
questioned because of doubts about how much it produces in the way of additional energy.
According to David Pimentel of Cornell University, “To produce a liter of 99.5% ethanol
uses 43% more fossil energy than the energy produced as ethanol.” 17 If that statement is
even remotely accurate, then the U.S. corn ethanol program must be viewed as a farm
subsidy program, not an alternative energy program.
Production of ethanol from sugar cane, a major industry in Brazil (where production is also
subsidized and where half of the cane crop is devoted to ethanol production), seems to
have more potential. According to one estimate, the amount of energy produced is about 9
times the amount of fossil fuel energy input. 18 However, Pimentel and Tad Patzek place
the energy return on Brazilian cane sugar much lower, at 2.28:1 rather than 9:1; for U.S.
cane sugar, they estimate the rate of return at 1.48:1. 19
15 Energy Information Administration, Biofuels in the U.S. Transportation Sector, February 2007 with errata as
of October 15, 2007, http://www.eia.doe.gov/oiaf/analysispaper/biomass.html.
16 Jeff St. John, Corn Ethanol’s Subsidy Glut, January 9, 2009,
http://www.greentechmedia.com/articles/read/corn‐ethanols‐subsidy‐glut‐5489/
17 David Pimentel, “Renewable and Solar Energy Technologies: Energy and Environmental Issues,” in Biofuels,
Solar and Wind as Renewable Energy Systems: Benefits and Risks, David Pimentel, ed. (New York: Springer,
2008), 10.
18 Robert M. Boddey et al., “Bio‐Ethanol Production in Brazil,” in Pimentel, ed., Biofuels, Solar and Wind, 321‐356.
19 David Pimentel and Tad W. Patzek, “Ethanol Production: Energy and Economic Issues Related to U.S. and
Brazilian Sugarcane,” in Pimentel, ed., Biofuels, Solar and Wind, 361.
Report of the Bloomington Peak Oil Task Force
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