Ethanol bailout next?

The bottom line is that fuel-efficient cars and alternative fuels like E85, a fuel formulated with 85 percent ethanol, represent the future of the auto industry. It is a future a future American car companies can attain if start making some tough choices now...
Barack Obama, "The Audacity of Hope."

An easy choice is to walk away from the fraud known as ethanol. The headline, by the way, is a tease. The ethanol industry couldn't exist without government subsidies, about $7 billion a year. One can argue that ethanol production--yes I'm stretching the defintion of the word--has been on the receiving end of a federal bailout since the first drop trickled out.

But the Indianapolis Star is reporting that the ethanol industry is suffering.

Bankruptcy. Red ink. Painful shakeout.

Those terms, normally associated with old-line manufacturing, now are popping up to describe what was seen just three years ago as a sure bet for Indiana: high-tech ethanol plants.

Ethanol producers across the Midwest are being squeezed by falling prices, tight credit, overbuilding and the volatile market for corn. As a result, many have seen their profits shrink and their stock prices fall. Several have slid into bankruptcy and have scrapped deals and projects.

The latest setback came Friday, when Aventine Renewable Energy Holdings, struggling to conserve cash, said it would slow construction of a plant in Mount Vernon, Ind., near the Ohio River, and delay the opening for about nine months. The plant, designed to produce 220 million gallons of ethanol a year, had been scheduled to open early next year.

Even with federal "bailouts," the the ethanol industry is struggling. Obama is a big supporter of the fuel, and he wants to double the federal guaranteed market for it.

Which means if the president-elect gets his way, more land will be devoted to ethanol production, which will drive up the price of food.

To produce a gallon of ethanol, it takes almost a gallon of ethanol.

What a scam. It's amazing Tony Rezko didn't get into the ethanol racket.

Ah...but you can't make money in ethanol.

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Corn, ethanol, toilet paper, and Sheryl Crow

Obama pushing Ethanol, after voting against Clear Skies

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