It’s actulally a tax credit to the gasoline excise tax that only goes to the blender not the producer, which is now 51 cents per gallon of ethanol used. The only incentive for alcohol production is the small producers credit of 10 cents for production under 15 million gallons per year with a capacity of no more than 30 million gallons per year.
You could argue that this would subsidize ethanol production by allowing blenders to pay more for ethanol, raising the breakeven price of production and allowing producers to make a profit at a higher corn and natural gas price. But this isn’t reflected in current prices, as gas and ethanol are selling about the same on a BTU basis.
As far as the burning our food argument, if ethanol production is burning our food than so is soft drink production.
“”As far as the burning our food argument, if ethanol production is burning our food than so is soft drink production.””
Same goes for fat food (junk food) and ethanol in addictive drinks with more car accidents related to the 50,000 plus alcohol-related auto deaths every year.