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The Energy Independence and Security Act of 2007 (EISA), which mandated a steep rise in domestic ethanol production, is causing unforeseen negative consequences for food prices while failing to live up to the desired gasoline results and other expectations, concludes a Texas A&M University research team headed by an economics professor who studies energy issues.James Griffin James M. Griffin, director of the Mosbacher Institute for Trade, Economics & Public Policy, which is part of Texas A&M’s Bush School of Government and Public Service, and Mauricio Cifuentes Soto, a graduate student assisting him, say in their report that the goal of...

Why on earth did President Obama offer algae as a solution to America's energy problems? I suspect that if he could, he would press the rewind button and erase the comment, as it has exposed him to widespread ridicule from heavyweights like Charles Krauthammer.  But the question remains: why bring it up at all?An answer may lie in his addiction to crony capitalism. Andrew Stiles of the Washington Free Beacon reports: Solazyme, a San Francisco-based firm that specializes in the plant matter, has received more than $25 million in federal grants and contracts as part of Obama administration's controversial...

WASHINGTON _ The Senate on Tuesday resoundingly rejected a sweeping measure to open the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge and other protected areas to oil drilling, as well as to approve construction of the Keystone pipeline project. Tuesday's vote was the first time in four years that the Senate has voted on a measure including ANWR drilling, and it failed miserably.

The United States can meet President Barack Obama's goal of producing 36 billion gallons of biofuels by 2022, but it better get moving. That's according to Tom Vilsack, secretary of the U.S. Department of Agriculture. According to a 2010 Agriculture Department report, the agency plans for the U.S. to produce 13.4 billion gallons of biofuels from grasses and sugars. The rest would come from oil seeds, crop residues and wood waste. The EPA is exploring other sources, such as animal fats, municipal solid waste and algae. The push for more biofuels comes as other industries, such as commercial power companies,...

In case you haven’t seen this, the Air Force is flying F-16s on biofuel derived from the camelina plant. Yup, years after the air service certified most of its aviation fleet to fly on coal-derived synthetic fuel (stuff that was pioneered by the Nazis and apartheid-era South African governments because no one liked them and the world cut off their oil supplies) it is now certifying its jets to fly on something a little more environmentally friendly. (The Navy has been working to get its ships and planes certified to run on biofuels for a while now, too.) Its plan...

Renewable Energy Group, the largest producer of biodiesel in the US, has raised $72 million in its initial public offering (IPO), only about two thirds of its target. The 7.2 million shares were priced at $10.00 each, below the $13-15 bankers for the company, based in Ames, Iowa, initially proposed. It will start trading on the Nasdaq Global Market today. Renewable Energy Group markets and distributes biodiesel throughout the US and operates six biodiesel plants, with a production capacity of 212 million gallons per year. The company reported revenues of $208 million in 2010, compared with $109 million in 2009...

The failed Range Fuels wood-to-ethanol factory in southeastern Georgia that sucked up $65 million in federal and state tax dollars was sold Tuesday for pennies on the dollar to another bio-fuel maker with equally grand plans to transform the alternative energy world. LanzaTech, a New Zealand-based biofuel company, paid $5.1 million for the plant in Soperton. Its main financial backer: Vinod Khosla, a California entrepreneur who also bankrolled Range Fuels, and helped secure its government loans, before Range went bust last year. LanzaTech hasn't received the same type of loans, but the company has received $7 million from the U.S....

Fresno, Calif. (AP) -- A federal judge is blocking California from enforcing its first-in-the-nation mandate for cleaner, low-carbon fuels, saying the rules favor biofuels produced in the state. . . . The California Air Resources Board adopted the low-carbon fuel standard as part of the state's landmark 2006 global warming law.

Another Failed Energy LoanTaxpayers are being stuck with the losses. The biofuels bust continues. The latest failure: Range Fuels.Last week, the company defaulted on a government-guaranteed $80 million loan that it had used to build an ethanol plant in Georgia. AgSouth Farm Credit, the servicer of the loan, will begin a foreclosure sale on the plant in January. The foreclosure provides yet another indictment of the Obama administration’s energy policies.Twenty-one months ago, the Department of Agriculture trumpeted its $80 million loan guarantee to Range — which claimed it could produce millions of gallons of ethanol from wood chips — by...

Sundrop Fuels, Inc., a gasification-based drop-in advanced biofuels company today announced that it has agreed to purchase about 1,200 acres of land near Alexandria, Louisiana, for the planned construction and operation of the company’s first production facility. The inaugural Sundrop Fuels plant will use sustainable forest waste combined with hydrogen from clean-burning natural gas to produce up to 50 million gallons annually of the world’s first ready-to-use, renewable “green gasoline.” Located in Rapides Parish a few miles outside of Alexandria, the Sundrop Fuels advanced biofuels plant will cost approximately $450 to $500 million to build and will be financed in...

LONGMONT -- Sundrop Fuels, a young company focused on developing what it calls "green gasoline," has announced plans to build its first production plant in central Louisiana. Sundrop, which relocated its headquarters to Longmont from Louisville about a month ago, let Louisiana's Economic Development Department make the announcement late Tuesday night that ground will be broken on the $450 million plant in 2012, and full production should begin in 2014. Ultimately it will employ about 150 people and will produce up to 50 million gallons of the renewable green fuel a year. ... "The technology can use any, literally any,...

Commercial aviation finally flies on biofuel The era of commercial airliners in the US flying on biofuels is here.A Boeing 747-8 freighter taking off from Paine Field, in Everett, Washington. The plane was one of the first to fly a biofuel blend, and on Monday, Continental Airlines flew the first-ever US passenger flight with an algae-biofuel blend.(Credit: Daniel Terdiman/CNET) A Continental Airlines Boeing 737-800 from Houston on 7 November became the first US plane to fly passengers while using an algae-based biofuel. According to an article originally published in the Houston Chronicle, the Continental flight carried 154 customers while using...

The first U.S. commercial airline flight powered by biofuels is set to take off from Houston on Monday ­– a United Airlines 737 that will fly to Chicago burning a blend of petroleum and an algae-derived fuel made by Silicon Valley’s Solazyme.

Trying to make a biofuel startup work is tough. On one hand, you're fighting for a share of one of the biggest markets on the planet—last year the global oil and gas market was an astounding $2.6 trillion. But fuels are a commodity—customers really don't care whether they get their gasoline from Exxon or Shell or BP, because the product is essentially the same. That means the margin on fuel is extremely low, which then means you have to produce in large-scale to make any meaningful profit. But that in turn means a lot of capital spending—just building a pilot...

Greening the European Union has suffered a setback. The European Biodiesel Board is reporting that the European Union biodiesel industry production forecasts are noting a 2011 decrease in output, the first since data has been gathered, down from 2010 figures of 9.57 million tons. The European Biodiesel Board reported that biodiesel generation in Europe in 2010 grew by 5.5 percent over 2009 production figures, while in 2009 the European Union’s biodiesel industry grew by 17 percent. Recently the European Union’s best year for biodiesel output was 2008, when the growth rate surged 35 percent over 2007 levels. Germany and France...

SOUTH SAN FRANCISCO, Calif.--(BUSINESS WIRE)-- Solazyme, Inc. (NASDAQ:SZYM - News), a renewable oil and bioproducts company, announced the continuation and expansion of its relationship with Unilever, one of the world’s leading consumer goods companies. The Commercial Development Agreement, which is funded by Unilever, expands the companies’ current research and development efforts and is the fourth agreement the parties have entered into. Upon successful completion of the development agreement and related activities, the two companies have agreed the terms of a multi-year supply agreement in which Unilever would purchase commercial quantities of Solazyme’s renewable oils.

Okay, someone's finally done it. Question is, what took so long? Never dreamed poop could get you blazing down the asphalt? Well, now it all comes true as Japan's biggest toilet maker, TOTO, takes the toilet on the road with its launch of the Toilet Bike Neo, a bike that's powered entirely by human waste. The bike runs on biogas converted from feces that is harvested directly from the driver -- who sits on the bike's toilet-styled seat.

China, arguably the world’s most influential and dynamic economy, is beginning to eye renewable as a partial solution to its voracious and growing energy needs. If Beijing determines that biofuels represent the future, expect to see the current modest western investment field to change dramatically. As yet, China’s involvement is modest. According to a PetroChina company official, the firm intends to increase its production of biofuels by 2015 to 1.1 million tons and import and additional 470,000 tons. PetroChina, a traditional hydrocarbon company, is clearly thinking outside the box to increase its alternative energy portfolio. According to PetroChina's Petrochemical Research...

When the six F/A-18 Hornets in the U.S. Navy's Blue Angels flight demonstration team thrill the crowds at the Naval Air Station Patuxent River Air Expo in Maryland this weekend, they'll be soaring on biofuel. Each of the six Hornets will be powered by a 50/50-blend of jet fuel and camelina-based biofuel, according to a Navy press release. Camelina is a high-oil flowering plant grown in rotation on land used for wheat and on land too marginal for food production, according to Sustainable Oils, the company providing it to the military. Sustainable Oils says camelina can also reduce carbon emissions...

Republican presidential candidate Rick Perry says it’s time for the federal government to quit picking winners and losers, and that includes federal efforts to boost the ethanol industry. Perry, the governor of oil-rich Texas, opposes the federal “renewable fuels standard” which requires a certain amount of corn-based ethanol be produced in the U.S. each year. “I’d like to see a level playing field for all of the energy producers in this country,” Perry told reporters in Iowa tonight. Iowa corn farmers support the federal rule which requires an increasing volume of ethanol be produced through 2015. Perry told reporters tonight...

On 16 August President Obama announced that the U.S. Departments of Agriculture, Energy and Navy will invest up to $510 million by 2014 in partnership with the private sector to produce advanced “drop-in” aviation and maritime biofuels for military and commercial use. This builds on a directive Obama issued five months ago as part of his “Blueprint for A Secure Energy Future,” his administration’s policy for reducing U.S. dependence on foreign oil imports, which now cost more than $300 billion. The plan envisages the three federal departments to invest a total of up to $510 million, which will require substantial...

In a biotechnological tour de force, Rice University engineering researchers this week unveiled a new method for rapidly converting simple glucose into biofuels and petrochemical substitutes. In a paper published online in Nature, Rice's team described how it reversed one of the most efficient of all metabolic pathways -- the beta oxidation cycle -- to engineer bacteria that produce biofuel at a breakneck pace. Just how fast are Rice's single-celled chemical factories? On a cell-per-cell basis, the bacteria produced the butanol, a biofuel that can be substituted for gasoline in most engines, about 10 times faster than any previously reported...

Slowly but surely, an extraordinarily important new industry is slowly taking shape, with the potential to transform the global economy. After years of existing largely as an environmentalist's fantasy, commercial production of biofuels for the world civil aviation industry is slowly becoming a fact, with production starting up across three continents. The leading contenders for biofuel feedstocks are jatropha and camelina, both of which have their fervent supporters. While currently neither is capable of production at a price approaching that of Jet A1 civil aviation fuel derived from hydrocarbons, research and extensive investment are nevertheless investigating the possibilities. While little...

Soaring gas prices have hit defense budgets, and served as a reminder of the volatility of oilBetween Iraq and Afghanistan alone, the U.S. Department of Defense needed an enormous amount of fuel last year -- the U.S. government uses 20 to 50 million gallons of fuel every month in Afghanistan to support operations. In fact, of the $15B USD it spent on fuel, 75 percent went towards operations, such as the efforts in these Middle Eastern nations. I. Massive Demand, Soaring CostsThe thirstiest branch of the armed forces was the U.S. Air Force (USAF). They used $8.1B USD in fuel,...

Reports from the WTO and USDA show that corn supplies are influenced by biofuel subsidies and mandates. The biofuels industry is being blamed for record food prices and high price volatility. Earlier this month a report from the World Trade Organization and other international agencies recommended that governments cut support for biofuels to ease that volatility. On the heels of that report, the U.S. Department of Agriculture issued its corn forecast; it suggested that corn supplies will be very tight this year because bad weather has limited planting and because the share of corn going to ethanol is increasing. After...

An extraordinary convergence of recent events seems poised shortly to make aviation biofuels the belle of the investor’s ball. The first is that on 8 June the follows the international standards certifying body ASTM International announcing its approval of its BIO SPK Fuel Standard, to be made official later in the year, of the use of hydrotreated renewable jet (HRJ) Jet A-1 fuel in commercial aviation. The potential financial implications are massive, as together the airline industry and the U.S. military use more than 42.25 million gallons (1.5 million barrels) of jet fuel a day. One of the leading contenders...

Investors looking for the next big thing after a hydrocarbon economy have a panoply of options, from solar to wind, as well as biofuels. In terms of quickly ramping up production biofuels clearly win the race, but navigating the PR fluff and reality is not a simple thing. The three main contenders for investor dollars are algae, jatropha and camelina. All have strengths and weaknesses, leaving investors to choose amongst them. Stripped of PR flummery, the only issue is where and when production can begin on a viable commercial scale. Investors who unravel the complexities of biofuel production and have...

Why would President Obama want high gas prices? It's a matter of ideology for him. He thinks it's good for the environment for gas prices to be high. The higher gas prices are, the less you will drive. Also, higher gas prices make his beloved "alternative fuels" more competitive. That is because these alternative fuels are inherently more expensive, and so can't compete with cheaper gas. Note this is not a prescription for easing the financial burden on working people. High gas prices make it more likely you will buy expensive "alternative fuels." But either way, your wallet will still...

CORN!! Joe Weisenthal Mar. 31, 2011, 8:09 PM Our CHART OF THE DAY showed the huge surge in corn following the USDA crop report. But that was just the first act. Corn futures were limit up, and couldn't go any higher. Well the market is open again, and corn is exploding higher again. Check out the last day in corn-ville and now the three different levels it's hit today. Image: CME

WASHINGTON (AP) — A ruling by the Obama administration allowing the sale of gasoline containing 15 percent ethanol is running into legal hurdles from trade groups opposing the plan. The National Petrochemical and Refiners Association sued the Environmental Protection Agency on Monday over the decision to allow the sale of gasoline containing higher blends of corn-based ethanol, the second major group to protest the ruling. The Obama administration said in October that gas stations could start selling the ethanol blend for vehicles built since the 2007 model year, increasing it from the current blend of 10 percent ethanol.

It’s high noon for ethanol subsidies and import tariffs, but not for the ethanol industry.After more than three decades, the U.S. ethanol blenders’ tax credit and the ethanol-import tariff that was put in place to offset it are set to expire at the end of the year. The way things are looking, we may finally be rid of these indefensible and parochial market distortions. The ethanol tax credit alone costs taxpayers over $6 billion per year. The expiration of these policies will have little, if any, impact on the U.S. ethanol industry, because the Renewable Fuel Standard requires Americans to...

This week marks the beginning of the end of the long national nightmare known as the 111th Congress.  Republicans were given a second chance—by default—through a national effort to stop the destructive Obama/Pelosi/Reid agenda. House Republicans are poised to begin making the same kind of business-as-usual mistakes that relegated the party to minority status in 2006.  The most glaring example is the looming threat of having Rep. Fred Upton (RINO-Mich.) become chairman of the powerful House Energy and Commerce Committee, despite his liberal voting record, simply because he’s next in line.  If there is one thing voters made absolutely clear...

The Energy Information Administration (EIA) reports for August that U.S. ethanol production rose in August to an all-time high, production averaged more than 869,000 barrels per day (b/d). The Renewable Fuels Association who also collects data calculated ethanol demand at all-time high as well at 911,000 b/d in August, up from 734,000 b/d a year ago. The U.S. is closing in on the million barrel per day milestone. Cheers in some sections, groans in others, but for America, slashing off the equivalent of 750,000 b/d of imported oil is a good thing. Most groans come from the odd couple of...

I love all those "green future" commercials companies like Exxon and BP ("Beyond Petroleum") run. They never fail to get a chuckle out of me, no matter how often I see them. I can’t remember who is responsible for the latest one in which an “engineer” and a “teacher” (both actors, of course) speak almost simultaneously in split screen. They both talk about how we need to get off of carbon-based fuels like petroleum. I’ve only seen it once — and will likely see it 100 times more — but my initial guffaw line was when the “teacher,” in exasperation,...

Since 2007 the price of food around the world has just about doubled. Bad harvests, inflation, or George Bush didn't cause this price increase. According to a secret report from the World Bank, reported in the UK's Guardian, 75% of the increase in price has one source: "Biofuels." This contrasts with US claims of only a 3% biofuels-caused increase. The World Bank also says that rising food prices have pushed 100 million people worldwide below the poverty line. Riots have been sparked from Bangladesh to Egypt. Where is the outrage? Where are the MSNBC stories on food riots? Where is...

The biodiesel tax credit will have to wait once again. Congress passed the small business bill shortly after returning from recess, but it did not include the extension as it previously had. Before the August recess, an earlier version of the bill contained the biodiesel tax extension proposed by Sen. Charles Grassley, R-Iowa, and was also approved by both the Democrats and the Republicans, but in a move to keep the bill alive, Sen. Harry Reid, D-Nev., stripped all amendments attached to the bill. Upon return from recess, Reid issued a procedure known as an “amendment tree,” which prevents an...

The U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) has just issued a report detailing the outlook and challenges of next generation biofuels. I provided some input during the drafting of the report, which hopefully was of some use. Here I select five pessimistic projections and five optimistic projections from the report.The report is: Next-Generation Biofuels: Near-Term Challenges and Implications for Agriculture Here are five findings from the report that promise to strongly influence the country’s direction on next generation fuels.1. Production and Capital Costs

The editors of Investor’s Business Daily write: Environment: Our growing addiction to alternative energy was killing aquatic life in the Gulf long before the Deepwater Horizon spill. Abandoning oil will kill more and also release more carbon dioxide into the air. President Obama sees the oil spill as a chance to make the planet a greener place by weaning us off fossil fuels and pushing us toward alternative energy. The earth and the Gulf of Mexico have indeed been getting greener lately, thanks to agricultural runoff due to a mandated surge in biofuels such as ethanol. Before the first gallon...

You may never have never heard of Patricia Woertz, or Archer Daniels Midland. Woertz is the CEO of ADM, America’s 27th largest company, and it’s the largest company headed by a female in the US. The reason you ought to care is that Woertz and ADM have the power to make your life more expensive – much more expensive. And they have been aggressively exercising that power for over 30 years. ADM is the largest primary food processor in the country – it turns corn and soybeans (among other products) into a host of consumer products: corn flakes, cornstarch, corn...

Environment: Our growing addiction to alternative energy was killing aquatic life in the Gulf long before the Deepwater Horizon spill. Abandoning oil will kill more and also release more carbon dioxide into the air. President Obama sees the oil spill as a chance to make the planet a greener place by weaning us off fossil fuels and pushing us toward alternative energy. The earth and the Gulf of Mexico have indeed been getting greener lately, thanks to agricultural runoff due to a mandated surge in biofuels such as ethanol. Before the first gallon gushed from Deepwater Horizon, there existed an...

Energy Policy: President Obama says the oil disaster proves the need to get off fossil fuels. But before we save the planet, let's save the Gulf and stop exploiting crises to deny America the energy it needs. Saving the planet is nice, but just how do we plug the hole again? With an abundance of hand gestures, the president didn't really say in his speech Tuesday night. He did say fossil fuels were bad and green energy is good, but the people of the Gulf states don't need wind turbines right now. Contrary to Obama's assertions, our "addiction" to foreign...

Energy: The administration has banned new offshore drilling until the Gulf oil spill is investigated. Was its heart in it anyway? It seems environmental concerns apply only to certain forms of energy. No one pays much attention to the aquatic "dead zones" that have appeared off our shores at the mouths of our rivers due to agricultural runoff created by mandates for corn-based ethanol. Ethanol is green energy, good energy — never mind that such biofuels drive up food prices, increase hunger around the world and damage the environment in their own way. The explosion that blew apart an oil...

* Hidden biofuels study now released under transparency laws * Says biodiesel can cause four times more CO2 than diesel

The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) is facing renewed criticism this week with scientists charging that the government arm inaccurately labeled ethanol a “renewable fuel” last February. According to reports, at the same time that it revised its renewable fuel standards, the EPA also re-ran numbers relating to corn-based ethanol’s lifecycle emissions, and determined that ethanol was responsible for substantially less greenhouse-gas emissions than gasoline, thus allowing it to be redesignated as “renewable.” But, scientists argue, the underlying data remained the same, and demonstrated that ethanol was not a “green” energy source. Nonetheless, they charge, the EPA presented the data in...

Nation wising up on corn ethanol Published: Thursday, April 15, 2010 8:28 AM CDT Corn-based ethanol is losing some of its luster, and that is a good thing for the average American, if not the corn grower. For the past 30 years, ethanol has had powerful advocates in the nation’s capital, including senators and congressmen from corn-producing states from both political parties. The fact that the Iowa presidential primary comes so early hasn’t hurt the corn growers either. But billions of dollars in tax credits for ethanol companies expire at the end of this year, and a fight appears to...

The promise of green energy has intrigued the Middle East, where concern about future reserves runs deep, but Saudi Arabia's recent plan for a multibillion-dollar investment in traditional oil projects underscores lingering concern about betting on renewables. Riyadh plans to spend $170 billon over the next five years on energy and oil refining efforts; the country's state-owned oil company, Saudi Aramco, will bankroll little more than half this endeavor, according to the Saudi Gazette. The energy giant called it unrealistic for Saudi Arabia to plow into alternative energy sources when the No. 1 cash crop of oil has built its...

The Environmental Protection Agency wants to dump more corn into your fuel tank this summer, and it's going to cost more than you think. The agency is expected to approve a request from 52 ethanol producers known collectively as "Growth Energy" to boost existing requirements that gasoline contain 10 percent ethanol to 15 percent. The change means billions more in government subsidies for companies in the business of growing corn and converting it into ethanol. For the rest of us, it means significantly higher gasoline and food prices. It's time that this shameless corporate welfare gets plowed under. In 2007,...

The European Union seems to be ahead of America when it comes to the issue of climate change. The nations' of that "union" were early proponents of that particular myth. They gave vast subsidies to solar power producers in Germany and planned to eliminate all its nuclear reactors. They rewarded the biofuel industry with huge government subsidies and mandates. American liberals looked to Euro-elites for guidance. Now, Europe is leading the way towards the realization that the ideology that they have adopted is wrong. ClimateGate was sparked by disclosures of emails in England that cast serious doubt on the validity...

Johann De Nysschen, president of Audi North America, has a message for the current U.S. administration—refrain from “prejudging winning and losing technologies” as it makes policies depending on the future of the automotive marketplace. Nysschen said there has been favoritism shown to the electric vehicle sector. “Clean diesel, done correctly, is more efficient, has lower emissions, with better performance characteristics, at a lower price,’’ Nysschen said. “And then we haven’t even touched on the potential of biofuels, using biomass to produce clean diesel, which would come very close to a carbon neutral footprint much sooner and far more cost efficiently...

According to a recent Congressional Budget Office report, the increased use of ethanol is responsible for a rise in food prices of approximately 10 to 15 percent. Why? We're turning corn into fuel — a highly inefficient one, at that — instead of food. The Mackinac Center for Public Policy points out that "mixing food and fuel markets for political reasons has done American consumers no discernable good, while producing measurable harm." However, perhaps summing up the issue most succinctly is Mark J. Perry, professor of economics and finance at the University of Michigan-Flint: Anytime you have Paul Krugman agreeing...