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Investment doesn’t make sense, despite U.S. need to import gasoline (http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/18160575/)

http://www.cleanmpg.com/photos/data/501/Corn_Field_in_California.jpgMSNBC.com - April 18, 2007

WASHINGTON - A top Chevron Corp. executive said Tuesday the push to displace as much as a fifth of the country's gasoline with ethanol will make it less likely the industry will build new domestic refineries.

"We'll take all the ethanol that corn growers produce. We'll use that enthusiastically" as a 10-percent blend with gasoline, Peter J. Robertson, Chevron's vice chairman, said in an interview with The Associated Press.

But Robertson, the No. 2 executive at the country's second largest oil company after Exxon, said he questions whether a goal of a 20-percent reduction in gasoline use, largely by substituting ethanol, can be achieved by 2017 as President Bush has urged.… http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/18160575/

Hi Chuck:

___I think all the Big Oil companies are saying why build another refinery when we are making money hand over fist by doing the minimum? This is exactly what I would do if I were Big oil and I know they are all thinking in this exact manner. No new refineries since the 70’s goes to show everyone what is really going on :( I personally cannot wait to go electric once and for all …

___Good Luck

___Wayne

LOL, of course they are.

Isn't ethanol still harmful to engines not built to use it? Plus with more ethanol we will be getting less mpg and in turn buy more gas. Or are they actually trying to make it as efficient (or non efficient) as the gas we're using now?

More corn for ethanol means less corn for chicken feed and other livestock feed.

More ethanol means higher grocery bills for you and me.

Thanks alot, oil companies, as if high gasoline prices weren't enough to tick us off.

Harry

Big Corn for you. Let's see:

1) It's been shown that raising corn and refining it to ethanol requires more fossil fuel that the amount of gasoline it displaces

2) Corn for ethanol displaces corn for food and feed, raising consumer prices on goods for which our demand is less elastic than oil (see tortilla prices in Mexico)

3) Ethanol has a lower caloric content than gas, meaning we need more of it to go the same distance -- and ethanol fuels need government subsidies in the marketplace to make up for it.

So, you've got an inferior product requiring government price supports that also raises prices on other goods. And our politicians are firmly behind this, because it satisfies two constituencies -- farmers who grow corn and US automakers that can't bring themselves to invest in proper alternatives to gasoline. Man, am I glad I have a voice in politics... except I don't. --RN

Hi HCHIN:
Big Corn for you. Let's see:

1) It's been shown that raising corn and refining it to ethanol requires more fossil fuel that the amount of gasoline it displaces.___This is unfortunately or not incorrect. There was a prof named Pimenthal IIRC that created that non-sense but it has been rebuffed by his peers a number of times. Did you know that gasoline production takes more energy to produce then it supplies using that same professors ideas? In reality this is true when considering an all-electric vehicle ;)

2) Corn for ethanol displaces corn for food and feed, raising consumer prices on goods for which our demand is less elastic than oil (see tortilla prices in Mexico)___It also helps keep gasoline prices in check somewhat … I hate to say this but if corn rises and food costs more, who is to delegate that an ethanol producer stop using corn? This is a somewhat free market and although it would be nice to subsidize food costs vs. transportation for another country, in a free market, the prices reflect real world realities. Mexico will have to deal with high commodity costs just as we do … If only we had the ability to produce sugar cane in the same quantities that we do corn. Think Brazil … We would have been off the gasoline kick a long time ago.

3) Ethanol has a lower caloric content than gas, meaning we need more of it to go the same distance -- and ethanol fuels need government subsidies in the marketplace to make up for it.___True but as a gasoline extender and GHG reducer, it serves its purpose quite well. For a present day vehicle running on E85 derived from corn, it is a huge mistake :(

___Good Luck

___Wayne