USDA-okay

Looks like the only organization that isn’t dumping on ethanol is the USDA. They aren’t completely exonerating it, either, but USDA Under Secretary of Rural Development Thomas Dorr thinks that rising food prices are due more to transportation costs than ethanol production. According to Dorr, “the overall increase in food prices is about 4.5 percent and, at most, 10 percent of that increase is being driven by ethanol,” crediting the remainder of the food price hike to fuel costs. He went on to quote an Iowa State University study saying that “the reduction of the [ethanol production] mandate will have minimal impact on the price of corn,” provided energy prices stay at their current levels.

So yeah, we can make it illegal to do anything with corn beyond eating it off the cob; the prices won’t go down until transport is less expensive. It’s important that we figure out how to develop ethanol from stuff we don’t need elsewhere, but it’s more important to not let the current problems with ethanol production distract us from the need for reliable alternative fuel. Call us paranoid if you must, but it seems like the current flood of media criticism is intended to make people throw up their hands in defeat and just accept that gas is $4 a gallon. Just remember that the world we want for our kids is this, not this.