Today in Biofuels Opinion: “Tinkering with energy regulation can have disastrous consequences”

Editorial by the Los Angeles Times: “The EPA should waive the ethanol requirement, but if that’s the only outcome of the ethanol brouhaha, the country will still lose. Lawmakers should see this as an important lesson: Tinkering with energy regulation can have disastrous consequences, especially when it’s done on behalf of special interests rather than the national interest. Given the number of phenomenally bad proposals for lowering oil prices floating around the Capitol, this lesson could not come at a more critical time.”

Peter Brabeck-Letmathe, chairman of Nestlé SA, in the Wall Street Journal: “Biofuels are economical nonsense, ecologically useless and ethically indefensible. Every 10,000 litres of water produces as little as five litres of ethanol, or one to two litres of biodiesel. This year, the U.S. will use around 130 million tons of corn for biofuels. This corn was not available as human food, nor as fodder to animals. Is this the right strategy, for a product that won’t satisfy even a small percentage of our energy needs?”

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