Is E85 Taking Food Out of Orphans Mouths?

Yes, that is a sensationalist headline. Sorry. Well, not completely. I'll get to my point in a minute, but first some history. I've espoused on this blog before what I think about corn based ethanol: I don't like it. We really are a corn based country. To steal a paragraph from the Washington Post's book review of the Omnivore's Dilemma.

American cattle fatten on corn. Corn also feeds poultry, pigs and sheep, even farmed fish. But that's just the beginning. In addition to dairy products from corn-fed cows and eggs from corn fed chickens, corn starch, corn oil and corn syrup make up key ingredients in prepared foods. High-fructose corn syrup sweetens everything from juice to toothpaste. Even the alcohol in beer is corn-based. Corn is in everything from frozen yogurt to ketchup, from mayonnaise and mustard to hot dogs and bologna, from salad dressings to vitamin pills. "Tell me what you eat," said the French gastronomist Anthelme Brillat-Savarin, "and I will tell you what you are." We're corn.

Because "we're corn" anytime that supply is jeopardized it has wide ranging consequences. The cost of protein goes up, milk prices sky rocket and crops such as soybeans are cast aside in the search for more corn production subsequently raising the price of those commodities.

Now back to the orphans. The amount of food aid our government buys has fallen to its lowest level in a decade. The amount of food bought for American food aid programs has fallen to 2.4 million metric tons this year from 4 million metric tons in 2005 and 5.3 million metric tons in 2000 Why? Higher energy costs to transport that food and now more increasingly the cost of the food itself. But that's not all. Just as high prices mean less food donations, it also means that the poor have a harder time buying food for themselves.

I'm not against E85 or ethanol (provided that there is a positive fuel energy balance). I'd just like to see it derived from other sources such as agricultural and forest residues, grasses, and fast-growing trees. I'd personally like to nominate switchgrass: it requires minimal irrigation, fertilizer, or herbicides but yields 2-3 times more ethanol per acre than corn does.

Sources:

NYT article on food donations (registration req)

Omnivore's Dilemma product page at Amazon.com

Plenty Magazine article on corn

Wikipedia article on switchgrass