Ethanol's promise may be a ‘scam’

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(AP Photo/Andrei Pungovschi)
Drivers are paying an average of 34 cents more per gallon for gasoline than they were a year ago, the federal government says.

BALTIMORE (Map, News) - Ethanol is the fuel of the future — or so we are being led to believe. In the wake of the top three U.S. automakers’ pledge to build 50 percent of their products as “flex-fuel” vehicles, some industry experts say consumers are being misled about its benefits.

“It’s a total scam,” said Dan Becker, director of the Sierra Club’s global warming program. “The automakers are trying to shield themselves from having to make more efficient vehicles. They’re avoiding the path to cutting oil dependence, curbing global warming, saving consumers money and ultimately saving Detroit from competitors like Toyota.”

The reality is that ethanol, an outgrowth of the Alternative Motor Fuels Act, has done more to spawn a billion-dollar industry than to lessen the total cost consumers will pay at the pump, said David Friedman, research director for the vehicles program for the Union of Concerned Scientists.

Under the act, automakers receive credit for building vehicles that run on alternative fuel, but the vehicles are not fuel-efficient. Ethanol is a win because it costs manufacturers only $50 per vehicle to make it a flex-fuel vehicle.

However, the end product is a gas-guzzling, fuel-inefficient vehicle that will actually create more greenhouse gases than those that run on gasoline, Friedman said.

“There is no doubt that when you operate on ethanol fuel, economy goes down 20 to 25 percent, but it still can cut oil use and reduce global warming if they run on 100 percent ethanol, not a blend,” Friedman said.

“Some people say ethanol is the silver bullet, others that it’s a waste of time. The reality is in the middle — we don’t have enough land to grow enough corn to replace all our gasoline consumption.”

According to Friedman, the hole in the oil drum is the loophole in the Alternative Motor Fuels Act that enables automakers to receive a credit for making vehicles that is not tied to fuel efficiency and the actual use of ethanol. “They are building these vehicles that most people don’t even know can run on ethanol, plus there are only 1,000 stations that sell it, one in Maryland,” he said.

rchappelle@baltimoreexaminer.com

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