Double Take: Big Oil Cashing in on Ethanol, But Stalling Delivery
by David Sassoon - Sep 23rd, 2007
in
The BusinessWeek headline says it all: "Big Oil's Big Stall on Ethanol" The government is paying oil companies 51 cents for every gallon of ethanol it mixes with gas. That's a $3.5 billion gift now, set to double to $7 billion within 3 years. You won't believe how the oil industry is saying "thank you" to America.
With a campaign to quash the spread of ethanol. They don't want this alternative fuel thing to get out hand.
It's another classic case of letting the fox keep watch over the chicken house. Congress set a target of substituting 15% of gas with ethanol by 2017. Best way to do that? Make it worthwhile for the oil companies to blend it. Big Oil was happy for the payday, and mixing 10% ethanol into the gas to make a mixture called E10 is a no-brainer.
But to reach the target Congress set, that's not going to be nearly enough. The Holy Grail? A mixture called E85 -- 85% ethanol.
"Whoa! Time out!" the oil industry is saying. But not out loud.
They are making it close to impossible for station owners to install E85 pumps. If there are no pumps, well, nobody can buy it. And that suits Big Oil just fine.
And just to make sure the idea of E85 doesn't get too popular, the industry is funding "research" that BusinessWeek characterizes as an "anti-ethanol information campaign."
It's an effort to manufacture convenient truths -- similar to the industry's contribution to the manufacture of junk science to dispute the reality of global warming.
When are these guys going to stop?
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