Over one-third of all corn grown in the United States is used to produce ethanol, a gasoline additive. Growing corn for ethanol comes at a high cost to our wallets and climate.
More ethanol means you pay more for food at the grocery checkout. Corn production for ethanol has raised the price of corn by 30 percent and other crops by 20 percent. Ethanol also harms the environment. It erodes the soil and requires massive amounts of herbicides, insecticides, and fossil fuel-based fertilizers.
Plus, creating ethanol is energy-intensive, and bad for the climate – new research shows that carbon emissions linked to ethanol are at least 24 percent higher than regular gasoline. Ethanol plants are often located next to existing trash incinerators and coal power plants, resulting in the concentration of polluting industries in already poisoned communities.
The misleadingly named Renewable Fuel Infrastructure Investment and Market Expansion Act of 2021 (H.R.1542) is likely to get a vote this week in a larger food and agriculture committee package. It would create a new program at USDA to support the expansion of biofuel infrastructure — ethanol, switchgrass, and wood biomass — and would seed the program with $500 million in subsidies for ethanol and biodiesel, but this is just the start.
Shouldn’t we get rid of any product that is ruining the land, polluting air and water, and endangering communities? Of course we should! But instead, Congress is considering including more ethanol and biofuel subsidies which means more dirty energy plants, pipelines, and other infrastructure.
Food & Water Action and its affiliated organization, Food & Water Watch, are advocacy groups with a common mission to protect our food, water and climate.
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