From the afternoon mailbag:
FOR IMMEDATE RELEASE: May 7, 2008
Contact: Joel Dykstra
605-310-3398
info@joeldykstraforsenate.com
Sioux Falls, S.D. -- Republican U.S. Senate Candidate Joel Dykstra is opposing the call by 22 Republican Senators to lift the national ethanol fuel mandate in an attempt to curb rising food prices.
“Asking the Environmental Protection Agency to waive the Renewable Fuels Standard would be a poor policy decision and a step backward in the effort to reduce America’s dependence on foreign oil,” Dykstra said. He said lifting the ethanol mandate would undermine the progress that has been made in developing renewable fuel sources and sends the wrong message to investors in new technologies.
Dykstra said ethanol is being unfairly blamed for higher food prices. Last year only 22 percent of the corn crop went into making ethanol, and even with increased exports there was still a 10 percent surplus. He points out the culprit behind food inflation is actually higher energy prices. “The oil companies and other biofuels opponents are capitalizing on the food shortages world-wide to try to attack the ethanol industry,” he said.
Everyone is looking for a quick-fix to the nation’s energy crisis, but Dykstra said knee-jerk reactions like a “Gas Tax Holiday” could end up doing more harm than good. “There’s no guarantee that a reduction in the tax would benefit consumers. Most likely the market will absorb the savings and we won’t see any benefit at the pumps, while we further decimate our federal highway funds.”
The energy crisis is not a new problem either. Dykstra said, “We didn’t get into this situation overnight, and we won’t solve it by waiving a wand and wishing it away.” “We have faced a continual increase in oil imports since the 1970s and failed leadership in Congress is the reason the United States has yet to implement any long term energy solutions.” He also blames the Democratic leadership in Congress for holding back efforts to find new sources of domestic oil.
Dykstra proposes an energy policy that calls for increasing domestic oil and gas production, embracing renewable energy options like bio-fuels and wind power, but most importantly pursuing development of new technologies with a goal of dramatically reducing oil imports by 2020. “We need to provide incentives for new energy technologies in the private sector and foster a new generation of energy concepts,” he said. ”We also need a national commitment to move the U.S. off its hydrocarbon addiction and into new resources to fuel the 21st century economy.”
1 comments:
The ethanol mandate is probably the biggest boondoggle ever forced upon America by naive, clueless government officials. No one but a few select selfish-interest groups benefit from this atrocity.
Making ethanol consumes more energy and resources than are produced when you take into account everything that is involved in the making ethanol. It also creates environmental problems, especially with water use and pollution.
Now poor people around the world are suffering and possibly starving to some degree because of this increase in demand caused by food conversion. America now pays higher taxes for the ethanol subsidy, higher taxes for food aid, and higher costs for food. The idiot politicians who forced this travesty on us deserve to be kicked out of office and dragged through the streets in chains.
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