CFDC’s Douglas Durante, Letter to the Editor, Boston Globe, Response to “How Government Makes Things Worse.”
Many studies have confirmed the environmental benefits of biofuels such as ethanol and ethanol’s ability to mitigate carbon emissions. While the recently published studies in Science, which Jacoby cites, indicate otherwise, a recent study by the US Department of Agriculture shows that ethanol made from feed stocks with low or even no energy feedstocks 94 percent fewer greenhouse gases than petroleum. Ethanol also played a key role in the reformulated gasoline programs of the 1990s, helping to meet Clean Air Act standards. Earlier this year, the Environmental Protection Agency confirmed that these programs have exceeded expectations in significantly improving ground, water, and air quality. The recently passed energy bill calls for increases in ethanol production, but it does so in an environmentally responsible manner. The architects of the energy bill anticipated new developments in research, and built in global warming and pollution reduction standards that ensure that all new technologies meet a carbon benchmark before implementation. The nation will move toward energy sustainability in an environmentally responsible manner. Studies such as those published in Science are no cause for alarm.
~ Douglas A. Durante,
Executive director, Clean Fuels Development Coalition
Bethesda, Md.