[Congressional Record Volume 149, Number 59 (Friday, April 11, 2003)]
[House]
[Page H3308]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                          THE FACTS ON ETHANOL

  (Mr. OSBORNE asked and was given permission to address the House for 
1 minute.)
  Mr. OSBORNE. Mr. Speaker, during last night's debate, there was a 
great deal said about renewable fuels and particularly about ethanol. 
Much of this was uninformed and inaccurate. I think some of it was due 
to the fact that it was based on old research.
  One of the comments that was made was that ethanol is not energy 
efficient, that it takes a lot more energy to produce than what it 
actually yields. Actually for every Btu of fossil fuel used, ethanol 
yields 1.4 Btus of energy. Gasoline for every Btu of energy used yields 
.8 Btu. MTBE yields about .7 Btu. It is the most energy efficient fuel 
that we have going at the present time.
  Also, ethanol reduces farm payments by $5.9 billion over 10 years and 
it adds $51 billion to the farm economy. It reduces the trade deficit 
by $34 billion over 10 years which certainly helps the economy as well, 
and in 2002 removed 4 million tons of carbon dioxide from the air.

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