[Congressional Record Volume 154, Number 66 (Thursday, April 24, 2008)]
[House]
[Page H2739]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




               TIME FOR A DIVORCE FROM CORN-BASED ETHANOL

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under a previous order of the House, the 
gentleman from Texas (Mr. Poe) is recognized for 5 minutes.
  Mr. POE. Mr. Speaker, Congress has a love affair with corn-based 
ethanol, and that love affair, Mr. Speaker, is on the rocks.
  Ethanol has led to increased food prices, food shortages, and more 
pollution and less energy. As we have increased our reliance on 
ethanol, food supplies and prices have soared and have led to a global 
food shortage as customers stock up before stores run out. Shortages 
have led to food riots in Egypt, Haiti and other nations. There is an 
international shortage of basic commodities such as rice and wheat, and 
this has resulted in protests and riots.
  American consumers are reactionary. They read about the international 
shortage and the riots and they run to the store to buy more food, 
stocking up. Yesterday, Wal-Mart and Costco announced they were 
limiting purchases of rice. You can only buy four bags of rice on any 
one trip at Wal-Mart.
  Mr. Speaker, who would have thought that in the United States we 
would start having food rationing?
  Also, because of inflation of the prices of corn-based ethanol, other 
food products are going up. Prices on beer, bread, coffee, pizza and 
rice are dramatically increasing. Anything that has a corn-based 
product has also increased in price.
  In Mexico, cornmeal prices are up 60 percent. In Pakistan, flour 
prices have doubled. And even China is having a food inflation problem. 
In America, the cost of all groceries is skyrocketing. The shortage of 
staple food has larger consequences for our country, and, of course, it 
adds to inflation.
  Also, we are now finding out that corn-based ethanol contributes to 
global warming. In March, Science Magazine reported that ``Using good 
cropland to expand biofuels increases global warming.''
  Under Congress' ethanol mandates, farmers must plow more land to grow 
enough corn to use in our vehicles. This releases carbon stored in 
plants and in the soil. And Science Magazine continues to say that 
corn-based ethanol will increase greenhouse gasses by 93 percent in 30 
years.
  Ethanol also pollutes. Factories that convert corn into ethanol 
release carbon monoxide, methanol and some carcinogens at a very high 
level. The science that predicted less CO2 from corn ethanol 
is now being questioned as junk science.
  Ethanol pollution has also contributed to the dead zone in the Gulf 
of Mexico. What that is, Mr. Speaker, is the water that runs down into 
the Gulf of Mexico at the mouth of the Mississippi, because of the 
pollutants in that water, it causes a dead zone about the size of New 
Jersey where nothing lives and nothing grows.
  As Congress continues to subsidize corn-based ethanol, farmers are 
using more and more fertilizer to plant corn, and thus more fertilizer 
runs into the Mississippi River, down the river to the Gulf of Mexico, 
and the dead zone continues to grow.
  You see, we don't eat corn anymore. We burn it in our cars. Farmers 
planting more corn only increase the dead zone problem. So now we are 
having a problem with food production that comes from the sea, from the 
Gulf of Mexico, all because of corn-based ethanol.
  And, of course, ethanol hurts other industries. While grain producers 
have benefited from ethanol mandates because of record profits, some 
other industries are hurting. The losers are livestock farmers and 
ranchers, who have lost about $30 more an animal since the fall.

                              {time}  1545

  In other words, corn prices going up cost more to feed their beef, 
and then beef prices continue to go up as well. And we pay. The 
consumer always pays.
  So, Mr. Speaker, Congress needs to rethink its love affair with 
ethanol. We need to lift the offshore drilling prohibition against 
drilling for crude oil and for natural gas. We need to develop our own 
natural resources. We need to allow permits for clean coal production. 
We need to use safe nuclear energy. And, we need to get back to eating 
corn instead of burning it in our vehicles. It is time for us to get a 
divorce from corn-based ethanol.
  And that's just the way it is.

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