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Billions for WHAT?
This morning’s Washington Post Business Section almost made me choke on my cereal.
The lead story documents the billions and billions of dollars with which we subsidize the blending of ethanol into our gasoline supply. It’s currently around $5 billion annually and will rise to more than $18 billion 15 years from now. And that’s just from the 51-cent tax credit the oil industry gets for every gallon of ethanol they add to the mix. That doesn’t include the agricultural subsidies lavished on farmers to grow the corn for the ethanol.
At the same time, the same Congress can’t find it within itself to spend the $6 million already authorized to fund a few programs to test what would encourage more people to ride or walk instead of driving, or the less than $10 million annual cost of a tax-break for bicycle commuters.
According to the most recent National Household Travel Survey, bicyclists rode about 6.5 billion miles in 2001, a number that has surely increased given rising gas prices and the obesity crisis headlines of recent years. Conservatively, that saved around 300 million gallons of gas from being burned. And remember that’s with bicycling making up a paltry 1 percent of trips in this country. We could double or triple the levels of bicycling in US cities with just a fraction of the money being spent to sustain our driving habit.
Biofuels certainly have their place in the mix of solutions to combat climate change – but I hope at least some of that corn is still left to make my morning cereal.
June 15th, 2007 at 4:12 pm
The bicycle is the original flex fuel vehicle. I believe that two apples is enough good quality carbohydrate energy to pedal 14 miles.
Instead, the price of corn is causing milk, eggs, bread and the cereal prices to leap. By the end of summer milk in Arkansas is expected to be up to $4.65 a gallon before leveling off. Leveling off. This means the price will stay there. The cause? The price of corn feed due to demand.
As long as the fuels we use in cars rely on a combustion process the greenhouse gases will persist.
So I anticipate our Congress will lead us from the expensive gasoline, green house gases and the largest global percentage of obese citizens today to
the expensive gasoline, equally expensive alternate fuels, expensive dairy products, continued green house gases and still the largest global obese population of tomorrow.
That is unless they get it in gear and pass laws that enable Americans to use their bicycles and alternative transportation more for those short trips under 5 miles when honestly possible.
June 30th, 2007 at 11:48 am
Billions for Gasoline, Not 1 Cent for Cycling and Walking!
Hee, hee! ;-D