CORN ON THE COB, OR, CORN IN YOUR TANK?

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#1

06-11-2007 03:39 PM by RedRaven

O.K. ladies, we're all too familiar with the rising prices of groceries... What do you think about the continued focus on producing bio diesel in this country?...

The cost of food has already gone up with crop farmers now focusing on growing more corn... Soybean production has actually gone down, as well as other crops, now that farmers can make more money producing corn... In turn you will see the prices of these other crops go up, simply because the demand will exceed the supply...

I see this as a bad omen... Because corn is used in so many foods, that if the price continues to go up to produce bio fuels, we're all going to lose in the long run...

It is expensive to produce bio fuels, and I can't imagine that in the long term that the price of bio fuels would be lowered to fuel prices we had prior to the Iraq war, and Hurricane Katrina...

So, do you think there should be more research, and development into other alternatives, or are you willing to pay high food prices, and high fuel prices?...

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#2

06-11-2007 07:07 PM by 4roses

:?

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#3

06-11-2007 08:21 PM by larz0142

Yes,but there won't be.Energy wise it take the same amout to produce either bio or regular fuels.We have close to 200 plus years of oil in the Earth.It sounds funny but they are rioting in Mexico over the price of corn and tortias...GOT WHEAT???

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#4

06-11-2007 10:54 PM by RedRaven

Quote:
Originally Posted by larz0142
Yes,but there won't be.Energy wise it take the same amout to produce either bio or regular fuels.We have close to 200 plus years of oil in the Earth.It sounds funny but they are rioting in Mexico over the price of corn and tortias...GOT WHEAT???
Yeah, I saw that on the news about the tortias... I went grocery shopping, and asked the meat department manager, why they were selling certain steaks cut very thin, that used to sell with a thicker cut? He said, they wanted to offer the steak at a better value, offering that steak at a lower price... :roll:

To me that was like bait, and switch... Yeah, we're offering you a low price steak, but, the fact is we're really giving you less for your money... Instead of just selling the reasonable cut of meat, at a higher price... I think the grocers are afraid to put the facts out there to the consumer.

That it is simply going to cost them a lot more for their meats, and other groceries... It all relates to fuel costs, using corn for fuel, driving up livestock feed prices, and ultimately costing you more money for a decent steak... Of course the manager states that if you want a decent steak, they will cut it to the thickness you want. But, of course they are not going to charge you the same price obviously, you'll pay more for that 1/2 inch of extra beef... :roll:

As for that info. about there being 200 years of oil... I thought the last I heard there was much less than that... Is that oil in the US, or oil around the world?...

You have to remember China has a greater demand for oil now, and basically competing with the US, in that regard...

I kind of liked the Hydrogen idea... Though it has it's set back's as well... It lets water drain from the tail pipe... That could be an issue for heavily traveled roads in the north that get snow during the winter... It doesn't take much water to produce Black Ice in winter...

It really bugs me that there isn't a way to really develop solar... Of all the alternatives so far, solar doesn't have any "side effects", in it's use... As far as I've learned so far...

Well, I suppose we will all just have to wait, and see what those MIT grads., can come up with for alternatives... :lol: :shock:

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#5

06-12-2007 12:43 AM by larz0142

My wife yells at me all the time for not naming sources,but I was watching Charle Rose one night about two yrs ago and the CEO of Exxon was on and said we have over 300 yrs of oil left.. I thought was kinda high.But that could be propaganda on both sides.If we got 300 or so yrs or we don't....lol mass panic if we don't.I know that the second largest oil reserve on the planet is in the Gulf of Mexico and it's not us tapping into it.

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#6

06-12-2007 09:13 AM by RedRaven

Here is something else to consider, oil is used in a lot of products, not just as a fuel sourse... Now, imagine what would happen if there were no more oil reserves to create such products...

What really needs to happen is that we need a new idea for those "things" in our lives that consume the most oil... Then if we still have these reserves left, we can use them conservatively, for oil based products, while new solutions are developed to use in those products down the road, as well...

I think that they should have used other oil producing plants in the development of bio fuels, if they were going to go ahead and do it, since corn is used in so many more areas of the food industry, and in the livestock agricultural industry... I don't know how much space the other plants require, or the yield, compared to corn... But, if it were possible I think I would take olive, or cannola over corn to use in bio fuel development, and give us back our corn at a decent price again... :wink:

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#7

06-12-2007 05:10 PM by Jackrabbit379

Well, Canola is mainly used for cooking oil.
About 80% of corn goes to feedlots, and it's $3.90 a bushel, so how is that so bad? I must be missing something.

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#8

06-12-2007 06:12 PM by RedRaven

That's a great price for corn, it's much more than it was last year, and it's great for farmers who grow it... But, on the other end, it isn't good for consumers... Like I was saying look at your beef prices, and your dairy food prices...

I was watching an economist on a news program the other day, and he said, exactly what I had already said here on the message board about food prices increasing...

There is another concern to think about as well... Crops are at the mercy of the weather... If you have severe drought in some regions for an extended period of time, it could have a serious impact not only on the supply of corn for livestock use, but, your bio fuels as well...

Just look at what happened to fuel prices when Hurricane Katrina hit the gulf coast...

I think we need to pursue a fuel source that won't be at the mercy of the weather...

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#9

06-12-2007 06:47 PM by larz0142

I say we use hemp oil...emmm hemp oil...ohh wait I think they call that hash or something like that..

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#10

10-15-2007 05:58 PM by Saylor

Bottom Line: Everything is going up but wages.
Bottom Line: Everything is going up but wages. I have been in the plastics industry for 40 years. In the mid 70�s with the oil crisis in order to keep fuel they cut back on plastic material. That doesn�t work. We need changes that the government is not making. Alternative energy: Solar, Hydrogen, and such things as: the way we design and insulate our homes that advantage of the thermo mass of the home, radiant, wind, and geothermal energy, etc. and a national rail system that works. Planes are not the most efficient way to move people.
I was watching 20/20 about the Dubai U.A.E. oil wealth. We have made them rich and a lot of the rest of the Arabic world as well.

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