Are America’s farmers becoming tree huggers? The agricultural industry’s enthusiasm for renewable energy was evident this week in Golden at a national conference on the topic hosted by the American Farm Bureau Federation.
Farmers and ranchers are looking for new ways to turn a profit: Commodity prices are low and production costs are soaring along with the prices of diesel and petroleum-based fertilizer. So the leading U.S. farm organization, historically a cautious and conservative group, these days is promoting renewable energy.
The farmers’ quest, to lease land for wind turbines and solar panels and turn crops and farm wastes into natural gas and gasoline and diesel substitutes, could create a reliable source of domestic energy.
Experts say that making the gasoline substitute ethanol from farm materials can produce protein-rich byproducts. (The process uses naturally occurring yeasts and is similar to making beer.) To make ethanol ventures viable, the byproducts could be used as livestock feed supplements. In the future, it may be possible to fill up your car and feed your cow from the same source.
The conference also highlighted the need for forward-looking government policies. The Bush administration’s chief energy push, promoting intensive oil and natural gas drilling on the West’s public lands, can’t fix the underlying problem. Crude oil is a finite resource that emits toxins and adds to global warming. Yet the Bush administration’s commitment to farm-based renewable energy has been tepid.
The energy bill recently passed by Congress did call for boosting use of ethanol to 7.5 billion gallons by 2012. But to put the figure in perspective, the U.S. market for liquid vehicle fuels (mostly gasoline and diesel) is about 135 billion gallons a year.
The same legislation also handed big government giveaways to the crude oil and coal industries. It makes little sense for Washington to subsidize the old energy industries. It does, however, make sense for the government to jump-start promising new technologies that could create sustainable, environmentally friendly energy supplies.
Meanwhile, farmers and ranchers should be prepared to make their own investments. Rural Electric Associations promote wind turbines and solar panels as a way farmers and ranchers can make money. Yet the REAs’ own commitment to green energy is lax. Colorado’s Amendment 37 requires large utilities to get 10 percent of their electricity from renewable energy by 2010, but it lets REAs opt out of the requirement – and several already have done so. If REAs want to sell renewable energy, they should also use it.
