Ethanol production comes at a high price

Click here for the Rutland Herald, Vermont, aticle.

I am all for the local ethanol plant to be built here. However, this is no cure for our present dilemma of oil addiction. This article explains, in part, why. I advocate the ethanol be used within the region and locally. I fear the politcians advocating for these ethanol plants to be built have this big utopian scenario in mind. Wide-scale use, purchase, and consumption of our ethanol plant products will deplete many of the resources we have locally. As an alternative in thinking, each region in the United States should require its own regional-type of energy production in order to become more self-reliant within the region.

In the same manner as other addictions, sometimes the best way to stop an addiction is to go cold turkey. If one can't go cold turkey, the next best thing is to cutback. What does this mean in terms of oil addiction? Conserve, conserve, conserve! (bet you thought this "librul" would never say that word!) The worst thing one can do to combat an addiction is to replace it with another addiction that is unhealthy. Forfeiting the resource depletion of one form of finite energy for the depletion of multiple other locally derived finite resources is not the answer!

In the spirit of conservation and replacing one addiction with another, I support local biking trails whereas more people can cut driving and rather walk and ride bikes! Buy locally grown food rather than having it grown, shipped, and packaged 2000 miles away! Support local mass transit with things such as buses, light rail, and trolleys! These are healthy substitutes, people!

These things listed above are the REAL answers to oil addiction. Not subsidies given to special interests with taxpayer money. In other words, technically, we will be fitting the bill for these plants that will suck our aquafiers dry. If you don't want the cost of your water to skyrocket 10-20 years from now, then please understand what this article is saying. Water wars are already happening in other parts of the U.S.

Don't let the Chocola ads trick you. He really IS beholden to special interest groups , and he is a millionaire who has received lots and lots of money from the likes of Tom DeLay. I tried to call, write, and email Mr. Chocola concerning oil depletion 2 years ago and all I received was a response about drilling in ANWR and the wildlife refuge. He didn't have a clue of what I was referring to concerning oil depletion/dependency. He thought I was some enviromentalist who was concerned about the caribou or something. Seriously--he didn't listen to a word I wrote or the references I gave him to read. And I don't know for sure but isn't Mr. Weatherwax tied in with the Andersons that are building the ethanol plant here in Logansport somehow? Follow the money. Follow the money trail if you can.