However, I think the focus on what Tim Russert said or the flaws in the U.S. approach obscures a topic that is far more relevant to this website: Could ethanol play a useful role in helping to transition to a future with less oil supply?

So let's leave the hype behind and instead consider a more modest proposal. Could ethanol provide 10% of global vehicle fuel within the next ten years? If so, I would say it could be one of a handful of solutions that could fill in the gap between oil produced and the amount of oil required to fuel modern lifestyles for the world.

In previous discussions here, we have established that Brazil supplied a little more than 11% of the energy input for its transportation sector from ethanol last year. Since 14% of ethanol produced is exported, this means that the country produces enough ethanol to provide 13% of its energy inputs to transportation. Previous years show even higher figures. Worldwatch Institute and the German government cite figures of 21.6% of transportation fuel from biofuels and 48.24% of non-diesel transportation use (they use 2002 consumption and 2004 production for about 40 countries). Even after adjusting these figures down by 25% for lower BTU content, they are not meaningless.

Yes, Brazil has been extremely successful in exploring for oil. But how does this hurt the ethanol case? Are you suggesting that it would be a solution elsewhere? I suspect that if Brazil had not discovered so much oil, ethanol production would be even higher.

Ethanol in Brazil is unsubsidized and is not more expensive than gasoline on a volume or BTU basis. The price has also gone up since global sugar prices have gone up. However, adjustments can and will be made. The same WW/German study says that sugar occupied 2.4% of agricultural area, half of which can be counted towards ethanol (and half towards sugar). This represents 0.5% of land with the potential for agriculture. So the potential to ramp up production is great.

By the way, the reason the Brazil's gasoline market is only 3% of the size of the US market is that half of gasoline use (by volume) is offset by ethanol and Brazil uses about 50% diesel for transportation. So Brazil's ethanol market is already 3% of the US gasoline market (by volume or about 2.2% by energy content).

Then consider that ethanol can be produced in a wide range of tropical countries using sugar, that there may be technologies that can produce ethanol viably in the US and other non-tropical regions (as Robert's article suggests, that these solutions are EROIE positive at rates of up to 8:1 and that ethanol has immense climate benefits. Why dismiss it out of hand?

I do think that we need to look for a wide range of ways to handle reduced energy supply in the future. Efficiency will be crucial, but I think prices will gradually bring this around. I also think that we will increase the amount of transportation fueled by electricity in the next decade. There are a lot of other things we need to do as well, but don't let your frustration with big mouths and bad policy make you overlook an important part of the solution.