lets get going....

Our responsibilities to this planet are clear. Even if we only do it to save our own skins and the heck with animals, we need to do something. It's clear we are all the problem. All of us. Waiting for government is not the answer, and philosophy and religious changes are locked in stubborn dogma. We all know the problems so what next?

Participate...

Curb and evolve your daily life so that environmental consciousness begins to be a part of that every day...

If you own a house there are many low cost options. Here is just one idea for you...generate at least some power from your rooftops, whether it be solar or wind and knock down your consumption at least. Just do your part and encourage others to do the same.

Here's an innovative windmill design that is sure to get you thinking:

http://www.treehugger.com/wind-technolo ... nergy.html

So what if you can't generate all your power needs with a windmill or a small array of solar panels. Point is cut down on what you do use.

We are the problem. All of us. We are all causing the global warming and the extinction of species due to habitat loss. We need to end this prevalent believe some government or corporation is to blame or the same is to fix everything.  You are the problem so do something.

Lots of info here on their site:

http://dearchimedes.com/charts-data/




Paul

When allowed, any weed will destroy any garden. What departed here was leadership and integrity. What remains is a short sighted escapist self absorbed culture far to deep in survival mode to care about anything else. I blame capitalism...it has done much good, it is also a soulless shortsighted system that requires deception (marketing) and excels at producing crap.

STEVENMAJOR wrote:When allowed, any weed will destroy any garden. What departed here was leadership and integrity. What remains is a short sighted escapist self absorbed culture far to deep in survival mode to care about anything else. I blame capitalism...it has done much good, it is also a soulless shortsighted system that requires deception (marketing) and excels at producing crap.

Perhaps we do need management, more regulation to safeguard ourselves against our own uncontrolled ambitions. It might be fair to say that before there were needs for billions, all needs were sustained handily from Mother Earth. But I think you hit the nail on the head that we are mostly in survival mode, trouble is our idea of survival is far removed from the reality of survival of say someone in Somalia. What I make in a day they could probably live off of for a year--yet I do not see myself as greedy, or wasteful, or extravagant. Quite humble and frugal really.

Steve this is why I say we need to all give up blaming anything or anybody but ourselves. I mean we could go for uber regulation so we all, including our leaders, manage things proper, especially all things to do with the natural world, but I really don't believe anyone will want to give up their freedoms. Yeah capitalism, just like everything else we touch, can turn to gold or wind up a pile of crap. but any system of economic structure will have similar outcomes. Or religion, or poltical systems, or philosophies for that matter.

This is why I mantain that the secret is stop looking for the duality of life to rescue us. Demanding THE ONE solution as if there is some absolute out there that if only we adapt it our problems will go away.

The key I believe is to move along with the changes at hand and adopt a problem solving method that works off the principle of responding to what our..... AND of course the needs of the whole planet....... are...... in real time. Just 50 years ago global warming and oil supplies seemed not to be that great of a problem. They were known problems to some, but not like today. But 50 years ago people, mostly the young, grabbed a hold of an idea and said.... whoa!  Stop the war, stop racism, stop prejudice, stop polluting, stop poisoning, stop the corporations, stop applying the factory mindset to our natural resources, let women and blacks get jobs, education, and voting rights equal to the white male.....Point is Steve we knocked down a lot of doors and literally transformed this country to an almost complete different one. But it all rather died out. Maybe we all thought the work was done,or maybe in trying to make the world a wonderful, easy, beautiful place we literally took the struggle away from the succeeding generations and they then grew up with a much different and elevated sense of what survival means.

For example, at least in Cleveland, back in the 60's, one NEVER saw a black person driving a new car. Never, not, ever once. They drove rust bucket junk cars sometimes taped together. When driving to downtown one could not even see the buildings from mile and a half away because the smog was so thick. There's a freeway that runs along the shores of Lake Erie and when you drove on it you literally, I mean literally, had to hold your nose to fight back against the stench of rotting dead fish killed by the pollution in the water. Acid rain was eating up our buildings, our statues, the copper sheathing on many historical monuments. Lampreys were taking over the lake...it wasn't safe to eat the fish caught in the lake.

The straw of course that broke the camels back was when the river caught fire. In fact it did so twice. The fire burned down bridges as it drifted underneath them.  The whole incident was huge international news and sealed this cities fate as to be regarded as some smelly armpit of the world, a crowning achievement of the industrial age, of lost direction, values, morals. The whole country was terribly embarrassed really, but no where close to what the city was. Fortunately the seeds were already planted by the common concerned folks and were a tremendous catalyst that spurred the environmental movement in it's biggest way. This affected the entire country on all levels. Affected the world really.

Point again is that as it happened back then, it is you and I and all of us "little people" that drive the engine. Capitalism works just fine--we are the problem.

Now back to the windmill. I like this one I just posted a link for as it is aesthetically attractive. At least more appealing than the 3 bladed chop masters. I think this has a great influence on people--to have one of those choppers in their back yard........ It's just too invading looking.

Now say you put one of  these new babys on your roof or in your backyard. You would be the talk. And if a couple more homeowners did the same on your street....no longer would everyone look upon wind mills as a novelty but in fact the thing to do. Once that happens the whole idea is up and running. Same with solar panels.

Also by decentralizing our energy supply we no longer need centralized vulnerable energy producing stations as possible terrorists attack targets. We could rid our selves of the nuclear power plants maybe completely. Maybe restore some natural areas by tearing down a dam or two, or cut back further on coal plants. It won't happen if we wait for the government or corporate institutions. They still can't admit global warming is real and a real problem for us all for Gods sake..

The key is to do something, anything, that spurs people to thinking about producing their own energy. Once the seed is placed, a little rain will be all that's needed to evolve their thinking into response to today's energy problems. And it's not  necessary to be off grid completely, just less of a burden on it and a visible vanguard that is ushering in a new way to live.


Paul

Not sure what you may be getting at with the chart on number of bird deaths caused by collisions but keep in mind numbers can be very misleading.

There are numerous specie of prairie birds that are among the most endangered avian life on the planet. One example is the Greater Prairie Chicken. These birds have lived and survived directly on the prairie for millennia. There are no structures, glass, urban light, roads/vehicles, power lines, or towers. What there are now are wind generators. Modern agriculture along with the now present and growing number of wind generators are the most significant threat present today and may be more than the prairie avian life can withstand.

As you may have gathered I am not a fan of modern agriculture which over the last 75 years has increased to supply food to a growing world population which in turn need even more food to survive which in turn feeds the need for even more agriculture which in turn allows for more population growth which sustains the need for even more agriculture and on and on down the rabbit hole we go. That being said I am also not a fan of wind farms for very specific reasons. Wind power will never produce the electricity that is needed to replace any of the present forms of power production and will only threaten more natural environments in this futile cause. I admit I do not have the answers but I also am very aware at what does not and will not work.

I completely agree with your premise that each one of us are responsible for our actions. If there were more responsible humans than irresponsible humans we would not be in the situation we are in. Sadly the growing trend of human societies is that of less personal responsibility rather than more.

I would like to share a link to additional information concerning wind farms if anyone would be interested in the subject, it's effects, and impact. Country Guardian, The Case Against Windfarms.

Brad, you are right - windfarms are absolutely horrid for almost all prairie wildlife species.  I wrote a treatise on the subject....it is somewhere on one of these recent threads here on NatureScapes.


EDIT:  I found it!  Here's the link:
http://www.naturescapes.net/forums/view ... 7&t=253245

It is post #7.

Howdy Brad ......Yeah I've been looking into the loss of natural land so we can eat situation for some time time now. If you have caught my previous posts I cited stats and info from the department of agriculture that are more accurate than any since no other agency has the resources to monitor such things.

Here's the skinny...

We use 50 some percent of our agricultural land for food. Of that 50 some percent only 3 percent is used to grow all  of our  vegetable needs. The rest is used to raise cattle and other  animals, give them grazing and and pasture, and to grow crops to feed them. This is something to think about the next time you drive through the burger king.

IOW's eating meat is killing us and everything else too....Talk about  an addiction.

Brad please read this:

https://www.westernwatersheds.org/watme ... ticle6.htm

We need to get off the meat  addiction...If one can't for the environment then how about for the cholesterol and health issues.


I'm sure the truth in the bird casualty chart I posted has a lot of fact to it. My point  is we need to not only be concerned about  how wind mills affect bird mortality,  but  also these other things do too. Not  saying greater evils let windmills off the hook....not at all.


But why I posted the link to this unusual wind generator is because it would be less of a problem for birds than the "dice a matics" we now are all sold on. Look better too. No small factor when it comes to putting one on your own house....

But we need to be comprehensive here...Have you and others factored in all the consequences of using all the other forms of energy production and  how those affect birds and others or have you just grabbed the first thing you saw and run with it? There's a really big picture here that needs to take it all into account.


And the huge reason I started this thread is that we can all produce electricity at our homes now and thus have less a demand for wind farms. You didn't catch that? Its a win win win if we can do so as long as we get away from the chopper design......



Paul

Windmills work off of two separate principles depending on design....resistance or aerodynamic lift. They are both good and useful, but in separate ways. The resistance one is great for torque and is useful for pumping and power applications. It's simple and cheap. It's speed however will not exceed the speed of the wind. A typical anemometer is of this design. If the wind is 5 mph the cup on the anemometer can only go this fast. Period. This is just what you want for certain applications. Low speed and lots of power torque. But to generate electricity you don't need torque so much as you need speed. The faster you can turn the armature of a generator the more power you can generate. All formulas for power boil down to torque or you'll get speed. You'll get one or the other with windmills. Pretty much...

Now there is a limit to the energy one can get out of the wind. It's called the Betz limit. The Betz limit is 59% of the total energy in that wind at whatever speed the wind is. Here's the reason why..  If you put up a brick wall and a 30 mph wind hits it the force pushing on the wall is 100% gained by that wall. But after that your gain is zero since you have completely stopped the flow of the air at that second unless your wall gives way and lets the wind pass.. A windmill blade has the same problem.It needs to catch all that it can out of the wind without stopping that wind. Because after it stops, the windmill has to start all over again and let the wind build up for another strike. So this does not work at all.. What instead needs to be done and is a well known fact, is too extract as much as you can from the wind so as to not cut out in the succeeding seconds what can be extracted then. This is called the Betz limit and is 59%.

Your typical "dice a matic" windmills obtain between 35% to 50% of power on the Betz limit scale. Remember only 59% is possible so these get pretty close if conditions are optimal--sometimes. 40-45% is the rule of thumb. They do this because they are aerodynamic windmills. They do not use the force you feel when you stick you hand out the window as you drive down the freeway. That's pure resistance. They use airfoils and cash in on the power of lift generated over a wing like shape. This propels them not in the exact direct opposite direction of the wind direction but in a 90% or so direction of the wind,  Remember we need speed....we need RPM's for electrical generation. An aerodynamic airfoil wind turbine blade as found on the conventional windmill can yield tip speeds 8 times the wind speed. This is why we use airfoil aerodynamic windmill blades for electrical generation.

Speed, speed, speed is the goal. Tip speed in essence. Geared down high tip speed equates to high geared torque which get's converted into high generator rotation and that means more watts(Amps X volts).

The claims for this Archimedes windmill is 52% on the Betz limit scale. Is it true?? Boy I have no idea until I would see an independent lab report. But if it is true.... Wow!...this would be about the most efficient windmill ever. But consider their claims are off. Even 30 % of the Betz limit is plenty enough to power a generator efficiently. Keep in mind that anemometer style windmill, like the savonious only hits 10%, maybe 15% the Betz limit.

Don't forget...when you buy electricity part of that cost is transmission loss which can easily be as high as 10%. The general overall number is 6% for the US--it all depends on distances from the station and how modern and efficient the lines and equipment. Now if we all conserved, we can cut our use somewhere between 20 to 30 percent. Lets use 20 % for now. Add to that another 10 % saved from transmission losses and  you can see our needs now are down 1/3 or more. That's not chump change. Our buildings by far are the biggest users of energy. 69% of our energy is being fulfilled by coal and natural gas...these two are the big greenhouse gas problem. 20% is produced by nuclear and only 3 % is wind and solar. Biggest problem as I see it is we need financial help to get these systems installed at the building level. Something like what Germany did...not some partial percent amount off your taxes. In the long run savings would be a salvation on many levels.





Let's start thinking out of the box here........


Paul

According to Environment Canada, the number one cause of bird deaths in Canada is by cats....

http://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/9-leadi ... -1.1873654

Estimated at over 200 million deaths per year caused by cats vs an estimate of 70 million by other means.

usage chart:





Here's an informative site everyone should bookmark:

http://michaelbluejay.com/electricity/

From the site:The legendary James Hansen, one of the first scientists to warn about global warming way back in the 80s, recently said that the real key to preventing climate change is reducing home energy use.  That's because, as he says, we can't stop the oil from being burned for transport, since if we don't use it, another country will. But we can certainly stop burning our own country's coal.  And the quickest way to reduce coal emissions by 50%, is to reduce our electricity consumption by 50%.



Also:
Solar panels have been just as cheap or cheaper than grid energy since 2013, in most places.  Solar is unlikely to continue to get a lot cheaper, though, because the price of the panels has dropped so much that most of the system cost is now for installation, not for the panels themselves. With a solar system, you have a large upfront cost, and then you get practically free electricity for the next 25 years or so.  Most homeowners get a loan to pay for the install and then make monthly payments on it.  So, for example, you might pay $100/mo. on the loan, vs. $140/mo. for electricity if you didn't get the system.



Paul

John Labrenz wrote:According to Environment Canada, the number one cause of bird deaths in Canada is by cats....

http://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/9-leadi ... -1.1873654

Estimated at over 200 million deaths per year caused by cats vs an estimate of 70 million by other means.

Lawnmowers kill 2.2 million. Another reason to get rid of lawns.

They're saying 167,000 killed by windmills. It's all bad, but when looking at the outcry against wind farms and bird deaths, and the little to very little outcry against people letting their cats outside, and feral cats, there appears to be a real disproportionate amount of attention and civil action to support and help the problem of unnatural bird deaths in a reality and rational venue.

I'm not saying I'm in favor of wind farms....I don't like or want  them. They are too visually intrusive, especially when there are a hundred of them or so in a spot.....

But I do believe and support on site generation of electricity by a combination of solar and wind...but not the conventional wind generating units. 




Paul

Good information Paul thanks. I have been a Docent for the Konza Prairie Biological Station since 2009 and have learned much about our great prairies and the life that resides within. It has been over the last 6 years I have chosen to be an advocate for these few untouched places that still exist on our planet. I do as much research as possible when facts are needed and try very hard not to grab the first thing I read and run with it. I have personally seen the impact of man on places of extreme wild beauty never touched by civilization. What I do know and believe with all my being is the abuse of our lands is wrong whether you are a treehugger or a hedge fund manager and should not be allowed to continue especially for the sake financial gain or population growth.

As you pointed out the combined effect of our present sources of energy is a much greater problem than wind farms for now. What always strikes me is the ongoing demand of more, more, more at any cost, environmental, wildlife, future civilizations, whatever, it doesn't seem to matter. The small silent wind turbines being developed by The Archimedes you mentioned in the initial post is a fantastic idea. I really am not against wind power it is were they are putting these humongous turbines and the direct effect they have on the land that is completely insane. I know the wind always blows on the prairies I have lived on the prairie my entire life. The wind is supposes to blow here there is a natural beneficial reason for that and it is not to produce electricity for humans miles and miles away. (Sorry I get carried away).

I have long thought that every house and building in metropolitan areas should have solar panels on the roofs. With additions to these types of wind turbines there is a chance a positive effect could start taking place. Solutions will have to come from the private sector that have the ability to think outside the box.

I will take a small exception to the for-mention statement that meat is killing us. I do respect your opinion on this matter and don't believe it to be wrong just personally over encompassing. I will say we have completely went overboard on meat in this day and age and would be much better off raising and consumer much less than the average American does at present or none if that is what a person chooses.  I will share this bit of information which relates to the prairie. There are three main factors that are vital for long-term health of a prairie environment. Fire, grazing, and climate. 

• Fire has always been a factor on the prairie since before the encroachment of man. Mother nature would cause fires and they would burn uninhibited until exhausted of fuel. Without fire the prairies would turn to woodlands within a generation. 
• Grazing had always been done by large herds of herbivores most noticeably Bison. We all have heard about the millions and millions of head of Bison that covered the prairies. Their grazing of the flora played a vital part in the diversification of plant life which in turns sustained diverse wildlife. The Bison are no longer a positive impact on the prairie. Today they have been replaced by cattle. It is true cattle do not directly replace Bison. The Bison "roamed" cattle are fenced in. In addition cattle are a commodity and treated as such. Raised as fast as possible with the addition of grains which in turn need more land to be produced. So there are important differences but having cattle on the prairie is a bad thing it is actually a good thing if managed very well. But then again money always seems to come first. I must add this, some of the most environmentally conscious folks I have met are ranchers. They do truly want to do what is right for the land after all it is their livelihood. As one such rancher put it to me: they don't raise cattle, they raise grass which they use cattle to harvest since grass is not useful to people. I have even heard them say, they don't own the land they just take care of it. So many ranchers will always have my respect. 
• Last but not least is climate, which in itself should be enough said.

I got a kick out of the mention of cats and lawnmowers killing birds. I'm sure the do kill lots of birds. Robins, Sparrows, Starlings, Jays etc. Not many cats or lawnmowers on the Tallgrass Prairies of the Kansas Flint Hills.

"When the last tree has been cut down, the last fish caught, the last river poisoned, only then will we realize that one cannot eat money."
There is debate where the above quote originated, one possibility of merit is put as Prophecy of the Cree Indians.

One of the worst ideas for windfarms, location wise, was stopped! I can't believe that they would have proposed it for an area so important to migratory songbirds.

http://www.valleymorningstar.com/news/l ... b2370.html

http://tx.audubon.org/newsroom/news-sto ... or-blade-0

Joe

We all talk about "Wind-farms" and have all the answers as to how they can benefit us all. And then I hear "To Heck with the animals" on a Nature Photography site and wonder what the heck I am doing here! Then I see a neat little chart giving numbers of how many birds are killed by different sources and ask myself, "So that makes it OK??" My answer is that "one bird or animal killed to save our skin is ONE TOO MANY".....We made our bed and we should sleep in it without the demise of a helpless and guiltless bird or animal. And then I guess you who support these inefficient turbines of death and destruction claim to be "Green" while you "clear-cut" thousands of acres of forest and flatten ridge-tops to "brown and barren" spaces along major raptor and songbird migration routes to make room for these things that roughly require numbers exceeding 3,000 at roughly 3 to 5 acres per turbine to replace one conventional power-plant.  Sorry Bud, No Sale Here!!!! There are other means and we can adjust to our created environment by our selfishness and stupidity a whole lot better than an innocent bird or animal. Wind in "mass" is not the answer!

pleverington wrote:Howdy Brad ......Yeah I've been looking into the loss of natural land so we can eat situation for some time time now. If you have caught my previous posts I cited stats and info from the department of agriculture that are more accurate than any since no other agency has the resources to monitor such things.

Here's the skinny...

We use 50 some percent of our agricultural land for food. Of that 50 some percent only 3 percent is used to grow all  of our  vegetable needs. The rest is used to raise cattle and other  animals, give them grazing and and pasture, and to grow crops to feed them. This is something to think about the next time you drive through the burger king.
Paul

Here's something to think about. Much of the corn is not used for animal feed. Much of the corn is used to produce ethanol. Here is a Google search that indicates that in 2012 +2013, 40% of the corn is used to produce ethanol:

Corn used for Ethanol Production

And although some of the corn being used for ethanol enters the feed market, it is only 1.547 billion bushels of  the 5 billion bushels used for ethanol, according to this:

http://www.ethanolproducer.com/articles ... hanol-ddgs

Regarding soy, after producing oils and other products, most (75%) of the remnants are used as feed for poultry and swine, with the rest used to feed dairy cattle, beef cattle and pet food:

http://ncsoy.org/media-resources/uses-of-soybeans/

Some of the soy is used for production of biodiesel, as well. 

In many places (probably most of the US) ethanol is a 10% additive to the gas sold at the pumps.

Here's an interesting take on corn, especially the section titled "The Corn System Operates at a Big Cost to Taxpayers":

http://www.scientificamerican.com/artic ... hink-corn/

Joe

Dizzy wrote:We all talk about "Wind-farms" and have all the answers as to how they can benefit us all. And then I hear "To Heck with the animals" on a Nature Photography site and wonder what the heck I am doing here! Then I see a neat little chart giving numbers of how many birds are killed by different sources and ask myself, "So that makes it OK??" My answer is that "one bird or animal killed to save our skin is ONE TOO MANY".....We made our bed and we should sleep in it without the demise of a helpless and guiltless bird or animal. And then I guess you who support these inefficient turbines of death and destruction claim to be "Green" while you "clear-cut" thousands of acres of forest and flatten ridge-tops to "brown and barren" spaces along major raptor and songbird migration routes to make room for these things that roughly require numbers exceeding 3,000 at roughly 3 to 5 acres per turbine to replace one conventional power-plant.  Sorry Bud, No Sale Here!!!! There are other means and we can adjust to our created environment by our selfishness and stupidity a whole lot better than an innocent bird or animal. Wind in "mass" is not the answer!

Dizzy I suggest you run through the posts once more and pick up on what has really been said. No one is advocating wind farms and in fact is trying to rid them by placing wind generation at the home or building that needs the electricity. AND use a design that is bird friendly. The design I provided link to in the original post is of such a design or at least should be by the looks of it....this is the whole point. But the lofty ideal of one bird killed is too many is way out of the realistic and pragmatic. If that statement were true you yourself would not be driving, would never cut your grass, would not use electricity that utilizes power towers and transmission lines, would not be using a cell phone as that uses towers, would not have windows in your house or do business or enter any building with glass for windows, and suffer greater threat at night by elimination of lighting. IOW you would have to live like a caveman as you yourself are as guilty of killing birds, more so even than people who want and erect wind farms, by using and supporting all these other things that kill birds. Think about it.

This is why I say to myself...stop looking for someone or something else to figure out the solutions for me. Take responsibility, roll up the sleeves, and get busy. So I eat extremely little to no meat...I am designing and building my own windmill and am installing solar panels this year...I have a passive solar water heater already...I am eliminating all my lawn as much as possible within the boundaries of the local law...I am conserving waste by recycling, composting, and reuse so as to produce a minimum that needs to go to the land fill....I built and maintain a large pond with trayed waterfalls that is a mecca and sustaining source of fresh water for frogs, birds, coons, skunks, turtles, ground squirrels, and an occasional great blue heron!!  All this on a compact city lot..

By the way you should read the post I made about red herring fallacies as you just summoned up a bunch of them. OK your against wind farms and so is everyone else. Well now what do we do?  Whats your answer to the energy problem? More coal and nuclear? Fusion would be an answer but no one has done it yet on a scale that matters. Solar farms would be as bad as wind farms as they disrupt the entire area and cast shadow where there should be light.

The only answer for a great deal of the problem would be generate power at the point where you need it, conserve, and curb extravagant behavior. And like I said .......do what you can and don't worry about the rest of the world. Then you will have the right to meanie at least....


Paul

SantaFeJoe wrote:

pleverington wrote:
Here's the skinny...

We use 50 some percent of our agricultural land for food. Of that 50 some percent only 3 percent is used to grow all  of our  vegetable needs. The rest is used to raise cattle and other  animals, give them grazing and and pasture, and to grow crops to feed them. This is something to think about the next time you drive through the burger king.
Paul

Here's something to think about. Much of the corn is not used for animal feed. Much of the corn is used to produce ethanol. Here is a Google search that indicates that in 2012 +2013, 40% of the corn is used to produce ethanol:

Corn used for Ethanol Production

And although some of the corn being used for ethanol enters the feed market, it is only 1.547 billion bushels of  the 5 billion bushels used for ethanol, according to this:

http://www.ethanolproducer.com/articles ... hanol-ddgs

Regarding soy, after producing oils and other products, most (75%) of the remnants are used as feed for poultry and swine, with the rest used to feed dairy cattle, beef cattle and pet food:

http://ncsoy.org/media-resources/uses-of-soybeans/

Some of the soy is used for production of biodiesel, as well. 

In many places (probably most of the US) ethanol is a 10% additive to the gas sold at the pumps.

Here's an interesting take on corn, especially the section titled "The Corn System Operates at a Big Cost to Taxpayers":

http://www.scientificamerican.com/artic ... hink-corn/

Joe

Solid input there Joe...Thanks.


More than one-third of our corn crop is used to feed livestock. Another 13 percent is exported, much of it to feed livestock as well. Another 40 percent is used to produce ethanol. The remainder goes toward food and beverage production.


Well not according  to everyone's analysis. According to the National Corn Growers Association:
The chart and following from the link you provided Joe:
http://www.ethanolproducer.com/articles ... hanol-ddgs

"Beginning last year, the NCGA has revised the way it presents data on the amount of corn going into ethanol to reflect the amount that leaves the plant as coproducts and re-enters the feed market. Because the USDA does not account for distillers grains and corn gluten feed, it overstates the amount of corn used for ethanol and understates the amount used as livestock feed, NCGA said last year. After the Governors’ Biofuels Coalition requested USDA report corn usage for ethanol more accurately, the agency did add a footnoteto its supply and demand estimates report last spring. 
Taking the DDGS production numbers into account, ethanol accounted for 27.3 percent of corn usage in 2011, according to the World of Corn report. The largest usage of corn remained feed and residual, at 36.3 percent. The 5 billion bushels of corn that went into ethanol production is down somewhat from the 5.021 billion bushels for the same use in 2010. Corn exports, on the other hand, dropped from 1.835 billion bushels in 2010 to 1.65 billion bushels in 2011."


36.6% (feed in the US)+ 12.2%(residual feed after ethanol) + 13%(feed shipped to foreign markets) = 61.8% of our corn grown is used for animal feed. It was 90% until a decade ago.

The 4.1% HFCS is high fructose corn syrup in the pie chart.  mmmmmmmmmmm

27.3 % for ethanol---That used to be for animals or other types of crops. Gotta remember with all the money made available now from subsidies from the government many farmers are converting land previously used for other crops to being used for corn. Wouldn't you if you were a farmer.

So this ethanol argument and using percentages skews the truth greatly. Corn has been almost all for animals until just very recently and the ammount of corn used by the animals is roughly the same today...in fact more. The fact that farmers have converted acres to grow corn for greater profit now throws off the percentage breakdown misleading one to draw a false conclusion that animal usage of corn for feed is not that great. The facts are as we demand more and more meat, as we increase in population, we need more corn for the meat purpose. That's gotta make sense to anyone. More meat=more corn=less land for other things. Ethanol only makes this whole situation worse.

From Scientific America:

http://www.scientificamerican.com/artic ... hink-corn/

"And the resources devoted to growing corn are increasing dramatically. Between 2006 and 2011, the amount of cropland devoted to growing corn in America increased by more than 13 million acres, mainly in response to rising corn prices and the increasing demand for ethanol. Most of these new corn acres came from farms, including those that were growing wheat (which lost 2.9 million acres), oats (1.7 million acres lost), sorghum (1 million acres lost), barley, alfalfa, sunflower and other crops. That leaves us with a less diverse American agricultural landscape, with even more land devoted to corn monocultures. And according to a recent study published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, roughly 1.3 million acres of grassland and prairie were converted to corn and other uses in the western Corn Belt between 2006 and 2011, presenting a threat to the waterways, wetlands and species that reside there."

"The corn system operates at a big cost to taxpayers. the corn system receives more subsides from the U.S. government than any other crop, including direct payments, crop insurance payments and mandates to produce ethanol. In all, U.S. crop subsidies to corn totaled roughly $90 billion between 1995 and 2010—not including ethanol subsidies and mandates, which helped drive up the price of corn."

"Yes, the corn fed to animals does produce valuable food to people, mainly in the form of dairy and meat products, but only after suffering major losses of calories and protein along the way. For corn-fed animals, the efficiency of converting grain to meat and dairy calories ranges from roughly 3 percent to 40 percent, depending on the animal production system in question. "

"In the U.S., corn uses more land than any other crop, spanning some 97 million acres— an area roughly the size of California. U.S. corn also consumes a large amount of our freshwater resources, including an estimated 5.6 cubic miles per year of irrigation water withdrawn from America’s rivers and aquifers. And fertilizer use for corn is massive: over 5.6 million tons of nitrogen is applied to corn each year through chemical fertilizers, along with nearly a million tons of nitrogen from manure. Much of this fertilizer, along with large amounts of soil, washes into the nation’s lakes, rivers and coastal oceans, polluting waters and damaging ecosystems along the way. The dead zone in the Gulf of Mexico is the largest, and most iconic, example of this."

Good article for folks to read I think...


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The age of the electric car being practical is now here. Very much so. Recharging an electric car using solar and wind power at one's house seems to me as entirely feasible today and would eliminate the need for ethanol and oil wouldn't it? At least for cars...

My point is the use of corn for ethanol is only a very recent thing and land gobbled by the year 2000 for growing corn was for animal feed almost entirely and is the same amount of land as we use now to grow corn. But until very recently, 90% of the land being used for corn was all for livestock and a small percent 10% for people. The REASON we now use the left over mash from corn products is because we have to. This argument does not at all let over consumption of meat eating off the hook. It only looks that way when looking at the most recent numbers. We still grow the corn for animal feed, but before we give it to them, we extract the ethanol from it, then they get the mash that's left.( I gotta wonder how much less healthy that is for them).

Ethanol is a failure. But it will continue as it keeps many people in business like our farmers. If we got off ethanol, oil, and eating meat, there would be a lot of land made available for other purposes. Less fertilizers washing into the ecosystems. Less water used from the aquifers. More refuges, widlife areas, national prairies, forests, wetlands and we would STILL have all the urban land and more that we now enjoy.


Paul

Joe:

On the subject Of soybeans:


"Ninety-eight percent of the U.S. soybean crop is used for livestock feed. Soybean meal is also used in lower-end dog foods."

This was from wiki which referenced this source: http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/top ... 84/soybean

Same thing from another source(Your link actually):

"Most soybeans are processed for their oil and protein for the animal feed industry. A smaller percentage is processed for human consumption and made into products including soy milk, soy flour, soy protein, tofu and many retail food products. Soybeans are also used in many non-food (industrial) products."

From: http://ncsoy.org/media-resources/uses-of-soybeans/


These are most interesting I thought.

Present Uses. Soybeans are the United States' second largest crop in cash sales and the number one export crop. In 2003, the export value of soybeans was more than 9.7 billion dollars, or about one-sixth of all agricultural exports. Normally, more than half of the total value of the U.S. soybean crop comes from exports as whole soybeans, soybean meal, and soybean oil. About 40 percent of the world's soybean trade originates from the U.S.

The first soybeans arrived in America in the early 1800's as ballast aboard a ship! It wasn't until 1879 that a few brave farmers began to plant soybeans as forage for their livestock. The plants flourished in the hot, humid summer weather characteristic of the northeastern North Carolina. Around 1900 the US Department of Agriculture was conducting tests on soybeans and encouraging farmers to plant them as animal feed.

Again....for animal product....

I know it's difficult to fully realize how much we all suffer for that Big Mack or McNuggets but the facts are there...

Paul

On the subject of an electric car charged with a home energy system here's a thought:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k62FzVuSF58

There are shops that do conversions. Or spend the bucks if you have them on a Tesla

For $18,000 the Nissan Leaf looks great:

http://www.choosenissan.com/cleveland-a ... .286975751

Here is the current line up of electric cars with their ranges.

http://www.cheatsheet.com/automobiles/t ... ?a=viewall

Paul

In this article, there are some interesting facts on ethanol and other things.  The numbers for the year 2022 are telling.

http://www.ers.usda.gov/topics/crops/corn/policy.aspx

Truly, it's all about the money. I remember the land banks from the '70s and never understood why the government would pay a farmer to leave a field fallow! Now there are plenty of incentives available for raising certain crops and other things.

And here's a link you might find useful. I just don't have time to get into it, or the desire.

http://www.ers.usda.gov/data-products/f ... abase.aspx

Joe