The sweet corn season is upon us, in fact, that is on my things to do this week end. Get some sweet corn.... I've been checking out the sweet corn prices along my trails, and noticed that the price per dozen cost has jumped up to $4 - $5.00.
Ethanol is racing into the new energy era. More oil is not a solution, and fossil fuels are environmentally unfriendly and limited. For the last year and a half, I have been regularly delivering to a particular ethanol plant. This new ethanol plant used to be a grain operation. This huge grain plant took a long time to convert over to an ethanol plant. Two weeks ago, I delivered a pump to them. The new operations were already started, but the contractors were still there finishing up and getting the bugs out of the new system. The contractor guy that unloaded me, blurted out a figure that was unbelievable. He said that with all of the crew working, the cranes, etc., the total hourly rate for cost was $30,000 and hour, and that they were almost finished. $30,000 an hour???? WOW! In the meantime, truck loads of corn were going in and trucks going out of there like a working ant farm. My question was, " Is there going to be enough corn to replenish all of these new ethanol plants nationwide?" He didn't have an answer for me, but it gave him something to think about.
I left there thinking about this greener solution. Where is all this corn going to come from? There are countries in South America that are jumping into corn farming. Unfortunately at the cost of many acres of rain forests. There is only so much farmland, which is steadily getting swallowed up by developers. Does that mean less oats, soybeans, and wheat? That means less supply, and will increase those prices. The concern regarding starvation has been raised due to the increasing price and low supply of wheat and other grains.
Think of the process for a minute. You have the farm tractors operating, the distilled process for ethanol is coal-fired, and the big trucks transporting corn in and ethanol out. Are we really gaining anything coming up with this greener solution? I'm not going to pretend I am a professional number cruncher or anything, but the numbers don't seem to jive. They must think, as long as the finished product is good for the environment, it's all good.
We will have to wait this one out. Until then, I am going out to Olsen farm and getting me some of that high priced, super-sweet, mouth-watering sweet corn. Hurry, the prices are going up, and the season is short.
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