feed wheat v oil price

[ianben]

Ration-al
Yeah
I think it is that simple

We, Canada EU US FSU, all use the low qualitity over produced commoditities for energy when the opertunity arises.

Lets imagine West Edmonton Mall has a multi-fuel boiler and today can give $3.50/bu for Toms feed wheat. Next year all his wheat grades1 and they burn oil or gas.

Equally I want to see the same boiler in Manchester Trafford centre so I can sell wheat at its energy value too.
I probably produce low quality more often? None of us can control weather!!

Having the facility to remove low quality and surplus stock, as and when, will give us the ability to ask a fair price for our produce while maintaining a reliable supply of quality produce.

Dedicated energy crops which might look good but still leave us with one fickle market if energy prices slump.

One crop with lots of markets must be better for the farmer dont you think?

[TOM4CWB]

Ianben;

Being involved in the CWB elections and scratching my head... has been really good!

A fellow in western SK. has a pat. on a process that produces ethanol, gasification, and carbon pellets... which can produce even higher values per bushel than you quote... right here in oil rich SK. ands AB.

WE CAN DO BETTER!

[tower]

I am somewhat astounded by the direction this is going. Do a little googling about ethanol, ecology, pricing. You will find that most of the money (subsidies or not) is going to ADM for it's handling of the grain, fertilizer, seed, and chemicals.

You will find that the ratio of energy used to produce the grain to that gained from the grain is in the 10:7 range. Basically if the government is paying a subsidy for this purpose it is paying farmers to waste energy and put more pollutants into the ecosystem than they were before.

Millions of acres have been put into production that otherwise would have been left in grazing land or forest. This is a way to reduce the problem of surplus for farmers? All it is doing is making a lot of factors that affect all of us worse.

[TOM4CWB]

Tower;

BTU's in 60lb (1bu) of wheat, BTU's of fuel required to grow 60lb of wheat, you are saying it takes 10 units of fuel to produce 7 units of energy out of production from one bushel?

15lb of deisel/ac for field operations
$15/ac for P2 05 and K20

Nitrogen can be fixed by previous crop.

Are you saying 60bu/ac of wheat has less net energy value than this miniscule amount of fuel and fertiliser/ac?

[tower]

That is what I understand from the articles that I have seen. Let's not forget the chemicals, trucking, processing required to grow, deliver and distill the end product.

[TOM4CWB]

Tower;

It is obviously in the profit interests of the oil industry/status Quo to say what you have repeated.

Obviously oil got it's energy from the sun through plants, in the first place.

To say a 200bu/ac plus corn crop (10,000 lb/ac production)... is not just a giant solar collector for energy, ignores all reality! Those targeting ethanol corn can produce these kinds of production numbers.

The majority of the energy to produce corn of course comes from the sun.

So how much energy does it take to produce a litre of fuel for your combine?

Kind of a irrelevant number, if it takes twice (or whatever) the energy to produce and supply a litre of fuel... that is burnt in our tractors/combines as they travel down the field. Could we do better if we needed to?

Of Course!

Plants are still the best solar pannels I know of!

[tower]

It is obviously in the interests of ADM, suppliers of seed, fertilizers, chemicals, graders, storers, handlers, and shippers of corn or wheat, to have us grow huge quantities of low value product so that ADM can also get huge subsisies for turning the grain into ethanol. ADM is used because they produce about 40% of the Ethanol made in the US.

So sure a field of corn is a big solar collector, but the solar energy used is not included in the calculations mentioned above. It should be of course. In that way we could determine how that collected energy could be used more efficiently.

Perhaps the question, how much does it cost to produce a litre of fuel for my combine, might better be asked how much does it cost to replace the fuel we are wasting producing more expensive fuel.

[ianben]

Why do we need to worry about the maths in the energy equation or who else is making money or being subsided.

Wheat has a value as energy lets make sure we do not sell it for less.

All I am interested in is farmers getting higher prices!!!

I prefer to deal with companies that are fancially sound. So what if adm make millions so long as I am making some too.

Here a biofuel company went broke leaving farmers with willow for coppicing and no market whatsoever.

Lets produce crops which can serve lots of markets and are credible alternative.

Obviously energy crops have to be used locally but your canola could be used to fuel your combine as oil prices rise.

The horse was an energy supply that managed to produce a surplus so it is possible.

[tower]

Ianben, now we have 450 horse tractors but the tractors aren't the energy source. The source is a dwindling and increasingly expensive crude oil that we need so desparately that we are spending thousands of millions fighting for it.

The reason we have to worry about the energy Math is that if we are going to spend that kind of money and hundreds of thousands of lives to maintain our supply, we'd better not be wasting it producing more expensive energy.

If sustain-ability, our ability to farm and pass on our food production capacity to our kids in at least as good a condition as we got it, is a serious goal we need to look at more efficient end-uses for what we are producing even if it means we are producing less.

[ianben]

Tower
Simply explained, biomass is vegetation -- for example, trees, grasses, plant
parts such as leaves, agricultural waste products, and ocean plants. Being
extremely efficient solarcollection systems, plants will produce and store
energy in the form of carbon as they grow.

During photosynthesis, plants combine carbon dioxide from the air and water
from the ground to form carbohydrates, which form the building blocks of
biomass. The solar energy that drives photosynthesis is stored in the
chemical bonds of the structural components of biomass. If we burn
biomass efficiently (which extracts the energy stored in the chemical bonds),
then oxygen from the atmosphere combines with the carbon in plants to
produce carbon dioxide and water.

Biomass is one of the oldest fuels known to man. Although basic, the
primitive campfire illustrates the nature of using biomass for power.
When biomass is burned, it produces heat. In a power plant, this heat
is used to turn water into steam. The steam is then used to turn turbines,
which are connected to electric generators.

Prior to 1875; the United States primary energy supply was from biomass.
And back then, an acre of native grass provided the energy to fuel a
horse -- then the country's only means of transportation! (That's roughly
what it took to pasture one.) Today, using that same quantity of native
grass as a biomass resource, enough fuel can be created to drive a
car 10,000 miles!

There is actually and abundance of biomass in virtually every part of
the world that can be tapped to create power. If we used all the biomass
potentially available today, the energy content in that fuel would produce
an estimated 2,750 Quads. (1 Quad is equal to 1,000,000,000,000,000
BTUs) At present, the world population uses only about 7% of the
available annual production of biomass.

Biomass is probably the most underutilized renewable resource in the
U.S. today. How much of this alternative energy material is available
for use in this country right now? Here is an example. Space heating
accounts for approximately 50% of our total annual energy budget and
is also responsible for more than 25% of our total Green House Gas
emissions. Approximately six quadrillion BTU's of energy were consumed
for space heating in the United States, representing about $45 billion in
expenditures. According to the 1997 census there are 101 million homes
in the US. The current available biomass resources could potentially heat
the equivalent of 260 million homes!

By displacing more polluting forms of energy generation, biomass resources
for energy will also assist America in reducing its dependence on Persian
Gulf oil and cut emisions of those harmful greenhouse gases. Using
Biomass for energy technologies will also create jobs and fuel economic
growth across America.

Using biomass to create energy showcases many unique qualities that
can provide a plethora of environmental benefits as well. It can help
mitigate climate change, reduce acid rain, soil erosion, water pollution
and pressure on landfills, provide wildlife habitat, and help maintain
forest health through better management.

More than any other resource, biomass is capable of simutaneously
addressing the nations' energy, environmental, and economic needs.
Biomass is the logical alternative fuel of the future.


I would just like to draw your attention to the last paragragh.

Can it be a win win win solution.

If you go right back to the begining of this thread sustainability was my greivance.

Why are we selling feed wheat a a price we cannot replace it for?

Why are we selling wheat for less than its energy value?