But there's still a small trick. He only counted oil. The problem is that making ethanol uses a lot of natural gas and extra gas use increases imports. So ethanol makes us only 1.1% more energy independent (counting oil and gas).

But we're just getting started right? Wrong. In 2006 we made 5 billion gallons, and the USDA told us, in Mar 2007, that by 2017, corn ethanol will pretty much level off at 12 billion gallons (take a look). That gets us to 2.8% energy independent. In 2006, ethanol cost us an extra $7.3 billion in subsidies and at the pump.

That's the good news. Now check on Ethanol & Climate.

Suppose we found a huge oil field in Texas and it produced so much we could stop importing oil. Would we be energy independent? The military would be. But you and I would be right where we are now. Here's why.

Say, with our newly discovered oil, the world price of oil went down to $40, but then something happens in the Middle East and the world oil price goes to $100. All our oil is local, and local costs didn't change, so our oil companies keep selling to us for $40/barrel, right?

You gotta be kidding. An oil company can sell to you for $40 or some foreigner for $100; what's it going to do? Oil companies don't even stop to think about that one. What happens when they start selling all their oil to foreigners for $100/barrel. Big shortages here in the US. Then our prices go up. And up. And up. Until we offer to pay $100. Then those oil companies sell to us, same as to the foreigners. Even if we have all our own oil, the oil companies will still make us pay the world price of oil. We will never be independent of that price.  And it's the price that matters.

Sure, but how much is this costing, and isn't there a cheaper way? And couldn't we find a way that did something for global warming? Corn ethanol costs about the same as gasoline per gallon (a little more), but 1.53 gallons are needed to replace a gallon of gasoline. So when gas is $2.00 we pay $3.00 for the same energy ethanol. That's on top of the 51¢/gallon subsidy. So to save a gallon of gas costs us more than $1.75 extra on top of the normal price of gas (and more when gas prices are over $2.00).

But even that's an underestimate, because making ethanol uses imorted natural gas (and a little oil) which makes us more energy dependent.

There are other ways to save gas that are much cheaper. Not using a gallon of gas saves two or three dollars instead of costing an extra $1.75, and it reduces greenhouse gases 8 times more than replacing the gas with ethanol. According to the American Academy of Sciences, some auto efficiency measures could be implemented for less than the cost of he gas saved.