An exerpt from the new introductory chapter of the soon-to-be-re-issued book, THE FORBIDDEN FUEL: “…beginning in 2008, the industry – along with the rest of the U.S. economy – would make a crash landing that would shutter some ethanol plants, crater stock values and shake the faith of many corn farmers. The stage was set for industry woes by a record run-up in prices for their key feedstock – corn, which by June 2008 had surged to more than $7.00 a bushel in a market stoked in part by the expanding production of corn-based fuel but also by tight global grain markets responding to growing world demand as more and more people in emerging economies were adding grain-eating livestock to their diets. (Many analysts also attributed the hot commodity markets of 2008 to financial speculators and commodity traders.) Then, in the second half of 2008, ethanol prices collapsed in tandem with those for oil—which dropped by approximately $100 per barrel from July to December—and most other commodities, rocked by world economic slow-down. Corn prices also tumbled from record highs – although they still ended the year at roughly double the prices of 2005.

For anyone interested in biofuels, whether for or against, it is good news that the book considered to be the definitive history of alcohol fuel will be re-issued spring of 2010. THE FORBIDDEN FUEL will be re-issued by Bison Books; the new edition will contain a lot of new material.

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