HAVE A GREAT SATURDAY READERS!

Another big football Saturday. The LSU Tigers play Tennessee at 2:30 pm on CBS (another national broadcast) in Tennessee. It was also announced today that the final LSU game of the season against Arkansas, the day after Thanksgiving will ALSO be broadcast to a national audience on CBS at 1:30 pm. This is the first year since 1938 that LSU does NOT play an SEC home game at night in "Death Valley"! And, the fans DON'T LIKE THAT AT ALL! But, when the SEC signs a HUGE $$$ contract with CBS and ESPN, you have to play when they want you to play. The fact that LSU is rated #1 also has a lot to do with the time of the game.

The ethanol gas folks in Brazil are experiencing a shortage on their sugar cane crop. That threatens their ethanol gas production. So, they will be trying planting sorghum to supplement the sugar cane.........read the article below:

Monsanto Sorghum Seeds to Yield Brazil Ethanol During Cane Break

Q

By Stephan Nielsen - Oct 14, 2011 3:02 PM CT

·MonsMonsanto Co. (MON), the world’s largest seed company, will sell enough sweet sorghum for 20,000 hectares (49,400 acres) of plantations in Brazil this year as sugar cane mills struggle to meet demand for ethanol and are seeking an alternative source of the renewable fuel.

The plantations may generate enough sorghum to produce 80 million liters (21.1 million gallons) of ethanol, said Jose Carramate, St. Louis-based Monsanto’s sugar cane leader.

Sweet sorghum, an 8-foot (2.4-meter) plant that resembles sugar cane and may yield 80 percent as much fuel, may become an alternative feedstock for Brazilian mills after a poor cane harvest forced some plants to close this month, more than a month early, for the annual inter-harvest break during the rainy season.

“This year will be the magic year,” as mills put the crop to the test, he said in a telephone interview yesterday. “We could see 100,000 hectares planted next year at the very least.”

Farmers will plant the sorghum in October on fallow land and harvest it as early as February when early season cane has low sucrose levels and produces little ethanol.

Monsanto is working with 20 mills, he said. The company will either sell the seeds or furnish them for free and take a cut of the profits, according to Carramate.

“This isn’t a replacement crop. It’s planted in addition to cane,” on land that mills clear each year to renew their plantations, he said.

Brazil clears and replants about 1.7 million hectares of cane plantations each year that may support sorghum crops during the inter-harvest period, he said.

Low Costs

Crushing sorghum stems and processing the juice into ethanol requires no modification to mills’ machinery, though some farmers have had difficulty planting the small seeds, he said. “The challenge here isn’t industrial but agronomic,” he said.

Sweet sorghum may provide mills with an extra $5 million of earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization a year, Bill Burnquist, general manager of U.S. seed company Ceres Inc.’s Brazil unit, said at a Sao Paulo conference Sept. 29.

Brazil, the world’s largest producer and exporter of sugar, will grow 588.9 million tons of sugar cane this year, down from last year’s 623.9 million tons, the country’s crop-forecasting agency Conab said Sept. 5.

“This is a great opportunity for sweet sorghum to offset part of the production gap,” Carramate said.

To contact the reporter on this story: Stephan Nielsen in Sao Paulo at snielsen8@bloomberg.net

"Pete" Landry.........comments welcome at...........way2gopete@yahoo.com

HAVE A GREAT FRIDAY READERS!

The "E-85" folks are panicking! They have come to realize they will lose out when the current "Ethanol Subsidy" expires at the end of this year. So, they're crying for help.

Louisiana has three (3) E-85 stations - two in the Shreveport area and one in the Baton Rouge area. There was a fourth in the Lake Charles area. It was open for 6 months and sold only 100 gallons of gas. When folks who have "Flex" vehicles try this fuel and learn that they lose 40% gas mileage, they don't go back for more.

But, this coalition won't give up. They want to hang on to their subsidy. Read the story below:

Coalition for E85 Urges Retention of Ethanol Tax Credit

Posted by Cindy Zimmerman – October 12th, 2011

A coalition of retailers, producers, equipment manufacturers have formed the Coalition for E85 with the stated purpose of protecting consumer access to 85% ethanol blends.

According to the coalition, if the current tax credit for ethanol expires at the end of the year and is not renewed, Flex Fuel vehicle (FFV) drivers could end up paying up to 38 cents more per gallon for E85. This increase they say will force many small businesses that have invested more than $100 million in E85 infrastructure to close their pumps.

“E85 is not only an alternative fuel, it is our nation’s most widely adopted alternative fuel,” said Matt Horton, CEO of Propel Fuels, one of the lead members of the Coalition for E85. “If we are to make a meaningful dent in our dependency on foreign oil, we must expand E85 infrastructure and ensure this fuel has fair tax treatment.”

The coalition wants the Internal Revenue Service to recognize that E85, is not an additive, but a true alternative fuel like natural gas or propane. They note that E85 also provides a platform for advanced biofuels and can be made from non-food sources such as farming byproducts, algae biomass and household waste. Currently other alternative fuels such as compressed natural gas, propane and hydrogen receive a $0.50 per gallon tax credit as part of the Alternative Fuel Credit. The Coalition believes E85 should be included in this group.

Coalition member Todd Garner, CEO of Protec Fuels, says if the current tax credit for ethanol goes away permanently, the impacts on the price and availability of E85 will be dramatic. “We must not abandon E85 this close to self-sustainability,” he said. “We hope retailers, producers, auto makers, and others concerned about the future of E85 will stand up and fight with us.”

The Coalition for E85 currently includes Propel Fuels, Protec, Clean Fuels Development Coalition, ethanol industry associations, pump and tank companies, and individual E85 retailers.

"Pete" Landry........comments welcome................way2gopete@yahoo.com