Energy

This Land, Our Land: Rural Development, Energy and Conservation in the Farm Bill

Rural America makes up only 16 percent of the U.S. population, but 90 percent of the land.1 Most of the resources we depend upon—food, water, energy, fiber and minerals—are either derived from or heavily impacted by rural land use, and stewarded by rural community members.

A critical moment for Farm Bill energy programs

There is a lot to talk about following last Friday’s release of Senate Agriculture Committee Chair Debbie Stabenow’s draft Farm Bill, but hardly any time to talk about it. The bill is scheduled for mark-up tomorrow. Yes, that’s April 25th. After the full mark-up, the Committee bill will move to the Senate floor for debate, probably sometime in May.

Earth Day and Tar Sands Oil

In January of 1969 the Santa Barbara Channel was the site of an oil well blowout that still ranks today as the third-largest oil spill in U.S. waters, after the Deepwater Horizon in the Gulf of Mexico and the Exxon Valdez in Prince William Sound.

Sign-on letter in support of the Energy Title

A diverse coalition of 123 national and Minnesota organizations sent letters to U.S. House of Representatives and Senate leadership urging them to preserve and fund Farm Bill energy programs that are critical for national security, the environment, and rural economies.

Urging support for energy programs in the 2012 Farm Bill

Yesterday our Minnesota Senators Amy Klobuchar and Al Franken introduced a bill in the Senate to protect energy programs in the Farm Bill that are critically important for rural communities. Sen. Tom Harkin of Iowa led the bill’s introduction, and Sen. Kent Conrad from North Dakota was also a co-sponsor.

What's at Stake in the 2012 Farm Bill?

The U.S. Farm Bill—arguably the nation’s largest and most influential food policy tool—is written by Congress every five years. It includes far-reaching programs for crop production, farmers, rural development, energy, conservation and international food aid—the largest portion going to food assistance programs.

Learning from the indirect land use change debate

When land previously used for producing food is transformed into land for producing ethanol, what impact does its change have on the environment and global food supply? Does the net difference in food production spur development in other parts of the world—often meaning deforestation to make way for increased acreage—that ultimately increases global greenhouse gas emissions?

Learning from the Indirect Land Use Change Debate

For the last few years, environmental advocates and ethanol producers have been mired in a debate over something known as indirect land use change (ILUC), a measure of greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions caused by, but not directly associated with, biofuel production. The controversy centers on these questions: Does ethanol demand in the U.S.

The water, energy and food nexus

As I flew back from Bonn last week, on my way back from the Bonn 2011 Nexus Conference (16–18 November), one thing was clear to me. Corporate environmentalism is entrenching itself firmly in the corridors of global governance, and challenging its advance will require new strategies.

World's largest ethanol producer drops the antibiotics

Good news doesn’t come often enough in this business, so when POET—the world's largest ethanol producer—announced they’d decided to phase out antibiotic use in some of their ethanol plants, we celebrated.

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