Self sufficiency is a myth

What do Jeddah, Saudi Arabia and Greenville, Ohio have in common? Apparently quite a lot, based on perspective gained during recent assignments in the Midwest and the Middle East.

While conducting audits in Darke County, Ohio, I was struck by dozens of small signs protesting carbon dioxide sequestration. When I inquired of my hosts as to the reason for the placards I was informed that it was in fact a protest against a large local ethanol plant.  These facilities use prodigious quantities of water and generate carbon dioxide which currently is vented into the air adding to the problems of global warming.

In an attempt to circumvent this inherent reality of ethanol production and to comply with anticipated EPA mandates the owners of the plant advanced a proposal to vent CO2 into wells, sequestering the by-product. The opposition to CO2 injection demonstrated by the residents of Greenville is an indirect means of constraining ethanol production. The issue at hand is an alarming decline in the water table in the town which has reduced output from domestic and municipal wells. Once welcomed to the community, the ethanol plant is now regarded as a liability.

Which brings us to Saudi Arabia. During the 1980s the Kingdom embarked on a program of “self sufficiency” in grain production. This was achieved in part by abstracting water from deep wells. A combination of profligate irrigation and high-tech agriculture resulted in production of wheat as the national staple, peaking at 5.4 million tons in 2000. The realization that by 2007 agriculture consumed over 85% of water in the Kingdom stimulated re-appraisal of self-sufficiency in grain and other agriculture products as a national priority.

The sharp reduction in subsidies paid to farmers and an increasing occurrence of dry wells reduced production by 2009. Water in aquifers in Saudi Arabia cannot be replaced and the reality is that the severe water shortage will require massive expenditure of money and energy on desalination to provide for the requirements of the population and industry.

There are obvious similarities between Greenville and Jeddah. Both cities have been impacted by well-intended government-initiated programs. Cultivation of wheat in Saudi Arabia and production of corn-based ethanol in the U.S. are both technically and financially irresponsible. Projects can only survive with government subsidies and support.

In the case of Saudi Arabia the motivation was self sufficiency in grain. In the U.S. the intent was to displace imported energy by using biofuels.  In Saudi Arabia which functions as a benevolent autocracy, policy decisions can be made and rescinded rapidly on the basis of facts and national priorities. In the case of our domestic ethanol program there are restraints to making changes. We are faced with overlays of conflicting interests including lobbying activities on legislators in both houses. This has created a selective indifference by both the executive and the legislature to the obvious financial and environmental impact of our current policy.

Recognizing the futility of domestic self-sufficiency Saudi Arabia is back tracking and will in future rely on grain purchases and possibly a form of agriculture neo-colonialism, cultivating grain in under-developed nations such as the Sudan, the Philippines and Indonesia. The question now arises as to how long citizens of the U.S. will continue to bear the costs of diverting corn to ethanol.