Preventing Consumer Price Spikes in Commodity Trading With Ethanol
By: Lance Winslow
We need a viable solution to prevent consumer price spikes in commodity trading with ethanol. We have seen what has happened with commodity traders running up the price of gasoline every time there is significant world events, which will cause a supply and demand conflict. During the 2005 Atlantic Tropical Hurricane Season we witnessed gasoline prices in excess of three dollars per gallon and oil prices of $70 a barrel.
If in the future we use flex fuels and E85 Ethanol we may see incredible price spikes in fuel due to droughts or floods in the Midwest causing problems with growing crops or the corn that will be used to make the ethanol. We need better genetically modified crops, which use less water and grow faster. It would be best if these genetically modified crops used terminator seeds so they would not interfere with the other crops or become mixed. Monsanto makes terminator seeds and that would solve this problem.
It additionally one of the major issues will be trying to prevent extreme weather. Either a significantly long drought period of four or five years or massive rainstorms and flooding will cause huge price spikes that the consumer may not be able to afford. The United States military is working on strategies to control the weather and it is time that we use these strategies to also protect our crops. If we can control the weather we can control the cost of fuel and to that means a more stable economy. Please consider this in 2006.
Lance Winslow