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Some farmers say ethanol is being left out of the electric vehicle conversation

Some Midwestern producers say the whole story isn’t being told about electric vehicles.

Jan Tenbensil, a farmer from Southwest Nebraska, tells Brownfield many people believe electric vehicles are carbon neutral, but they’re not. “Just because a vehicle doesn’t have tail pipe emissions, we have to look at the entire lifecycle of the power source,” he says. “Be it coal, natural gas, solar or wind – all sources of electric have a carbon intensity that we have to measure.”

East Central farmer Rick Gruber says ethanol-blended fuel is more environmentally friendly because it has a lower carbon intensity score than EVs and ethanol benefits agriculture. “It really helps our bottom line. It’s good for the air.  It’s good for farmers. It’s good for the rural economy. It’s just a broad-based approach to solving some of our issues we have with treating our liquid fuels market.” 

NeCGA approved a policy resolution supporting renewable energy and electricity from non-petroleum and scoring its carbon intensity at its annual meeting in Lincoln Thursday.