Thursday May 25, 2006

Editorial Cartoon by Graeme MacKay, The Hamilton Spectator – Thursday May 25, 2006
Ethanol: Viable fuel option or green pipe dream?
As rising oil prices have motorists paying a premium at the gas pumps, consumers are beginning to wonder when it will all end, and where the solution lies.The answer could be contained in ethanol, a bio-fuel that the government is increasingly touting as the renewable resource of choice that will also help to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.
The provinces and the federal government recently joined forces and announced a plan to boost the amount of ethanol mixed into all Canadian gasoline to five per cent by 2010, up from the current one per cent requirement.
Following a meeting in Regina, Environment Minister Rona Ambrose praised the initiative as an important milestone for Canada, and said the provinces showed a “successful will to move forward” on ethanol benchmarks for gasoline.
“It’s an ambitious target but we’ve done a lot of work in the last few months with the energy minister and agriculture minister, and feel very strongly it’s a reachable target,” Ambrose told CTV’s Canada AM.
“It’s time we think Canada start to play in the new economy, and we give opportunities for our agricultural sector and for Canadians to start participating in this kind of environmental challenge.” Source (CTV News)