Much like the corn industry of North America the sugar industry of Brazil has a good amount of it's crop being used to produce ethanol fuels. This is a practice that this article is trying to convince the reader that this practice should be discontinued because as various studies have proven that this practice of fuel production is highly inefficient and, in the case of Brazil taking from one of their major exports and a food source. Sugar is one of the most common commodities in the post industrial world. There is practically no house in the US that doesn't have sugar, we use it in our drinks and our desserts and hundreds of other foods. By taking out a large portion of their commodity for fuel production Brazil is harming their economy on a two-fold basis of reducing exports and using a fuel that is more expensive in the long run. Ethanol is much harsher on engine components and is less efficient than petroleum, so you have to purchase more ethanol to equal the same driving distance as you would get with gas. Ethanol also takes large farming machinery to gather and process, these machines almost all run on diesel fuel and therefore ethanol is taking greater petroleum resources to produce. Ethanol is a very backwards method for achieving an alternative energy, it is fairly clear that it will never be able to replace gasoline and diesel and as this article advocates, should be a discontinued production practice. It is only going to cost people more money and could reduce food production enough to cause more hunger.
http://www.americanthinker.com/2011/03/the_energy_myth_that_wont_die.html
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