[Peakoil] Policy on ethanol and tax

[Alex P]

Hi folks,

The ethanol and fuel tax debates are up and running in Australia.

Unfortunately from my point of view the ALP is taking the short-sighted 
positions.

On ethanol the state governments in NSW and Qld are moving to subsidise 
ethanol production. It is not certain whether ethanol production actually 
has a net energy benefit. ie you may actually spend more energy making it 
than is embodied in the ethanol.

Senator Minchin had an interesting letter on it in the AFR which I've 
attached.

Here are some other links on the topic.

http://www.ers.usda.gov/publications/aer721/aer721.pdf
http://home.austarnet.com.au/davekimble/ethanol.pdf

The second issue is fuel tax. The ALP Federally is reviewing its policy in 
this area. Unfortunately, their efforts may be too narrowly focussed. The 
best option would be to cut income tax to match the extra tax take from 
fuel tax or a similar measure. This may be what the Federal Government is 
already doing with their across-the-board $6 a week tax cut. Lyn Martin 
suggests actually raising taxes on fuel, but at least she is not going in 
the wrong direction. People can then decide to rationalise their fuel 
consumption, and arrange alternate transport, or spend the tax cut on 
petrol if they have no choice. What is needed in addition is expenditure 
on rail services, public transport etc, but no-one is talking about this 
yet. Will it be the ALP? I am pessimistic, but we can always try.

The upshot of all this is that we need to determine the facts on these 
topics and others and then formulate arguments to cover all angles. Then 
we are able to lobby and campaign from a coherent viewpoint, even if we 
have differ on what the policy should be.

This is what we sould do nationally with other oil groups.

Alex
O4O4873828

ACT Peak Oil discussion list
http://www.act-peakoil.org

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