WICHITA — The American Petroleum Institute filed a lawsuit Monday in Washington D.C. challenging the EPA’s mandate for oil companies to the buy 8.65 million gallons of ethanol made from cellulosic materials and blend it into their gasoline for retail sale. Oil companies say there isn’t nearly enough cellulosic ethanol being made, forcing them to bid up the price — or just violate the law.
“EPA’s standard is divorced from reality and forces refiners to purchase credits for cellulosic fuels that do not exist,” said API Director of Downstream and Industry Operations Bob Greco. “EPA’s unrealistic mandate is effectively a tax on manufacturers of gasoline that could ultimately burden consumers.”
The vast majority of U.S. made ethanol comes from corn but the federal government has tried to encourage the ethanol industry to develop the ability to make ethanol out of wheat straw, corn stalks, switch grass and other inedible plant material. The idea is that cellulosic material is more plentiful and less valuable. The problem is that, at this point, it’s a lot more expensive to unlock the energy from cellulosic materials. The industry is only doing the research and expanding production when they can make money at it, which means there’s not much commercial scale ethanol production at this point.
The oil industry plainly thinks the federal government has unleashed another mandate built on wishful thinking. Probably, but the government may get its way anyway: As oil companies bid up the price of cellulosic ethanol — driving up the cost of gasoline at the pump — it becomes more valuable and ethanol companies will get more serious about investing in it, eventually bringing the price down. That’s what happened with corn ethanol, which is now as cheap as gasoline. The question is how long is “eventually”?
The true believers among Wichita housing brokers will always say it’s a good time to buy a house.
Today, they’re right, according to the National Association of Realtors.
With home prices sagging nationwide and more buyers coming into the market, this is one time when it truly is a good time to buy a house.
WICHITA — More evidence that job growth is here to stay: the Conference Board’s latest Employment Trends Index rose again in February.
“The acceleration in the ETI suggests that rapid job growth is likely to continue in the next several months, despite modest improvements in demand and production,” said Gad Levanon, Director of Macroeconomic Research at The Conference Board. “In the past year output per hour of work grew very slowly. If this trend continues, employment growth could remain robust even if GDP continues to grow at a modest 2 to 2.5 percent, as we expect.”
February’s growth in the ETI was driven by positive contributions from seven of the eight components. Indicators showing improvement were: Percentage of Respondents Who Say They Find “Jobs Hard to Get”, Number of Employees Hired by the Temporary-Help Industry, Initial Claims for Unemployment Insurance, Industrial Production, Real Manufacturing and Trade Sale, Part-Time Workers for Economic Reasons, and Job Openings. The only negative indicator was Percentage of Firms With Positions Not Able to Fill Right Now.
The Conference Board is an independent business membership and research group.
WICHITA – Took a little time Sunday afternoon to wander through JCP – you know, the retailer formerly known as J.C. Penney – in Towne West Square. It was my first trip since the company’s new CEO, former Apple wunderkind Ron Johnson, opined publicly that the retailer’s customers were “tired of all those sales offers,” a true warning shot that sounded an awful lot like an “uh-oh” to a now-former Penney’s regular like myself.
I used to frequent the store. Good clothing and the best prices in the market, along with friendly, knowledgeable clerks.
So much for all that.
Here’s the short tale for those of you who haven’t been to JCP: Prices are universally about 20 percent higher. Not a sale to be found, and about half the customers of a normal Sunday to boot. The store’s staff has also been cut in about half, and those who remain have been turned into shrinkage hawks, roaming the store demanding that shoppers account for that pair of pants they held in their hands five minutes ago.
In short, in at least one store the Apple genius has re-created Sears, and we all know how that one’s working out. Worse, there’s no cool whiz-bang electronic gadget with a fruit logo to be found to save the day, just the same Nike shirts that used to be $45 and are now selling for $60.