By Vijay Jayaraj
Instability in the Middle East has disrupted oil and gas flows to India. However, India’s proposed plan to produce 30% ethanol-blended gasoline and diesel as a response to supply anxiety would be a costly error. To understand the pending disaster, you only need look to the United States.
Failed American corn-ethanol
For decades, the American government heavily subsidized and mandated corn ethanol in motor fuels. The National Center for Energy Analytics recently published a comprehensive autopsy of this experiment. The findings are devastating.
Washington’s aggressive push for biofuels destroyed millions of acres of pristine land. Farmers, incentivized by government, plowed under native grasslands, drained wetlands, and converted fallow conservation acreage into intensive cultivation. Land was diverted from feeding people to filling fuel tanks.
Moreover, the supposedly harmful greenhouse gas emissions that ethanol use was to reduce instead are shown to increase when the entire lifecycle of land use and production inputs is taken into account. And the promised energy independence? A mirage. Americans paid for environmental destruction and higher food bills to benefit the pockets of the politically connected, all while exporting their high-quality fuels.
Bigger failure awaits Indian sugarcane ethanol
If the American corn ethanol experiment was a failure, Indian ethanol made from sugarcane will be a catastrophe.
Sugarcane requires lots of water, consuming over a long growing season up to two-thirds of a gallon per plant—more than double amount required to grow the corn that American production uses.
In terms of fuel extraction, the water requirement of ethanol from Brazilian sugarcane is 647 gallons of water for every single gallon of ethanol produced. In the United States, that number climbs to 733 gallons. In India, the demand is even greater—791 gallons.
India already faces a severe water deficiency. When the monsoons fail to produce sufficient seasonal rains for the crucial Indus and Ganges river basins, harvests suffer and cities ration drinking water. Mandated increases of sugarcane production for fuel can only exacerbate water shortages. Switching from sugarcane to rice, corn, or wheat to meet ethanol quotas offers no relief from greater water demands.
The ultimate metric for analyzing any energy source is the comparison of how much energy is produced to the amount of energy required to produce it. Ethanol’s score is abysmal compared to gasoline and diesel, which are distilled from energy-dense crude oil.
Agricultural production is energy intensive, requiring tractors, irrigation pumps, the manufacture of artificial fertilizers, and the distilling of alcohol. By the time ethanol is pumped into a fuel tank, the output of the process may even fall short of the inputs.
“Producing one gallon of ethanol may well take more energy than the end product contains,” according to the Texas Public Policy Institute. “With fertilizer, water, an energy-intense fermentation process, and transportation necessarily by rail or truck instead of existing pipeline, ethanol production utilizes much more energy than crude oil to reach the pump.”
Free India from climate chains
All that extra work to produce ethanol increases the emissions of carbon dioxide (CO2) and other greenhouse gases that climate alarmists insist are so dangerous, making the charade of this biofuel even more ridiculous.
Besides, we know that there is no impending climate crisis. In July 2025, the U.S. Department of Energy released an analysis of the effects of greenhouse gas emissions, confirming that there isno existential threat from the weather.
Far from being a pollutant, CO2 at higher levels in the atmosphere delivers massive benefits to humanity. CO2 is plant food. Satellite data confirm India’s forests are expanding. Its agricultural production is breaking records. The enriched atmosphere allows crops to utilize water better and yield more food.
India cannot afford to play games with the energy needs of 1.4 billion people to climb the economic ladder. If the Middle East can no longer supply Indian needs, retreating into the dark ages of burning biomass is not the answer.
Instead of pouring billions into government mandates, India should drastically increase purchases of American natural gas to bypass the geopolitical instability of the Middle East. The U.S. possesses vast reserves of this energy–dense fuel to power industry, make fertilizers that sustain crop yields, and reliably generate electricity.
It is time to abandon the ethanol illusion and secure the energy India needs to thrive.
Originally published at PJ Media, June 10, 2026.
Vijay Jayaraj is a Science and Research Associate at the CO2 Coalition, Fairfax, Virginia. He holds an M.S. in environmental sciences from the University of East Anglia and a postgraduate degree in energy management from Robert Gordon University, both in the U.K., and a bachelor’s in engineering from Anna University, India. He served as a research associate with the Changing Oceans Research Unit at University of British Columbia, Canada.
Thank you for this article. I remember that when I was a child, I used to hear about vehicles running on “beet alcohol” (or at least that’s how I remember it). I found the idea amusing and rather strange. Ah, the days of youth, long gone!
As for India, I’ve seen that some parts of the country are suffering from severe irrigation problems, particularly due to agricultural groundwater pumping, on top of the droughts that regions such as Maharashtra and Bundelkhand have historically been accustomed to. Despite this, India continues to post record harvests. Given its more than 3,000,000 km² of territory, I can easily imagine that the diversity of climates is substantial, and that harvests in other regions are able to compensate for losses in areas affected by drought.
If anyone happens to have more information on this subject, I’d be very interested to hear it!
Ethanol is a house of cards waiting to collapse. Its stated purpose is to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, yet a full lifecycle analysis—from soil preparation and crop production to processing, transportation, and final combustion—suggests otherwise. When the entire process is examined, ethanol appears to impose significant environmental costs on multiple fronts while doing little, if anything, to reduce overall CO₂ emissions—the very objective used to justify its government-subsidized promotion.
To a rational observer willing to step back and evaluate the complete system, the policy makes little sense. The disconnect between the stated goals and the actual outcomes is enough to drive the average person either to drink heavily or to spend their evenings reading Anthony Watts’s website. Either way, it is a tragedy for common sense.
Bureaucrats are always concerned with pocketing public funds. Even if they are not they are, in most cases, incapable of using those funds properly. In pursuing their political agenda they are often completely detached from the fundamental laws of nature incl. those you have referred to in your comment. They do not like LCA either. Let alone common sense… This is sad but this is true.
LCA?
LCA=Life Cycle Assessment
Ethanol is being used to pay corn farmers a premium for their product. The rest is smoke and mirrors.
I do not fault the farmers for taking advantage of a situation not created by them.
You are correct SN4, it’s not the fault of the small farmers. But corporate farming might be shouldering much of the blame since they have the political influence.
Same could be said about hydrogen production yet there are schemes still going on in many countries!
So put the ethanol to good use by drinking it, rather than burning it!
I’ll drink to that.
And be subject to American threats of withholding supply unless India “behaves itself” and obeys American orders?
North Korea learnt the worth of dependence on America supply promises the hard way, years ago. Let some other sucker buy American energy with all the conditions and restrictions attached.
India is India. Not China, not America, not the UK. ethnically diverse, linguistically disparate, a vast, seething, colorful nation with thousands of years of history and culture behind it.
I’m surprised it has remained the world’s largest democracy for so long. Maybe the British influence helped – British cricket, law, and railways seem to have been accepted by India – why not democracy?
If India wants to become America’s vassal, it will – although judging by the number of Indian nationals supporting US essential industries, it might work the other way round. Maybe the US should deport all Indian nationals on the grounds of national security?
Only joking – Silicon Valley would collapse along with other parts of the economy. Funny old world, isn’t it?
You can always tell a leftist. They assume that the entire world works on a command and control structure. That if someone starts to buy something from the US, that they will never be able to buy from anyone else, ever.
That and their automatic assumption that the world would be perfect, if only the US wasn’t in it.
Ethanol has the distinction of being the only energy source worse for the economy and the environment than solar. If you compare full fuel-cycle water consumption — meaning crop growing + processing for ethanol, and extraction + refining for petroleum fuels — the contrast is ugly for ethanol.
Conventional gasoline from crude oil is nowhere near the range for ethanol. The Belfer Center summary says producing a gallon of conventional gasoline requires:
Petroleum gasoline: roughly 3–7 gallons of water per gallon of fuel. [storage.go…leapis.com]
Corn ethanol: roughly 322 gallons of water per gallon of fuel in the 2009 Water Footprint analysis, and described elsewhere as one of the most water-intensive fuels on average. [anthropoce…gazine.org], [storage.go…leapis.com]
Sugarcane ethanol: roughly 647–791 gallons of water per gallon of fuel in that same Water Footprint analysis, depending on country. [anthropoce…gazine.org]
Footnote: A technology that only looks competitive after you hide its land, water, and system costs behind mandates, subsidies, and selective accounting is not a serious long-run solution. Saying so is not partisan; it is basic resource arithmetic.
It is basic honesty, too.
The next pipe dream on a large scale. Funny that for decades only Brazil embarked on this ethanol road to nowhere and nobody cared nor tried to copy it.
I waited for years to see “unleaded” painted over on gasoline pumps. Now I see “regular” and “may contain up to 10% ethanol”.
Methyl tert-butyl ether (MTBE) replaced lead, and ethanol, replaced MTBE.
Use the bolded part to search and learn why stuff is in gasoline.
If it wasn’t for the idiocy of State and Federal Govts in Australia India could be getting massive volumes of LPG from Australia, much of which would come from sources on the periphery of the Indian Ocean and very conveniently located to supply India.
The same brains trust that dreamed up the ethanol jape also decided it was a good idea to burn North American deciduous forests in Yorkshire boilers. Result more CO2 and higher prices for everything.
Justt like every other green energy stuff this is dysfunctional lunacy with a built in catastrophy waiting to happen in the long run
and a poor country like India can not afford to waste farmland for fuel if it wants to avoid famines, especially if there already is a water deficiency(which will then be blamed on AGW)
But it is also evil ignorance if the presented solution is to use the country as savior that created the instability in the Middle East.
The same lunacy as in Europe where the USA blew up north stream(“thank you USA” polish minister Sykorski) and Europeans were then charged “astronomical gas prices” ( german Minister Habeck) by the USA.
That aside: if you start buying from the US – they’ll instantly cut you off if you don’t do what they say, as sanctions are their first tool, before regime change and war.
And considering what an asskisser to the US India already is –
Modi instantly stopped buying massively discounted oil from Russia after Trump(the Russians are really bad at colluding,I Guess)
told him to a few months ago, knowing very well he’ll get the Imran Khan treatment, who was sacked a few days after he announced that the USA is trying to remove him –
how slavish will they become if they get completely dependend on the US?
But let’s ignore my usual and totally unjustified,americano- and hegemonophob fake news
for a second and pretend that a pathological war country that ignores all contracts (jcpoa) and promises(no NATO expansion/Baker)is reliable and honorable and not a Wall Street/MiC Mafia posing as a country :
The USA can not satisfy Indias energy needs because they barely produce enough for themselves.
The only reason they successfully pretend to do so is by using its oil reserves (or I’m just too stupid to read the Energy Information Admin. data the American way),
which will soon reach a 40 year low –
as result of Trumps endless streak of broken promises, as he didn’t fill the reserves up as he promised during the election.
If the USA doesn’t steal another countries oil very soon(Venezuela is decades away from being effectively exploited and the Iran robbery failed for now) they won’t be able to deliver –
and as soon as Trump is gone, democrats and RINOs will instantly cut down production.
And(going back to my usual americanophobia and wrong observations) what does the author actually thinks will happen if India becomes as successfull as China? – will India be treated differently by the US than China is now ,as the USA simply can not compete with the cheap labor and manpower of India ,especially not with 45 mio illiterate grown ups and 40% of students who can not read on a basic level(net zero reading skills).
How smart would it be to have the USA as main supplier?
Just asking for a friend.
You certainly do an in depth version of things with a very one-sided point of view.
Anyone who thinks that the US is the source of instability in the middle east has already demonstrated themselves to be to biased and bigoted to listen to.
Purchase natural gas or coal. Minor nit.
“However, India’s proposed plan to produce 30% ethanol-blended gasoline and diesel as a response to supply anxiety would be a costly error. ”
It would be a catastrophe in another sense – most of the engines “fueled” with that 30% ethanol ‘ersatz gasoline’ would be rapidly destroyed.
Ethanol is corrosive and absorbs moisture. Engines not built to tolerate that much ethanol will be ruined by it.
Not to mention the fuel economy will be reduced a good bit.
In the USA, only passenger vehicles and flex-fuel motors built after 2001 can use E15 (15% ethanol), but E10 is what is regularly sold. Some places have non-ethanol, especially those in farming/ranching regions. Lawn mower and chainsaw manufacturers recomment it. The last I bought was a dollar more per gallon.