"Why Wal-Mart wants to sell ethanol"
This would be a hell of bold and smart move by Walmart. They would make a fortune establishing themselves as the country's leader in the new fuel, tell "Big Oil" to go fuck itself, and make a lot of friends in the environmental communities as well.
Brasil's economy runs on mainly on distilled sugar cane fluid, that now approximately 80% of Brasilians use to fuel their "Flex" cars.
It costs about one-tenth as much to fill-up with ethanol and the emmissions are supposedely much lower than with pure gas.
I am not sure what kind of environmental damage has been incurred as a reult of the increased demand for sugar cane plantations, and I am sure that there is some, but it must be looked at as a viable alternative to the costly search for oil.
Oil is limited, ethanol is renewable.
Oil needs to be prospected, sugar cane needs a green thumb and a conscious/conscientious plantation owner with good government subsidies and keen business sense.
Oil is messy, spills cost millions of dollars to clean and the immediate, inevitable wildlife deaths that amount are massive regardless.
Oil needs extensive processing and therefore huge amounts of infrastructure to deal with it. Building a refinery, getting the crude oil there, refining (more pollution during the process), and finally redistribution of the extremely flamable substance for sale.
Ethanol is processed on the cane plantations, with all of the resulting byproduct being organic cane matter that is, in turn, used for composting the new sugar cane fields!!!!
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