We develop a stylized model of fuel markets in an open economy to analyze the impact of ethanol policy on social welfare and greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. The policies considered here include the $0.51 per gallon blender’s subsidy for ethanol and the import tariff of $0.54 per gallon on...

This article develops a dynamic micro-economic land use model to identify the cost-effective allocation of cropland for traditional row crops and perennial grasses and the mix of cellulosic feedstocks needed to meet pre-determined biofuel targets over the 2007-2022 period. Yields of perennial...

Regulatory agencies are planning to implement policies targeted at mitigating greenhouse gas emissions (GHG)—e.g., low carbon fuel standards and carbon trading. Biofuels are viewed as a path to achieve these goals. Biofuels, however, pose challenges to regulators because their GHG emissions...

A key argument in the societal debate against polices to support biofuels is that production of these alternative fuels may in fact consume more energy than they generate and emit more greenhouse gases than they sequester (Fargione et al., 2008; Searchinger et al., 2008; Rajagopal and Zilberman, 2007;...