South Florida Entrepreneur Howard Melamed Offers To Lease U.S. Sugar Everglades Land

Melamed Would Use Land To Harvest Sugar Crops And Produce Ethanol
2008-07-08 20:05:36 - Delay Everglades Restoration for 30 Years
PRNewsInside.com

Coral Springs, FL/July 8, 2008 - South Florida entrepreneur, Howard Melamed is proposing to lease the 192,000 acres of land that the State of Florida is purchasing from U.S. Sugar and use the land for ethanol production for the next thirty years to try to ease the nation's toxic energy problems. After the expiration of the thirty-year lease, the land would then be given for the Everglades restoration project. Melamed, in his proposal to Florida Governor Charlie Crist, is offering to pay Florida $120,000,000.00 per year for the use of the land. The State of Florida is purchasing the land from U.S. Sugar for $1.7 billion. Estimates show that if Florida were to agree to Melamed's proposal, the land could produce 120,000,000 gallons of ethanol from sugar cane harvested.

'Our nation needs to reduce its dependence on foreign oil which is strangling every aspect of our economy,' said Howard Melamed. 'The impact of foreign oil is brought home daily as consumers feel the pinch at the gas pumps and leaders such as Charlie Crist are forced to change their positions on offshore oil drilling in Florida to meet this energy emergency. My solution would quickly produce alternative fuels to help end our dependency on foreign oil while assisting the State to pay the mortgage for the land that it recently purchased without raising our taxes.'

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