premise: Ethanol is a ludicrous fuel made out of corn, at a cost far higher than the petroleum it replaces, produced with a huge government tax subsidy, which started during the energy crisis a quarter-century ago and has long since become a classic case study of stupid policy entrenched by special interests (in this case farmers and Archer Daniels Midland, the company responsible for the fabulous discovery that if you tell the government what to do in commercials on every Sunday talk show, the government apparently is powerless to resist).
hypothesis: Production of ethanol is less expensive compared to petrol.