A 1.3 to 1.5 energy gain is miserable compared to other sources. It can never be more than solar power, because quite literally, the energy comes from the sun. Slowly!

You'll notice that the farmers aren't using alcohol to produce the crop or the pesticides and fetilizers.

How many of the dryers and stills use the alcohol or byproducts to get their heat?

And just forget about making steel or aluminum with energy from alcohol. There is energy used in every step of the process for everything that gets produced.

Force a low-density energy source on the economy, and watch it go back to pre-1900 levels. Because that's what they had then. They broke out of their condition and created an industrial revolution that raised the standard of living of mankind beyond anything before in history, mainly by lowering the cost of energy. The society that resulted from an industrial economy then raised a generation of brats who figure they can destroy the basis of their civilization without it affecting them.

Watch as the exodus of manufacturing from the U.S. continues ....