I understand your position. I still contend however that even if Ethanol was totally efficient. To the point even of 10% in and 90% out, that our country, as in "Land mass" that can remain fertile and productive, can't sustain the amount of produce (Whatever type used) required to satisfy ethanol requirements for the entire country.

Currently, 93 MILLION acres of corn is grown a year to handle ethanol and food products. Yet, that only makes up approximately 1% of our fuel requirements. To plant enought corn, sugar beet, switchgrass, etc... required to make our country 100% self sufficient and fossil fuel independent, would take more land and water than we have to use. We already have water issues.

The USA is roughly 3.7 Million sq Miles. Thats about 2.3 Billion Acres. Now granted, that means only between 4-5% of the land mass is used for growing corn. But simple math shows that if you only grew corn, which currently only does 1% of our fuel, it would require 100X more planting than doing now. That means 400-500% of our land mass. Even with better produce to make ethanol, if you could get 5 times the efficiency that corn does, it would still require 80-100% of our land mass. Where are people and cities suppose to be. let alone the fact that a large portion of our country is desert and can't grow anything. Hell, you could find some form of ethanol production that is 20 times more efficient than corn, and you would still need 20-25% of our country's land mass to grow it. Sorry, but it can't be done.

Then, to top it off, these numbers don't even consider the fact that the majority of our ethanol production currently is for E10. That means that 90% of most gas is still fossile fuel. Even if it was 100% towards E85, that's still 15% still using fossil fuels.

Forget EVERYTHING else about the debate on ethanol vs oil. Our country can't grow enough of ANYTHING to produce the amount of ethanol we would consume. Hell, the planet couldn't do it for the entire world. If we could grow that much food, we could end world hunger and fix a lot of other problems.

Ethanol is not a band-aid. It's a waste of time and money. Any money being used towards ethanol production is strictly for political reasons. That money should go towards other sources of energy that doesn't destroy the earth and water, and is self perpetuating. Wind, Solar, Hydro, Nuclear, etc.... Ethanol is NOT a renewable form of energy. The soil does die off and artificially keeping it alive will only work for so long. We don't have the soil/land or water to do that. Later... Mike....

 

I completely agree with you that there will never be enough corn to supply enough ethanol to displace that much gasoline. Ethanol can be had from other sources, though. There is a professor here who is working on developing a fast growing plant to use to make cellulose based ethanol. Sorry I don't have a link, but I think it's on the NC State website as a news release or something to that effect. These other sources may or may not be able to supply any more ethanol than now, but if we were to write off ethanol entirely, we would never know if there are any better ways (and various sources) to produce ethanol. Hate it if you want to, but try to be patient with the research...

The only large scale source of free energy we have is solar or derivatives of solar, such as wind. Nuclear is not without its problems too, mainly, what to do with the waste...

 

FREE???!!?!?!?!?!

If you're referring to $$$$ free, you are forgetting the astronomical costs of initial purchase.

 

The energy is free, it's just the infrastructure that co$t $$$.

But in any case, I don't think the cost in general is astronomical.

 

The problem with any type of ethanol, is that it requires land to grow it on. Water to feed it. Processing to turn it into ethanol. Unless there is some type of plant that can produce at least 50 TIMES more ethanol than corn "LITERALLY", we don't have the land and water for it. Even at 50 TIMES more ethanol than corn, that would take about 200,000,000 acreas (Twice whats being used now) to satisfy the need. That equates to about 10% of all of our land in the country. When you take out the cities; residential areas; national and state forests and parks; deserts; and all other areas that can be used to grow this mystical plant that produces 50 times more ethanol than corn, we still don't have the land or water to do it. Why waste so much time and money on this? It's stupid.

Use the money towards improving the electrical power grid with more hydro, solar, wind, and nuclear. (If the U.S. Navy can have ships last more than 20 years on nuclear and safely dispose of the waste, so can our power plants). Nuclear energy technology has come a long way. Unfortunately people don't move as fast as technology. They are still afraid of it. Then again, these are the same people that listen to Jiffy-Lube and bring their cars in for an oil change every 3000 miles. Even though the manufacturer, manual, oil companies, etc... all show almost twice that.

Anyway, that's the real problem. Too many people letting the government tell them what is good instead of them learning it for themselves. Then the other group thinking that "Doing Something" is better than doing nothing. This attitude has caused more problems throughout mankind's history. This idea of a band-aid type temp solution is such a waste of resources. Figure out your long rang goal and work backwards from there. Later... Mike....

 

Solar-electric system: $100,000.
Time to payoff in electric bill savings: 30 years.
Projected lifespan of system: 20 years. (Just a little bit short of what it needs to be IMO)

http://www.jc-solarhomes.com/solar_energy_facts.htm

 

Good discussion. I hope that it will solve the energy shortage.

The universe has untapped energy. Just 1 sun could power a truck for a few years.

 

In terms of waste or pollution, the sun is the only source of energy that does not create either. Sure, harnessing that energy takes money, as does harnessing the energy from anything else.

Sure, nuclear is a reliable source of energy, and I'm not afraid of it (there's a nuclear power plant about 30 miles from where I live). The problem is what do you do with the waste? Disposal might be safe now, but what about that storage location in a hundred years? Will it still be safe then? Nuclear waste is toxic for quite a long time.

I guess that we'll just have to agree to disagree about ethanol and its feasibility. The trick is not trying to grow stuff all over our land, but to find ways to make ethanol from materials we already have. Pretty much anything can be fermented to make ethanol, it's just a matter of finding an economical way to do so. I'm sure when nuclear power was first introduced, there were plenty of nay-sayers who were fighting just as hard against nuclear as you are against ethanol. I've said it before and I'll say it again, ethanol is not some magical wonder that will save us from all our dependence on oil. But it may help offset a little bit of its use. The only way it can happen economically, as you have pointed out many times, is to be able to produce it efficiently and without harm to the environment, and to be able to harness a high percentage of its stored energy when burned. Current production methods and flex fuel vehicles are certainly not optimal, nor am I claiming them to be. I'll keep researching, you keep preaching against it--I'm perfectly fine with that. Have a great day.

 

If you want pollution free energy, then we should all have wind driven compressors and large air tanks. Our vehicles should be driven by compressed air. It would not be hard to make a vehicle that would get you a 200 mile range, filling up at home or at an "air" station (also wind powered).

 

Mike, living in Wyoming has its advantages. In every large city, and many whole states, the EPA has mandated that all gas be E10 at least for the 6 'winter' months. Here in CO, we have E10 all year. We have no alternative to purchase 'real' gas, inless we drive to Cheyenne every few days, which has its own negative financial impact. You've only escaped impact because there aren't enough cars in Wyoming for the EPA to particularly care yet, but they will before long...

 

Please provide some numbers (energy balance) that show it would "not be hard" to get 200 mile range on compressed air. Look at how poor the range is burning compressed natural gas (CH4, methane at 3600psi in tanks that take up much of the usable space. That energy is from carbon and hydrogen, not from the pressure itself. The energy density is just not there with a compressed gas.

Jim

 

Christcorp, you said that you are getting 11 mpg tops in your '94? Something is wrong with your truck. My '96 also has the 460 in it and before I did any modifying to it I was clocking 14 mpg.

I know that this has nothing to do with ethanol but I had to add my 2 cents worth. Come over to my thread "fuel mileage" and see what I have done to my truck so far and my plans for future mods.

 

A problem with E10 is the fact that they usually start out with really crappy gas in the first place. The octane rating of the base gas before the addition of ethanol is about 84-85, and after the addition of ethanol will bring it up to a minimum rating of 87. This is a fact as told to me by a local fuel supplier and thier driver also confirmed this. The Shell station south of town used to sell 86, 87, 89 and 91 octane rated gas(the 86 was .02 cheaper than the 87), and I only used the 86 once-Got Pinging? Wow-my timing must have de-rated about 5 degrees. So don't blame the ethanol for lost mileage-a 10% blend shouldn't even matter. I get 16 mpg combined city/highway on E85 in my truck, and 30 mpg in my 97 Escort with 130,000 miles on it with a 50/50 blend gas/E85.

 

Octane rating has nothing to do with "Crappy" gas. Matter of fact, octane rating has nothing to do with the quality of the gas at all. Unfortunately, too many people think that if they use the highest octane rating available, that someone they are going to get better performance, mileage, etc... This is partially true, but not because higher octane is somehow a higher quality gasoline.

Putting it simply; Octane rating is the point of COMPRESSION at which the gasoline will IGNITE. Without explaining the formula; just pretend for a second that the octane number is the amount of pressure the gasoline can handle. (It's not, just using that for illustration purposes). A typical car will have approximately an 8:1 compression ratio. Let's assume that the 87 octane can handle that. If the compression ration of the car is 9.5:1; they may be too much compression for the 87 octane gasoline. That means the gas will IGNITE BECAUSE OF THE COMPRESSION instead of with the spark plug. That is what causes knocking. So, you move up to an octane of 89 which can handle say a compression ratio up to 10:1. Then, for the super high compression ration cars that go over 10:1, you would use the 91 octane. Because it is less combustible at a higher compression.

So, use the lowest octane rating your car will run on. If the owner's manual says 87, that is fine. Oh, FWIW; there are some states that are high altitude like wyoming that have 85-86 octane. Because of the much THINNER AIR MIXTURE, the compression ratio changes and you can use gas that is more combustible under pressure.

As for the ethanol; straight ethanol on it's own has an octane rating of about 110 or higher. Because of that, you have to mix it with a LOWER than 87 octane in order to bring it back to 87. If the straight gas started at 87, even at 10% ethanol, you've have an octane rating of approximately 89-90.

So, for anyone who cared to hear this; the octane rating of gasoline has nothing to do with whether the gas is crap or not. Gas is crap if they put in bad additives, water/condensation gets into the supply, and a number of other things. But not the octane or it's rating. And they have to start with a gas octane of 84-85 or they'd never get gas to 87. BUY THE LOWEST OCTANE YOUR CAR CAN HANDLE. IT"S THE CHEAPEST. (Not to be confused with cheap gasoline that is crap). Each car has it's octane rating use. If the car is correctly tunes, the octane rating is good. If the timing is off (Usually the problem) or somehow the engine has a HIGHER COMPRESSION RATIO because it was rebuilt or for another reason; then would you have to go to a higher octane than recommended by the manufacturer.

 

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