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#11
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Nothing good about Ethanol
"Denny" wrote: The bottom line is that at the moment producing Ethanol from corn wastes more energy than it makes according to experts. Well, use some rational thinking... We grow corn to make alcohol... What does the tractor that plowed and planted the field burn? diesel mostly What do the fertilizer and pesticides put on the field come from? petroleum base What does the combine that harvests the field burn? gas or diesel What does the truck that takes the corn to the local elevator burn? diesel or gas What does the train that moves the corn to market burn? diesel What does the electric motor(s) at the alcohol plant get the current from - and ditto the lights, air conditioners, furnaces, etc? (natural gas mostly) What do the employees at the alcohol plant burn to get there for work each day? gas mostly Where does the heat to distill the mash come from? natural gas What does the truck burn to take the alcohol to the gasoline terminal? diesel Those kinds of questions also apply to the exploration for and extraction of oil, the transportation and refining of crude, and the transportaton of gasoline. It takes energy to make energy; this is not news. Also, gasoline has enormous hidden costs related to our (U. S.) international efforts, military and otherwise, to maintain the security of imported oil sources. The question is: what are the real figures on energy margin recovery for ethanol? I can find a lot of hand-waving pro and con, but I'm having trouble locating any scientific/economic study that seems objective and trustworthy. [snip] Anyway, those of you who favor alcohol explain to me how burning alcohol reduces oil imports... Amen. -- Dan 'Gut feeling' Intestinologists concur that the human gut does not contain any rational thoughts. What the human gut *is* full of is moderately well known. |
#12
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Nothing good about Ethanol
You pilots putting auto gas in your planes need to think again, carefully. Not much thinking required, you *MUST* now test each and every load of fuel for the presence of ethanol before you put it in your plane. Ethanol free autogas is geting much harder to find. And it is certainly not labeled at the pump anymore like it used to be. |
#13
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Nothing good about Ethanol
Dan Luke wrote: "180pilot" wrote: The bottom line is that at the moment producing Ethanol from corn wastes more energy than it makes according to experts. I ain't got a dog in this fight, but any time I read a sentence like that, my bs meter starts to twitch. What experts? Employed by whom? What are their qualifications? What peer-reviewed studies did they publish? Coincidently, yesterday the latest Car and Driver arrived in my mailbox with a long article summarizing the case against ethanol pretty succinctly -- it quotes several studies including a meta study done by the University of California. It might be worth picking one up at the newsstand if this issue really interests you. I checked their website, the article isn't up there yet. One thing I learned is that one reason car makers love E85 is that it gives them a bonus on the CAFE standards. Only the gasoline that is burned counts, which means they get to multiply the gas mileage of an E85 car by 7 (1/0.15)when computing its contribution to fleet average MPG. This was estimated be with $200 million a year to GM alone. Damn, everywhere you look with ethanol, there's a subsidy or preference of some sort involved, isn't there? |
#14
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Nothing good about Ethanol
B A R R Y wrote:
RST Engineering wrote: The ethanol is blended with the gasoline right at the tanker truck. I heard an interview on a financial show a few weeks back that had an oil company executive telling a completely different story. He explained that plants and storage facilities needed certain parts and seals changed to switch from MTBE laced gas to a gas / alcohol blend. Which explains why the blending is done at the truck instead of the plant. Could this be a regional thing? You think it could take a while to shut down a plant and do the conversions required? -- Jim Pennino Remove .spam.sux to reply. |
#15
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Nothing good about Ethanol
Dan Luke wrote:
What experts? Employed by whom? What are their qualifications? What peer-reviewed studies did they publish? Think about it logically. Besides, in order to be "energy independent" with Ethanol alone, we would haqve to plant corn on every arcre of farmland in this country.... forget growing any actual food. Ethanol is a pipe dream, and except as an additive to boost octane it is not cost efective. |
#16
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Nothing good about Ethanol
Exactly. But it makes dumb people *feel* good so lets do it.
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#17
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Nothing good about Ethanol
("xyzzy" wrote)
One thing I learned is that one reason car makers love E85 is that it gives them a bonus on the CAFE standards. Only the gasoline that is burned counts, which means they get to multiply the gas mileage of an E85 car by 7 (1/0.15)when computing its contribution to fleet average MPG. This was estimated be with $200 million a year to GM alone. Simple enough to correct - call it Fuel Mileage. Montblack |
#18
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Nothing good about Ethanol
ktbr wrote:
Exactly. But it makes dumb people *feel* good so lets do it. Right up there with the "safety" aspects of vehicles with tendencies to roll over and terrible panic maneuver habits? Let the marketeers roll... G |
#19
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Nothing good about Ethanol
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#20
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Nothing good about Ethanol
ktbr wrote: Think about it logically. Besides, in order to be "energy independent" with Ethanol alone, we would haqve to plant corn on every arcre of farmland in this country.... forget growing any actual food. Bah, we've got millions of acres here in Montana, any wheat producing state will, that are not farmed right now because it won't support sweet corn. But it will grow the field corn that you use to produce ethanol quite nicely. |
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