Ethanol future?

[ASU2003]

Is E85 really that great? There are some concerns that people are rising that make it look like the corn farmers (in the red states) are trying to get this pushed forward. But, is this really the best idea? I know that Brazil has a bunch of E85 cars, but the amount of corn that it would take and the conversion of our cars would take up a lot of land and money.

Making ethanol, they claim, will help America achieve the elusive goal of "energy security" while helping farmers, reducing oil imports, and stimulating the American economy. But will ethanol significantly reduce our oil imports? Will adding more ethanol to our gas tanks lead to further price hikes at the pump? And will it take more energy to produce a gallon of ethanol than it actually contains?

I can understand why the Republicans like it, it means more money for big business. The Democrats like it because the farmer gets a pay raise from the price of corn going up. Plus both parties like it because it will reduce foreign countries influence over us.

Here is something I found on-line:

The two scientists calculated all the fuel inputs for ethanol production—from the diesel fuel for the tractor planting the corn, to the fertilizer put in the field, to the energy needed at the processing plant—and found that ethanol is a net energy-loser. According to their calculations, ethanol contains about 76,000 BTUs per gallon, but producing that ethanol from corn takes about 98,000 BTUs. For comparison, a gallon of gasoline contains about 116,000 BTUs per gallon. But making that gallon of gas—from drilling the well, to transportation, through refining—requires around 22,000 BTUs. They determined that making ethanol from switch grass requires 50 percent more fossil energy than the ethanol yields, wood biomass 57 percent more, and sunflowers 118 percent more. The best yield comes from soybeans, but they, too, are a net loser, requiring 27 percent more fossil energy than the biodiesel fuel produced.

Michael Wang, a scientist at the Energy Dept.-funded Argonne National Laboratory for Transportation Research, says "The energy used for each unit of ethanol produced has been reduced by about half [since 1980]." Now, Wang says, the delivery of 1 million British thermal units (BTUs) of ethanol uses 0.74 million BTUs of fossil fuels. (That does not include the solar energy -- the sun shining -- used in growing corn.) By contrast, he finds that the delivery of 1 million BTUs of gasoline requires 1.23 million BTU of fossil fuels.

I do think something needs to be done, but getting the car makers, filling stations(if they are needed), consumers (don't want to buy girly cars), and the government to switch from gasoline will take the perfect idea it seems like.

On a side note, I'm sure I will see a ton of advertisements for ethanol at the Indy 500 this year. The Indy cars run on it now, so people will see that it can power cars at high speeds.

[shakran]

Originally Posted by ASU2003

Making ethanol, they claim, will help America achieve the elusive goal of "energy security" while helping farmers, reducing oil imports, and stimulating the American economy.

Empty claims. We can't grow enough corn to make enough ethanol to put a significant dent in the fuel imports. We'd have to import the ethanol as well, thus removing the energy security we're supposedly gaining with it.

But will ethanol significantly reduce our oil imports?

No, not until 1) ethanol can be made efficiently and 2) all cars can run reliably on ethanol. Even then, with a 20-30% gas blend (e85 is often closer to 70% in the winter) we're still importing a LOT of oil.

Will adding more ethanol to our gas tanks lead to further price hikes at the pump?

It already has. The cost to upgrade the infrastructure to be able to store and pump ethanol, and the cost of making yet another specialty fuel blend, has already driven gas prices up.

And will it take more energy to produce a gallon of ethanol than it actually contains?

Yes. Especially since farmers in the midwest are now using ethanol in their vehicles. So right off the top, we have to remove however much ethanol they use to grow the corn. Then we have to factor in transportation costs of getting the corn to the ethanol plant, costs to actually MAKE the ethanol, and costs to transport the ethanol to the gas pumps (this is higher than transporting regular gas because ethanol can't be shipped via pipeline like gas can).

I can understand why the Republicans like it, it means more money for big business. The Democrats like it because the farmer gets a pay raise from the price of corn going up. Plus both parties like it because it will reduce foreign countries influence over us.

Well you were right on the first two, but you're a little off base in your third hypothesis. Both parties like ethanol becaue the public has been fooled into thinking it's a good thing. If the public THINKS it's a good thing the politicians will push it so that the public will vote for them.

I do think something needs to be done, but getting the car makers, filling stations(if they are needed), consumers (don't want to buy girly cars), and the government to switch from gasoline will take the perfect idea it seems like.

I agree with you that something needs to be done. In my mind it's pretty stupid, however, to rush new fuels to market when they're not ready for it. Look what's happening in Iowa. Lawmakers are trying to get that state to require a 20% ethanol blend in all their gas, even though GM has come out and specifically said that if your car is not a flex-fuel vehicle, any concentration of ethanol higher than 10% will corrode the fuel system. It's insane that Iowa is trying to destroy its citizens cars, but they're doing it because that's what the public wants them to do, and the public wants them to do it because the ethanol industry, in a PR campaign that rivals anything the Republicans or Democrats can do, has managed to convince people that ethanol is a great fuel.

And that's not even going into the fact that ethanol is not the wonderful enviro-fuel it's touted to be. In the first place, one of the chief sources for dangerous poisons and pesticides is a farmer's field. Grow more corn, and you'll need more pesticides, fertilizers, etc. This is bad for the environment. In the second place it's not at all uncommon for ethanol plants to be in violation of already lax EPA pollution standards.

The whole alternative fuels issue is screwed up. Ethanol MIGHT be a viable fuel in the future when we learn how to refine it more efficiently, but today it's simply not ready for prime time.

But we don't want to only blame ethanol. GM and others are also busy making hydrogen cars, because the oil industry (I'll explain in a second) has convinced the public that hydrogen is a great future fuel. Well maybe, but not until we figure out how to get the pure hydrogen without expending more energy than we get from the fuel.

And to explain, the oil industry is behind hydrogen 100% because a good source of hydrogen is methane. Methane is very easy to extract - easier than oil in fact - and it's found in oil wells. Methane is also more expensive than oil. So basically they've got all these pre-drilled methane wells just waiting to be tapped into, and the oil industry stands to make a killing on them.

On a side note, I'm sure I will see a ton of advertisements for ethanol at the Indy 500 this year. The Indy cars run on it now, so people will see that it can power cars at high speeds.

Of course it can. Any fuel can make a car go as fast as you want, as long as you design the engine to use the fuel to its fullest. Race cars run on 100 octane or higher gas. E85 is about 105 octane, so that's pretty close to race gas. Race cars can run easilly on that without a performance drop. Most regular cars, however, make the most power using 87-89 octane. Give 'em 105 octane and their power output will drop, and their mileage will suffer. This is confirmed by the ethanol industry. They say it's worth it because E85 costs less per gallon than regular gas does, but they fail to mention the major subsidies/tax breaks that ethanol gets, including the 50 cents/gallon federal blend tax credit.

Long story short? Ethanol is and always has been a huge scam foisted on a gullible public by special interest corn farmers. The industry cannot survive without government subsidies, which it has been enjoying for over 20 years. Unless MAJOR technologial developments happen, it will not help us achieve energy independence, it will not ease the gas prices, and it will not save the planet.

Now don't get me wrong. If those major technological developments happen and ethanol is 1) efficient to make, 2) cheaper than gas and 3) helps protect nature, I'll be wildly behind it. But it's asinine to force it on the public until it reaches that point.

[cybersharp]

Shakran speaks good sense to me.

[stevo]

After reading this thread I went off to read the news and look who I see.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20060523/...inton_energy_2

Sen. Clinton Pitches Ethanol Energy Plan
By DEVLIN BARRETT, Associated Press Writer
1 hour, 32 minutes ago

WASHINGTON - Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton will call for cutting U.S. dependence on foreign oil by 8 million barrels a day by the year 2025 — a goal she says can be met with more ethanol-based fuel and a $50 billion fund for new energy research.

Clinton, D-N.Y., who is up for re-election this year and is also a potential 2008 presidential candidate, is to outline her energy goals in a speech Tuesday morning.

"No longer can we all pass the buck and blame things beyond our control. It's time for everyone, from the president and our oil companies to each of us, to adopt a virtual revolution in our thinking about energy and act on what we now know," Clinton's prepared remarks said.

The senator is to urge a combination of government tax incentives, private investment, and new research to cut the consumption of foreign oil in half by 2025, or by nearly 8 million barrels a day.

Republicans immediately attacked Clinton's proposal, noting that she had voted against drilling for oil in the Arctic Wildlife Refuge and against some of President Bush's other energy expansion proposals.

"Senator Clinton's energy policy consists of a unique balancing act involving partisanship, political pandering and yesterday's mistakes," said Tracey Schmitt, press secretary for the Republican National Committee. "Voting against meaningful legislation that would increase domestic production is harmful enough, but adopting the energy policies of the 1970s is a price Americans cannot afford."

Clinton is calling for the creation of a $50 billion "Strategic Energy Fund" paid for by increased profits of the big oil companies. She had urged the creation of such a fund last fall when hurricane damage in the Gulf Coast sent the price of gas soaring.

She is also calling for a massive expansion of ethanol, a corn-based fuel additive and substitute, which is currently only available at a small percentage of gas stations in the United States.

President Bush and other elected officials have called for a greater expansion of E-85, a fuel made of 85 percent ethanol that can be used in vehicles built to run on both regular unleaded gasoline and E-85.

Clinton's speech calls for accelerating the spread of E-85 to half of the nation's gas stations by 2015 by offering a 50 percent tax credit for station owners who install ethanol pumps.

Ethanol is also a popular political cause in midwestern corn states like Iowa, which plays a key early role in the presidential primary process.

Politicians will sell us anything they think we'll buy.

[ObieX]

This "ethanol future" should already be our present. There really is no reason why this should not have gone foward years ago. There's so many stupid things preventing us from doing it though and it needs to stop. I'm also rather sure that most of the cars around today are already able to use ethanol mix fuels.

If people are worried that our farmers aren't gonna be able to make enough of the product needed for ethanol.. well.. there's an entire world out there. Most of the world has been trying to get us to buy its farmed products for decades but the US taxes the hell out of it to give a boost to our own farmers. Thats a whole world of cheap corn and other products that is being forcibly kept out of our country that we could be using to help it.

If the US was really serious about Ethanol.. why not drop the tariff on it? The ethanol tariff is FIFTY-FOUR CENTS A GALLON (yes thats right.. 54 cents a gallon.) Keeping that just proves that people would rather continue to pad the pockets of the current oil giants and they don't give a flying fuck about our oil addiction other than seeing that it continues.

[kutulu]

Then we have to factor in transportation costs of getting the corn to the ethanol plant, costs to actually MAKE the ethanol, and costs to transport the ethanol to the gas pumps (this is higher than transporting regular gas because ethanol can't be shipped via pipeline like gas can).

The farmers don't HAVE to use harmful pesticides. Also, tf the country gets serious about E85 they can always build piplelines. There are no fluid properties that make ethanol unfit for pipeline transport.

[shakran]

Originally Posted by ObieX

There really is no reason why this should not have gone foward years ago. (snip) I'm also rather sure that most of the cars around today are already able to use ethanol mix fuels.

Read the entire thread and you'll see why you're not correct here.


If people are worried that our farmers aren't gonna be able to make enough of the product needed for ethanol.. well.. there's an entire world out there. [/quote]

According to Cornell University agricultralist David Pimetal, we'd need to use about 97% of the land in the United States to grow enough corn to fuel all the cars on ethanol. That leaves 3% left over for food, roads, and buildings. It's simply not doable.

Most of the world has been trying to get us to buy its farmed products for decades but the US taxes the hell out of it to give a boost to our own farmers. Thats a whole world of cheap corn and other products that is being forcibly kept out of our country that we could be using to help it.

So let me get this straight. You want to gain US energy independence by buying our energy's raw materials from other countries? Isn't that kinda what we're already doing with oil?

If the US was really serious about Ethanol.. why not drop the tariff on it? The ethanol tariff is FIFTY-FOUR CENTS A GALLON (yes thats right.. 54 cents a gallon.)

Well the US Ethanol industry (which by the way gets a federal tax CREDIT of 50 cents per gallon) is not on your side on that one. This, btw, further proves that the ethanol industry is out to make a buck, NOT save the planet or make a better gas.

Keeping that just proves that people would rather continue to pad the pockets of the current oil giants and they don't give a flying fuck about our oil addiction other than seeing that it continues.

If that's the case then why is the ethanol industry in FAVOR of the tariffs?

Originally Posted by kutulu

The farmers don't HAVE to use harmful pesticides. Also, tf the country gets serious about E85 they can always build piplelines. There are no fluid properties that make ethanol unfit for pipeline transport.

There is no way to farm corn without doing damage to the environment. Fertilizer runoffs cause algae blooms in lakes. Failure to use harmful pesticides means a greatly reduced crop. Corn displaces a crapload of soil.

And the fluid property that makes ethanol unfit for pipeline transport is that it absorbs water and gas does not. That means we can't use current pipelines, which allow water to collect in them. We have to build new pipelines. If you feel like paying for that by higher gas prices, that's fine, but doesn't that defeat the purported purpose of ethanol?

[ObieX]

Originally Posted by shakran

Read the entire thread and you'll see why you're not correct here.

Spend a couple bucks and upgrade your car. It really isnt that expensive.

According to Cornell University agricultralist David Pimetal, we'd need to use about 97% of the land in the United States to grow enough corn to fuel all the cars on ethanol. That leaves 3% left over for food, roads, and buildings. It's simply not doable.

That is where the corn and sugar from other countries comes in.

So let me get this straight. You want to gain US energy independence by buying our energy's raw materials from other countries? Isn't that kinda what we're already doing with oil?

Let me put it this way. There's all taht material out there that is extremely cheap that can easily be used to help our country. People don't want it because farmers here think it will put them out of hte job.. when ti wont.. because as you have already said they cant support what we would need.. thus you would need to go someplace else. If we cant grow enough product here we can simply look someplace else where it is much much cheaper.

If the US is going to be dependant on others for energy (and it will ALWAYS BE DEPENDANT ON OTHERS.. and not just for energy) I'd rather we depend on the farmers who work for their living instead of rich power-hungry dictatorial tyrants.

Well the US Ethanol industry (which by the way gets a federal tax CREDIT of 50 cents per gallon) is not on your side on that one. This, btw, further proves that the ethanol industry is out to make a buck, NOT save the planet or make a better gas.

Yes, the poorly structured, still in the infancy stage, ethanol industry in the US gets a tax credit. In the mean time the fully developed ethanol industries in other countries that want to send their product to our country get the tariff.

If that's the case then why is the ethanol industry in FAVOR of the tariffs?

US industry is always in favor if them because they have it worse here than other companies in other countries do... you're right about US industry being out for a buck tho.. i mean.. why work if you're not gonna make a buck?

And i think its more the oil industry that wants the tariffs. And if the US ethanol industry does as well then you're right. its due to cash. Solve the problem by getting the good cheaper from someplace else.

There is no way to farm corn without doing damage to the environment. Fertilizer runoffs cause algae blooms in lakes. Failure to use harmful pesticides means a greatly reduced crop. Corn displaces a crapload of soil.

You can make ethanol from a variety of sources.. not just corn. There are also thousands of different ways to raise a crop without pesticides.. and the quality of your crop doesnt matter as much with making ethanol because you're not trying to make the corn pretty sopeople will buy it to eat.. you'remaking it to ship to a plant to be preocessed. It doesn't have to win any beauty contests.

[shakran]

Originally Posted by ObieX

Spend a couple bucks and upgrade your car. It really isnt that expensive.

That's asinine. The government should not be in the position of forcing me to downgrade my car. The government should not be in the position of forcing me to run my car on a fuel that gets lower mpg, and reduces power output, while not saving me any real money.

That is where the corn and sugar from other countries comes in.

As I mentioned already one of the core arguments for ethanol is that it will supposedly make us energy independent, so other countries can't hurt us at will by dicking around with the fuel supply. If we convert to all ethanol, and then we buy the ethanol raw materials from other countries, we have defeated the purpose. This argument does not make sense. At all.

If the US is going to be dependant on others for energy (and it will ALWAYS BE DEPENDANT ON OTHERS.. and not just for energy) I'd rather we depend on the farmers who work for their living instead of rich power-hungry dictatorial tyrants.

And you think that if we started buying ethanol materials from other countries that those dictatorial rich tyrants wouldn't jump at the chance to screw us over with that?

Yes, the poorly structured, still in the infancy stage, ethanol industry in the US gets a tax credit. In the mean time the fully developed ethanol industries in other countries that want to send their product to our country get the tariff.

I think you're defeating yourself here. You're right. It is poorly structured. And it's in the infancy stage. Only trouble is, it's been that way for over <b>twenty years</b>. Exactly how long should we give this industry before we finally cut it off life support?

You can make ethanol from a variety of sources.. not just corn.

that's true, but the majority of the US ethanol industry is fed by corn.

There are also thousands of different ways to raise a crop without pesticides.. and the quality of your crop doesnt matter as much with making ethanol because you're not trying to make the corn pretty sopeople will buy it to eat

No but you're trying to grow high-sugar corn so you get 8% ethanol yield. Unfortunately animals tend to really like high sugar foods, so you have to keep them away somehow. Scarecrows don't work real well. Hence, the pesticides. Why don't you suggest to us a way that you can grow corn, with no pesticides, and get the <b>same yield</b> as you would growing it the normal way.

[host]

Did anyone catch this guy, Vinod Khosla on NBC Dateline, earlier this month?

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/12676374/
A simple solution to pain at the pump?
Greener and cheaper, ethanol could fuel rural America — and won't feed Mideast terrorism

By Stone Phillips
Anchor
Dateline NBC
Updated: 6:40 p.m. ET May 7, 2006

.....At age 51, Vinod Khosla is one of the world’s most successful venture capitalists and a self-made multibillionaire.

He came to the U.S. from India in 1976, and over the next 25 years, is said to have created six new jobs for every day he’d been in the country. Though not a household name, Khosla was a co-founder of Sun Microsystems and renowned in business circles for his meticulous research and ability to spot the kind of innovative technology that can revolutionize an industry.

Three years ago, he turned his attention to alternative fuels.........

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/12713171/
• May 11, 2006 | 9:59 a.m. ET

Is an ethanol revolution coming? (Stone Phillips, Dateline anchor)

Dateline
In Brazil, in one of the sugar cane fields that help the country produce ethanol.
Before I started working on this story, I was one of those Americans who thought ethanol was that fad fuel from the 1970's that never caught on. In fact, the ethanol industry produced 4 billion gallons of corn ethanol last year and expects to top 5 billion gallons in 2006. Much of this ethanol is being used to boost the octane rating in our gasoline. (Adding more ethanol to the blend is how premium gasoline is made.)

But the talk now is of shifting from ethanol as an additive, to ethanol as a replacement for petroleum-based fuel. And the person who may know more about the business, technology and potential of ethanol than anyone else in the country says making that shift is "brain dead simple." Vinod Khosla is a venture capitalist, a bio-medical engineer and an ethanol evangelist, who's been briefing political and business......

http://bioconversion.blogspot.com/20...khosla-on.html
Thursday, May 11, 2006
MSNBC Dateline: Vinod Khosla on Cellulosic Ethanol

............But that’s only part of it. To really make America an ethanol nation, Khosla says billions of gallons will come from something as common as prairie grass. He says it’ll be much cheaper and deliver 10 times the energy it takes to make it.

As for the expense, Khosla estimates it would cost about $15 to 20 million to offer ethanol pumps at a thousand gas stations in California.

Khosla: We need to make sure that the major oil companies don’t manipulate the price of oil enough to drive ethanol out of business.

Phillips: Do you believe oil companies would deliberately drop the price of oil?

Khosla: Absolutely. A senior executive of a major oil company came up to me and said, “Be careful.” In a very warning tone he said, “Be careful, we can drop the price of gasoline.”

It sounds great....ethanol from prarie grasses. The challenges will be to ramp up volume and production efficiency, and to do it while oil swings....possibly wildly....in price.

The domestic ehtanol "industry" currently produces 5 billion gallons of the fuel annually. The U.S. imports 14 million barrels, or....560 million gallons of petroleum equivalents....per day. The U.S. produces an addtional 7 million barrels, or 280 million gallons of petroleum equivalents daily.

Current U.S. annual ethanol production is equal to less than ten days of imported petroleum consumption, and less than six days of total U.S. consumption of petroleum equivalents (6 x 840 million gallons = 5.04 billion gallons.)

If oil prices were to drop below the break even point of ethanol's production costs....even for a few months...the ethanol production "ramp up" would stumble....and seed money would evaporate.....just as it did every other time that it started to make economic sense to invest heavily in production of alternative energy sources. The heaviest cost burden is always during the initial investment phase....when not enough volume and efficiency has been achieved for output to convincingly produce "payback" profits.

Private enterprise will face the ramp up risks without much help from the bankrupted federal government. Ironically, the money spent in Iraq and in doubling expenditures on the military between 2001 and 2007, would have been more wisely spent on grants and incentives to produce enough domestic alternative energy manufacturing ventures to render petroleum a less strategically and politically charged......or vital, commodity. Now....I don't see that it is possible. We will, instead, ride the paper dollar to a near zero valuation...spending it to purchase foreign oil until no foreign oil producer will accept it in exchange. The bloated, overpriced military will either use all of it's "new toys" to take the foreign energy that our country can no longer afford to buy....or it will grind to a halt and rust on the ground or tied up at the pier.
I sadly predict that a lot more blood than ethanol will flow in our future!

[ObieX]

Originally Posted by shakran

That's asinine. The government should not be in the position of forcing me to downgrade my car. The government should not be in the position of forcing me to run my car on a fuel that gets lower mpg, and reduces power output, while not saving me any real money.

Come up with something better.

As I mentioned already one of the core arguments for ethanol is that it will supposedly make us energy independent, so other countries can't hurt us at will by dicking around with the fuel supply. If we convert to all ethanol, and then we buy the ethanol raw materials from other countries, we have defeated the purpose. This argument does not make sense. At all.

Those who think the US will ever be independant when it comes to energy are fooling themselves.

As i said.. the problem with the way things work now is that most of the gas coems from places where the government is questionable and taking allt he oil for its own greedy ends. If you go ethanol you'll be helping the little guy. But i guess you're one of those people who would prefer to see people in other countries suffering just so your car can go "vroom vroom" louder as is evident in the first part of this post.

And you think that if we started buying ethanol materials from other countries that those dictatorial rich tyrants wouldn't jump at the chance to screw us over with that?

Paranoid much?

I think you're defeating yourself here. You're right. It is poorly structured. And it's in the infancy stage. Only trouble is, it's been that way for over <b>twenty years</b>. Exactly how long should we give this industry before we finally cut it off life support?

You must have missed the second half of that part that i typed. Ethanol i already well established in many other countries that we are friendly with. We can obtain it easily from them at lower prices .. especially if there were no tariffs. And if that supply isnt enough we can make the rest ourselves with our home-grown plants.. and can import whatever else we need.

The industry hasnt really gotten any attention in the US until very recently.. thats why its still int he building stages. Other countries have been using this stuff for quite a while now. The blame falls on us for not keeping up.

that's true, but the majority of the US ethanol industry is fed by corn.

times change.

No but you're trying to grow high-sugar corn so you get 8% ethanol yield. Unfortunately animals tend to really like high sugar foods, so you have to keep them away somehow. Scarecrows don't work real well. Hence, the pesticides. Why don't you suggest to us a way that you can grow corn, with no pesticides, and get the <b>same yield</b> as you would growing it the normal way.

Why so picky about the yield? And as i said earlier you can import tons of material from other palces for far less money than it will take to produce it here. And saving money is what this is all about, right?

[shakran]

Originally Posted by ObieX

Come up with something better.

Why? What I came up with was good enough. I'm sorry that you have no valid response for that, but your comeback was sub par.

Those who think the US will ever be independant when it comes to energy are fooling themselves.

Yes, I understand that. Which is another example of how the ethanol industry is busy scamming the public.

As i said.. the problem with the way things work now is that most of the gas coems from places where the government is questionable and taking allt he oil for its own greedy ends.

Wow, if that isn't an imperialist American statement I don't know what is. Let's face it. We may not LIKE what the countries who OWN the oil are doing with THEIR oil, but it's THEIR oil. Calling them greedy for profiting off their oil is ridiculous.

Plus a great deal of the profits from gas in this country go to american companies like Exxon/Mobil.

If you go ethanol you'll be helping the little guy. But i guess you're one of those people who would prefer to see people in other countries suffering just so your car can go "vroom vroom" louder as is evident in the first part of this post.

Thank you for analyzing me so ineptly

1) I'm not interested in helping the little guy on the road to economic ruin. What do you think is going to happen when the general public finally figures out that this ethanol thing is total bullshit? They're going to stop buying it. And then all the kajillions of dollars borrowed to build farmer-owned ethanol plants is going to come due, and the plants won't be able to pay it because they can't sell their product. We're looking at the economic destruction of the midwest. It should be quite obvious that this is not good for the country.

2) I never mentioned wanting a loud car. I know you read my post, so that means you're just making crap up. That kind of argument might work on Fark, but it won't fool people here. What I am not interested in is reducing my gas mileage (therefore using MORE FUEL PER MILE) while reducing my power (therefore using EVEN MORE FUEL PER MILE). Why does using more fuel sound like a good idea to you?

Paranoid much?

OK, look. If you want to have an idiot debate, go find another forum. If you want to debate intelligently, then respond with better stuff than this crap. That didn't respond to my very valid point. If you can't come up with a legitimate argument, then don't respond.

You must have missed the second half of that part that i typed. Ethanol i already well established in many other countries that we are friendly with.

what is your point? We used to be friendly with Iraq. Relationships change. If the industry is going to argue that ethanol is important for economic security, then suggesting that we get the ethanol from anywhere BUT the USA is asinine.

We can obtain it easily from them at lower prices .. especially if there were no tariffs. And if that supply isnt enough we can make the rest ourselves with our home-grown plants.. and can import whatever else we need.

you're still skipping the ethanol efficiency issues. Ethanol costs more to produce than gas. Add in the transportation costs to get the ethanol from Brazil or whereever else someone starts making it, and you're gonna be spending a lot of cash on a BS fuel.

The industry hasnt really gotten any attention in the US until very recently.. thats why its still int he building stages. Other countries have been using this stuff for quite a while now. The blame falls on us for not keeping up.

The only countries that can produce ethanol with anything approaching efficiency at this point are equatorial countries, because that's where you grow sugarcane and sugarbeets. I've said before that if the USA manages to figure out a way to make ethanol where we get more energy out of the ethanol than we use producing it, then I'm all for it. But as it stands, that's not the case. Until ethanol is a VIABLE fuel we should not force it on the public. Period.

times change.

What's that supposed to mean? Switchgrass? Good luck getting the corn farmers behind that idea. And if the corn farmers aren't behind it then you can forget the farming states (MN, IA, etc) being behind it because whatever the farmers want, the politicans make sure they get it.

Why so picky about the yield? And as i said earlier you can import tons of material from other palces for far less money than it will take to produce it here. And saving money is what this is all about, right?

Aside from the energy independence issue which I've explained to you many times and really don't feel like typing out again, there is again the farm lobby. If you can figure out a way to get the politicians to get the material from foreign countries, when their voting farm constituents would vote them out of office for doing it, I'm listening.

But aside from saving money, this is supposed to be about finding a fuel that's renewable. If we pump more energy into ethanol than we get out of it, then we are not making a renewable fuel - we are simply wasting another fuel (coal, oil, nuclear, take your pick) in order to make an energy storage medium.

[ObieX]

Originally Posted by shakran

But aside from saving money, this is supposed to be about finding a fuel that's renewable. If we pump more energy into ethanol than we get out of it, then we are not making a renewable fuel - we are simply wasting another fuel (coal, oil, nuclear, take your pick) in order to make an energy storage medium.

What we're talking about is making a renewable fuel yes. But a renewable/cleaner fuel that would mainly be used in cars. Basically something to just power something really big and portable (can't exactly plug it in). What it takes to make that kind of energy doesnt really matter. If you have to use solar power to power the plants to pump out the ethanol to fuel your cars then thats what it takes. Its better than driving around in a coal powered car, for example. Engines are getting better and better at using their fuel as well, so ethanol doesn't need to be as powerful.

Also when it comes to transportation of the ethanol you don't need to use fossil fuels. The transportation of the ethanol takes big trucks.. and you can fill those with biodiesel which you can literally make out of pretty much any type of organic marterial.

So there ya go. renewable fuel.

I don't give a rat's ass about the farmer politick or what it takes to get a senator or member of congress re-elected. I'm talking strategy to get a viable renewable fuel source that doesn't leave us at the whim of every dude with a Napolean Complex.. be he dictator or CEO.

[shakran]

Originally Posted by ObieX

What we're talking about is making a renewable fuel yes. But a renewable/cleaner fuel that would mainly be used in cars. Basically something to just power something really big and portable (can't exactly plug it in). What it takes to make that kind of energy doesnt really matter.

yeah, actually it does. If you pollute more or use more unrenewable energy to make the fuel than you would use or pollute with the fuel you're replacing, then there's no point.

If you have to use solar power to power the plants to pump out the ethanol to fuel your cars then thats what it takes.

Now you're getting on the right track. . .but you're also proving my point. If we got solar plants up and running (and keep in mind that making solar cells is a very pollution-intensive process so you've gotta factor THAT in as well) to fully power the ethanol/biodiesel plants (and assuming we run ALL the shipping of the ethanol on either ethanol or biodiesel) then maybe we'll have something. BUT, we're not there yet, so to force that energy form on the public when it's not doing what the public is being told it is doing, is not only dishonest, but stupid.

Its better than driving around in a coal powered car, for example.

Well. . yeah I suppose. . . but since coal-fired cars are pretty rare, that's not really something we need to worry about.

Engines are getting better and better at using their fuel as well, so ethanol doesn't need to be as powerful.

That's where you're wrong. Yes, it does. Engines are getting better and better at 87-93 octane gasoline. NOT 105 octane ethanol. This is why flex fuel vehicles get worse gas mileage running on E85 than they do running on real gas.

Also when it comes to transportation of the ethanol you don't need to use fossil fuels. The transportation of the ethanol takes big trucks.. and you can fill those with biodiesel which you can literally make out of pretty much any type of organic marterial.

This is true, but then you have to factor in the energy used to produce the fuel used by the trucks, and subtract that from the gained energy side of the equation.

So there ya go. renewable fuel.

Some day, yes, absolutely. Today, not happening.

I don't give a rat's ass about the farmer politick or what it takes to get a senator or member of congress re-elected.

Well, if you want us to start buying biomass for ethanol from foreign countries, you'd better start giving a rat's ass, because it's not happening without the politicians, and they're not gonna do it if it'll blow their chances of getting re-elected.

[ObieX]

Originally Posted by shakran

Well, if you want us to start buying biomass for ethanol from foreign countries, you'd better start giving a rat's ass, because it's not happening without the politicians, and they're not gonna do it if it'll blow their chances of getting re-elected.

As i have said that is not a problem with me (and neither is buying the ethanol strait from other countries who already produce it.) I dont mind allowing other countries to actually develop once we take them off the insane import tariffs we have them on. I don't see any reason to hold the rest of the world back by not doing something like this. The reason many countries are struggling today is because their economies run on farmed goods, and they can't sell their goods to us becuase greedy politicians and farmers in the US want all the cash for themselves. If i were a farmer/farming company and i saw that there was no way in hell i would be able to compete/operate in the market without truckloads of cash from the government i would start thinking there must be a better business to go into.

And if that is what our elected officails do, frankly, its time to find new elected officials. When people pull that crap in my state they just dont recieve my vote the next election. It is unfortunate the rest of america cant wake up and do the same instead of voting for the letter beside someone's name every election.

[shakran]

Originally Posted by ObieX

And if that is what our elected officails do, frankly, its time to find new elected officials. When people pull that crap in my state they just dont recieve my vote the next election. It is unfortunate the rest of america cant wake up and do the same instead of voting for the letter beside someone's name every election.

But that's exactly my point. In states like Iowa and Minnesota, farmers have a major influence over politicians. Some politicians have mostly farmers as their constituents. So it really is a case of the politicians doing what the majority of their people want. That's really what they're supposed to do, so it's really hard to fault them, even though it might irritate non-farmers.