Tech Stuff: Ethanol Promises. Farm-raising our own energy independence: Could it happen?

Car And Driver ^ | July 2006 | PATRICK BEDARD

[newgeezer]

Tech Stuff: Ethanol Promises	1   2   3   4   5   6   7
Farm-raising our own energy independence: Could it happen? BY PATRICK BEDARD July 2006

You will be hosing ethanol into your gas tank. You will. It’s the law.

The 551-page Energy Policy Act of 2005, signed last August, includes many sops to a blur of special interests, but one single provision rang the bell for automakers, greenies, and farmers, and for a broad coalition of ordinary motorists who were hoping for something, anything, to bring down gasoline prices; starting in 2006, the average gallon of “gas” will contain 2.78-percent ethanol.

Congress has made to the petroleum industry an offer it can’t refuse. It’s called a mandate.

And it’s a mandate that keeps on giving, at least to the farm states, as it ratchets up the ethanol quota, nearly doubling it over the next six years — from 4.0-billion gallons in 2006 to 7.5-billion in 2012.

The idea is simple: Use ethanol as the gasoline equivalent of Hamburger Helper. The nation will stretch more miles out of every barrel we import from, as the President says, “unstable parts of the world.” It’s hardly the “energy independence” we’ve been promised for 30 years, but it’s a baby step in that direction.

Or is it? We’ll measure ethanol’s benefits against the promises made for it down the page, but first, a few basics.

Unlike other alternative fuels, no vehicle modifications will be needed for the mandated ethanol content, which increases to about five percent by 2012. It should burn just fine in all the gasoline burners already on the road. Gasohol, a mixture of up to 10-percent ethanol with gasoline, has been in wide use in farm states for 30 years, and all new cars are engineered for this fuel.

Before we go further, one clarification: There’s no requirement for every gallon of gas to contain ethanol. Instead, an annual ethanol quota must be met. So gasohol and E85 (85-percent ethanol, 15-percent gasoline) will still be sold where there’s availability and demand, which reduces the amount of ethanol that must be mixed in elsewhere.

The intent here is to guarantee a market for ethanol. Now producers can invest in factories with confidence of a payback.

With a bare-faced mandate for ethanol in place, the previous sham, the oxygenate requirement, is hereby deleted. This was a scheme dating back to the carburetor era that mandated gasoline contain two-percent oxygen by weight, so as to trick the fuel system into serving up leaner mixtures. It applied in localities with air-quality problems according to the Environmental Protection Agency — parts of 14 states and the District of Columbia. MTBE (methyl tertiary butyl ether) was the first choice of oxygenates, but since it contributed to ground-water contamination, ethanol became the fallback. However, feedback-fuel-metering systems, which self-adjust to operate at a fixed mixture regardless of fuel composition, became the norm roughly 20 years ago. As a result, the benefits of the oxygenate rule have decreased as newer vehicles’ fuel systems have replaced the older, more primitive ones. Today, as any engine engineer will testify, the rule has virtually no pollution benefit and has become nothing more than a backdoor mandate for the ethanol industry and corn farmers.

Now, with gasoline prices high and more people concerned about global warming, Congress has gotten brave enough to bring ethanol in the front door, in broad daylight, with mandates. Farm-raising our own energy independence is a seductive idea, better yet if it comes with a clean-burning fuel. But will it work? Let’s examine the various promises for ethanol one by one, to see if it can deliver.

Promises vs. Benefits Ethanol will reduce our dependence on fossil fuel. Ethanol will cut our dependence on foreign oil. Ethanol will protect us from gasprice shocks. Ethanol will clean up the air. Ethanol will save us from global warming.

Things to Consider About Ethanol What's ahead for Ethanol? What is Ethanol? Can We Get More? Ethanol Economics No Surprise: E85 Is a Bummer In Fuel Economy. Flex Fuel's Big Pay-off.

<< E85 and Fuel Economy		Ethanol and Dependence on Fossil Fuel >>
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[norraad]

Not only is it a tremendous waste of water to produce ethanol, Ethanol is at least 5% water when you by it!

If you listen while your pumpin'$3 water into your tank, you can hear big oil laughin' their a$$es off.

[griswold3]

We could all be "bio-towns"!!
www.in.gov/biotown_Sourcebook_040306.pdf
I heard a report about a British company building 4 methane plants in the US using chicken manure.. Sorry, can't find a reference.

[from occupied ga]

Here's one for you: ethanol

[TKDietz]

"Ethanol provides about 15% of the countries transportation fuel."


Your link says, "Ethanol use has now expanded to account for thirty-seven percent (by volume) of fuel used by passenger cars." That's pretty impressive, and since that data was published I've read where government sources in Brazil are now claiming that ethanol satisfies better than 40% of Brazil's automotive fuel needs.

Maybe I'm just not reading carefully enough, but I cannot find in the page you linked us to where it says that ethanol only provides 15% of their transportation fuel. I did see where they said that it accounted for 37% of the fuel used in passenger cars, and I believe that was as of 2005. Below that was a fuel consumption chart showing how many liters of diesel, gasoline and ethanol where sold, and if you do the math for 2005 ethanol accounted for better than 18% of sales, and one would think a lot of that diesel and some of that gasoline was burned in other applications besides for transportation purposes. I'd like to know how you came up with your 15% figure.

[Leifur]

You hit the nail on its head. The problem is artificial trade barriers between individuals of different countries, imposed by those countries. And the use of such important issue as energy diversication from mineral oil as pork by politicians and special interest groups.

It is enough that they get the food production, the energy production is to important to be messed by tarifs and subsidises.

[thackney]

from the link,

In 2005 the fuel consumed was:
Diesel 35.821 Billion Liters
Gasoline 15.878 Billion Liters
Ethanol 9.376 Billion Liters

Ethanol was 15% of the total volume of fuel used. Since ethanol has a lower energy content it provides even less than 15% for the energy needed for the transportation sector.

Passenger cars is not the only fuel used. Commerical made be fewer vehicles, but consumes a lot of fuel. I suspect passenger car figure also discludes personal light trucks.

If you want to see how Brazil gained their energy independence, I suggest the following links:

Total Oil Supply, All Countries
http://www.eia.doe.gov/pub/international/iealf/tableg2.xls

Projected International Oil Production Capacity
http://www.eia.doe.gov/oiaf/ieo/pdf/ieooil.pdf

International Petroleum (Oil) Reserves
http://www.eia.doe.gov/pub/international/iealf/crudeoilreserves.xls

[thackney]

Please also note

Despite the overwhelming success of flex cars, they still represent only a very small portion of the {Brazil} national automotive fleet. The National Association of Automobile Manufacturers (ANFAVEA) estimates that flex cars accounted for 7.7% of the national fleet at the end of 2005.

Even with their distribution system and cheap source of sugar cane, the ethanol is still subsidized in Brazil.

In addition to this legacy from the Proalcool program the Government of Brazil (GoB) maintains several programs designed to boost consumption of ethanol. As noted earlier, most ethanol is sold under the GoB’s requirement for a 25% admixture of ethanol to gasoline. In addition, taxes on flex cars are lower than taxes on gasoline powered cars.

The biggest incentives for ethanol, however, are the result of favorable tax treatment at the pump. The GoB assesses significantly higher levies for gasoline than for ethanol under its CIDES and PIS/COFINS programs. The differential in these assessments was estimated by industry contacts at approximately R$ 0.30/liter in October 2005. Moreover, differential treatment under state tax regimes may be even greater. In October of last year, it was estimated that ethanol enjoyed an advantage of approximately R$ 0.50/liter on state assessments in Sao Paulo. As a result, while pump prices were R$1.14/liter for ethanol and R$ 2.22/liter for gasoline, these prices included a differential of R$ 0.80 in taxation rates.

[qam1]

Renewable energy should be much higher. Windmills, solar, etc.

NO!

Solar & Wind are way too little to show up in that chart. With all the gazillions of dollars in tax breaks, subsidies and grants giving to solar and wind, solar only makes up 0.02% of our electricity generation and wind power makes up 0.38%

Source

Solar and wind are only good for powering Liberal fantasies

Most of the renewable energy % in that chart comes from hydroelectric power.

[newgeezer]

Lousy analogy. Hamburger Helper is much cheaper than ground beef.

It's a decent analogy, as far as he takes it.

Main Entry: anal·o·gy
Pronunciation: &-'na-l&-jE
Function: noun
Inflected Form(s): plural -gies
1 : inference that if two or more things agree with one another in some respects they will probably agree in others [not all others]
2 a : resemblance in some particulars between things otherwise unlike : SIMILARITY

Ethanol is much more expensive than gasoline.

That may not have been the case when the article was written.

Regardless, expensive ethanol is a fairly recent and ultimately temporary phenomenon. Just last year, ethanol was going for $1.48 on the open market.

[newgeezer]

Never mentioned to my knowledge is any thought of what the increased demand for corn for fuel will do to the food market.

That may be because the price of common field corn historically has had little if any discernable effect on the price of our food (whether it be corn-fed beef or corn flakes).

If the price of corn goes up a even a little, less of it will be left to rot in makeshift storage facilities (e.g. on the ground), and farmers here and abroad will be all too happy to grow more of it. The increase in supply will soon bring the price back down.

[LibertarianInExile]

This is a very evenhanded analysis--especially if you click the links and read the whole story.

BTTT.

[LibertarianInExile]

Yep, the stat the article points out is that if we were to use every single ear of corn to make ethanol, we'd still only be able to replace 10% of the gas used annually.

Ethanol is no solution for America's energy issues. And the government should have stayed out of energy policy. It'll only f up the market, as usual, which WOULD get us to the best solution eventually if gas prices rose enough to make people consider other option.

[A. Pole]

By the way, the mandate has caused the price of ethanol to go through the roof. Last year, it was about $1.50/gallon. This year, it's around $4.00.

Do not worry, the price will go back down as the production increases.

[A. Pole]

Ultimately biofuels will come up short, for the simple reason that they can't be produced in the quantities needed to run an economy the size of the USA's.

Sure they can. USA is big but so it has a lot of land can be put to use.

[A. Pole]

See above regarding algae-produced biodiesel. It is possible, using algae, to replace all of our transportation fuel and then some. Whether it is feasible or economical is another question.

The economy of scale and further technological improvements can solve the problems.

[newgeezer]

Do not worry, the price will go back down as the production increases

Of course it will.

Meanwhile, it's also worth noting that, since 1980, the price of domestic ethanol is kept artificially high by the federal government's 54¢/gallon tariff on foreign imports.

[TKDietz]

I do not believe that you can extrapolate from the data on the page you provided that ethanol only accounts for 15% of Brazil's transportation fuel. The chart is on fuel sales in general, not "transportation fuel." Everything I have read puts the percentage considerably higher than 15%. I can provide you plenty of links putting the percentage at anywhere from 25% to over 40%, but those saying it's greater than 40% are obviously defining "transportation fuel" only as that used in passenger cars. I can't find anything laying out the numbers for all transportation fuel and concluding that ethanol only accounts for 15% of all of Brazil's transportation fuel use. Now, just because more than 40% of the fuel used for automotive purposes in Brazil is ethanol, does not mean that ethanol accounts for 40% of their transportation fuel, not if you count buses, planes, boats used to transport goods and people (lots of that in Amazonia where even the capitol can only be reached by boat or plane), and big trucks transporting goods. I don't know what the actual percentage is, but it is still very impressive that they are able to supply better than 40% of their automotive fuel needs with ethanol.

Ethanol is a big deal in Brazil. It's a great source of national pride. It provides hundreds of thousands of jobs, and it does fill a substantial portion of their fuel requirements. They do also produce a lot of oil, but would not be energy dependent without ethanol. Ethanol will never provide for all their fuels needs, not even close. It does though keep them from having to import oil, and they'll be better off than most countries as oil supplies in their country and elsewhere dwindle.

[thackney]

The chart is on fuel sales in general, not "transportation fuel."

The data is labeled to be from distribution sales. It does not include other uses like industrial.

[from occupied ga]

Sure they can. USA is big but so it has a lot of land can be put to use

False - see the link in post 29

[TKDietz]

What does it include then? Are distribution sales the same thing in Brazil as they are here? Are you disputing the fact that better than 40% of all Brazil's automotive or passenger car fuel needs are met by ethanol?