Will the Reality of Biofuels Catch Up With the Hype?

Campus Report ^ | December 11, 2007 | Emmanuel Opati

[NVDave]

Yea — I’ve lost about 1 MPG consistently. I keep mileage records on every fill up and every trip in our F-350 (for IRS purposes) and I’ve seen our mileage go down since ULSD became the norm. I do not know to what to attribute this, because I have no figures for BTU content of ULSD vs. the old #2. All I can say is that I used to see between 18 to 20 MPG on our F-350 (empty) on the highway here in Nevada, and now 18 is the high end of the mileage; we never get 20 any more.

Just over 100K miles on the 7.3L Powerstroke.

[taxed2death]

re: post 58

Amazing... simply amazing how some people / organizations will twist “facts” around to make a study.

[riored]

to post 60.

Bush (apparently) did nothing to stop
Clinton’s decision.
Something similair happen to gasoline laws.

keep in mind that the oil industry
loves these problems.

........................
btw, this matter is one of my biggest beefs with Bush.

[NVDave]

What is more amazing (to me) is that such methodology is not challenged in peer-reviewed academic publications. As soon as I read Pimental’s work, I saw immediately where this claim of “ethanol consumes more BTU’s than it produces” came from. The biggest component of the energy input that Pimental has that other studies don’t is the energy to make the steel.

There are plenty of other variable factors that reasonable, informed people can debate about ethanol, but when some people in the debate keep pointing back at Pimental’s work (as the WSJ especially loves to do), it ceases to be a reasonable debate. The journalists and policy wonks who point to Pimental’s work haven’t actually *read* the study you see, they just look at the conclusions. When I point out the methodology, these people are absolutely silent - they have no coherent analysis of their own, they want to parrot someone with a PhD who has done a nice, tidy job.

NB that in the prezo from EERE that was posted, the majority of the studies show a positive energy output from Ethanol. Ever see the WSJ quote any of those studies? Me neither.

It should also be NB that Pimental’s background is in insects, not agronomy, engineering or energy. Insects. But because he has a PhD and he used to teach at Cornell (ie, an Ivy League school), he’s infallible to the east coast media.

I’m just a retired EE turned farmer, but even without a PhD, I can shred Pimental’s work with ease, it is so outlandishly in error. He also uses outdated yields, input costs, etc from the 80’s. Farmers don’t stand still, they adopt new technology relentlessly in a goal of reducing costs. Yields go up, inputs go down - that’s the meta-trend in American farming.

I’m not saying that ethanol is a cure-all; corn-based ethanol isn’t a huge energy win. It is a marginal improvement in the energy balance, and I’m being honest when I say “marginal.” The infrastructure developed for corn-based ethanol can and will be used when we develop cellulosic ethanol, which has a much better payback.

There are other biofuels which we should be investigating, such as butanol, which would remove the distribution barriers ethanol has, as well as handle most of the energy content issue. The WSJ and their ilk, however, want to pettifog and dismiss all biofuels outright as a boondoggle, rather than think in a long term about this: We need to cut loose of the noose the middle east has around our neck. We don’t need to replace the majority of oil imports to do this, since the majority of our imported oil comes from Canada. All we need to do is get rid of about 20% of our oil portfolio and we can eliminate the middle east completely. This can be done by a) increasing domestic production of oil and b) biofuels. Neither solution will do it all.

The problem is, the WSJ sees those of us who want to cut loose of middle eastern oil in the same light as people who want to build a wall on the borders: “Nativists” and so on.

[OregonRancher]

Sold 600 ton high quality alfalfa at $160/ton, third cutting, Fob. Not one complaint, just glad to have it. Retiring, selling the ranch. Good luck with yours.

DB

[OregonRancher]

Horses are a luxury for most and look for a lot of them on the market for what they can bring. Sad.

[thackney]

But I’m still unclear on whether those ethanol “total BTU” charts include solar or not.

In my opinion, but not certain, the total fuel would include electricity generated by solar power but would not include the season's total Solar BTU falling on the field or the value would be WAY higher.

NB that almost half of studies on page 3 that show ethanol “below the line”

Notice also the description below the graph: "Energy balance here is defined as Btu content in a gallon of ethanol minus fossil energy used to produce a gallon of ethanol". It is not a comparison of all energy inputs.

I do not claim Patzak or Pimental studies are valid. In my opinion, they are not a fair comparison.

But I also believe Total Energy used to produce should be the comparison. Counting the energy harvested in the crop or pumped in the product is not what I am interested in, nor am I interested in ignoring any electricity generated from non-fossil fuel sources. All of those energy source combined are our resources.

[NVDave]

We’re selling too. We had people just walking up on our outfit, asking if we were selling. No sale signs, no realtor, no nothing.

Is land going out of sight up in your country?

[thackney]

I have no figures for BTU content of ULSD vs. the old #2.

The Transition to Ultra-Low-Sulfur Diesel Fuel: Effects on Prices and Supply
http://www.eia.doe.gov/oiaf/servicerpt/ulsd/chapter2.html
2. Efficiency and Cost Impacts of Emission Control Technologies
Efficiency Losses

New vehicle fuel efficiency is reduced slightly in the 4% Efficiency Loss case, but the impact on stock efficiency is marginal because the number of new vehicles expected to enter the market is small relative to the total number of vehicles on the road. Fuel expenditures for heavy trucks are projected to be $1.9 billion higher in 2007 in the 4% Efficiency Loss case than in the reference case, and the difference grows to $2.9 billion in 2011 (Table 1), an increase of $410 in average fuel expenditures per truck. Cumulative fuel expenditures from 2007 to 2015 are projected to be $17.6 billion higher in the Regulation case than in the reference case and an additional $3.0 billion higher in the 4% Efficiency Loss case. The projected cumulative increase in energy use in the 4% Efficiency Loss case is approximately 80 trillion British thermal units (Btu).

Appendix D: Short-Term Analysis of Refinery Costs and Supply
http://www.eia.doe.gov/oiaf/servicerpt/ulsd/appendix_d.html

Hydrotreater Yields and Energy Content: The volume and weight percent yields of ULSD produced by the distillate hydrotreater can vary considerably, depending on the fraction of cracked stocks in the feed and the level of aromatics saturation. An average yield and energy content were estimated for this study, based on the Criterion data in a June 2000 study by the National Petroleum Council.167 The yield of hydrotreater product in the distillate boiling range was assumed to be 98 percent by weight, and the API gravity was assumed to increase by 2 numbers, which means that the volume yield was 99.2 percent. There was also a small increase in the Btu content of the product on a weight basis (98.2 percent of the feed energy content in 98.0 weight percent of the feed). The energy content declines on a volume basis, because the heat content of the product is 0.989 times the heat content of the feed on a volume basis.

ABCs of ULSD
http://fleetowner.com/mag/fleet_abcs_ulsd/

Energy content

In general, the processing required to reduce sulfur to 15 ppm also reduces the aromatics content and density of diesel fuel, resulting in a reduction in energy content (BTU/gal). A 1% reduction is expected, which may affect mpg.

[Lee'sGhost]

It’s really nice to hear someone talk who actually knows what he’s talking about.

[NVDave]

Thanks for the info. I knew about the costs of the new diesel emissions technologies — the biggest part of which coming down the road are the particulate filters.

The other thing they’ve been doing that kills efficiency is retarding the injection timing to optimize for lowest possible NOx emissions. This, IMO, is stupid. We should optimize for lowest fuel consumption then go after the other emissions we want to eliminate after we’ve minimized fuel consumption.

[Lee'sGhost]

OK, so I read your response to my post and the graph made sense (after I found the legend). Then I read the exchange between you and riored and some of the reference material he provided. Now, I’m a fairly smart guy but I quickly realize that I can’t get a handle on this thing unless I do a LOT of reading. Frankly, I don’t want to do that. I just want a simple answer to a simple question. Both of you guys seem well read on the subject so I’m hoping that your exchanges create an agreement that I can buy and bypass the need to become a self-educated expert on the matter.

Keeping in mind that it won’t change my mind about it being stupid to use food for fuel, it would be nice to have a logical, scientific answer.

Thanks.

[Mr. Lucky]

Would it help at all if someone pointed out that the use of corn for fuel removes only the starch, that all other nutrients remain and that the principal by-product (distillers’ dry or wet grains) is more easily digested by livestock than the corn was to begin with?

[thackney]

do those total BTU figures include solar energy or not?

Curiosity got the better of me. I had to do the math. Solar Energy input to the field is not included the graph. I was sure it would be huge. I greatly underestimated how much.

You may disagree with some of the input numbers, but I think you will see the result at the end is so large it cannot be included in the numbers.

An acre of U.S. corn yields about 7110 pounds of corn for processing into 328 gallons of ethanol.
77,000 BTUs per gallon of ethanol
http://healthandenergy.com/ethanol.htm

I used 5 kWH/m²/day for the solar energy input.
http://www.nrel.gov/gis/images/us_csp_annual_may2004.jpg

90 day season (just a guess, please correct me)

450 kWH/m²/season

4,070 m²/acre

http://www.onlineconversion.com/area.htm

1,821,085 kWH/acre/season

3,412 BTU/kWH

http://www.onlineconversion.com/energy.htm

6,213,799,475 BTU/acre/season

18,944,511 BTU/gallon of ethanol

246 BTU Solar input per 1 BTU ethanol.

Not a fair comparison in my mind, but they definitely did not include the field's solar input in the numbers.

When you look at it from purely energy input, we should cover the field with solar cells and build lots of batteries. Of course that wouldn't produce distillers grains or winter wheat.

[thackney]

In my opinion, this graph shows it fairly well.

Keep in mind the source of this study was a report promoting ethanol. In my opinion, I think the gasoline figure is too high, but I also think the ethanol figure is too high. And their are quite a few contradicting studies on the energy required to produce ethanol.

On a purely energy input measure, I don't think anyone can make convincing argument that it takes more energy to produce gasoline.

There are however, more benefit from ethanol than pure energy inputs. DDGs, balance of trade, domestic resources, etc. My biggest gripe with ethanol in the US is the targeted subsidy. If that was applied across the board to all domestic transportation fuels and our resources were opened up for development, this country could be energy independent.

[Lee'sGhost]

Maybe, but can you make corn flakes with it?

[thackney]

I don’t think you would like corn flakes made from #2 yellow corn used in ethanol production either.

[Lee'sGhost]

That’s what I thought.

[NVDave]

OK, thanks - that’s really quick work on your part.

Growing season - it varies widely. A “90 day corn” is on the shorter end of some corn varieties, 110 day is on the longer end, but 90 is a workable starting point. The longer we make the growing season, the greater your numbers, of course.

The by-product of DDG’s needs to be taken into account here in two ways - there’s a whole lot of energy used in drying those distillers’ grains (which, if we could assume a feedlot very close to the ethanol plant, we would not need), and the feed value of the DDG’s is giving us a huge win as feed. We’d either be using cracked corn for feed, or DDG’s. Either way, we’re going to grow corn - so IMO, getting ethanol *and* feed from the same acres, same crop and same growing season means we’re getting a win here.

Unless America is going to become a nation of tofu-nibblers, the feedlots are going to be cramming *some* sort of feed into those cattle to finish them. We can either use cracked corn and get no ethanol, or distillers’ grains and get the ethanol. The big point I have to keep driving home to people is that the majority of both corn and beans (soybeans to non-farmers) grown in the US go into cattle feed, so when we have a viable after-product from biofuels that still feeds cattle, we really need to take that use into account, because we’d be using the diesel/etc to produce feed that has no fuel component removed anyway.

[Mr. Lucky]

Thackney's answer is on point.

Food grade corn is not fungible with #2 yellow.