[thackney]

1 energy unit of fossil fuel is consumed in producing 1.35 energy units of corn-ethanol.

Energy from sources other than fossil fuel is used to produce ethanol. (electricity from other sources)

Although there are several conflicting studies concerning the production and energy requirements for ethanol, the US Department of Energy shows that more total energy is used to produce ethanol than ethanol contains.

Go to:
http://www1.eere.energy.gov/vehiclesandfuels/pdfs/program/ethanol_brochure_color.pdf

Look at page 3 and this chart.

Now look at the legend. The yellow section measures how much energy is required to produce the fuel.

Look back at the chart under TOTAL ENERGY and not a selected subset of the energy required.

Here is the energy required to produce ethanol.

[polymuser]

Thanks for the clarification and information. My bad.

[NVDave]

Something that isn’t made clear in the text of that presentation: do those total BTU figures include solar energy or not?

Please see the text on p 1. to see where the confusion arises.

[NVDave]

I’m sorry — page 2:

Here’s the text:

Some confusion arises because a portion of the total (not fossil or petroleum) energy input in the ethanol cycle is the “free” solar energy that ends up in the corn. Since the solar energy is free,
renewable, and environmentally benign, it should not be taken into account in the energy balance calculations.
While the total (includes solar) energy needed to produce a unit of ethanol is more than the total energy needed to produce a unit of gasoline, ethanol is superior when calculating either
(1) the amount of fossil energy needed or
(2) the amount of petroleum energy needed
(see GREET results in Figure 2).