ah, thanks, keith in the corn state that benefits from ethanol subsidies.
It's a crappy, dirty, inefficient fuel. Move the iowa presidential primary to be the last in the country and watch ethanol support dry up.
Feel free to wallow in your ignorance. I don't care.
What, having a potty mouth is now an acceptible substitute for knowing what you're talking about?
I dont know what fuels your prejudice, but it is not sound scientific or economic facts.
I challenge you to come to the Great Plains from where ever you are, and tour some of the modern plants and attempt to debate the scientists and economists that are making them profitable.
Ethanol is higher octane, lower energy density, lower sulfur pollution, and lower particulate emissions. Ethanol-gasoline mixes have a problem with the ethanol raising the volatility of the gasoline, leading to more hydrocarbon vapors.
It's a mixed bag, as far as fuels go.
As far as economics go, it's still expensive. That's partly tech based and partly infrastructure-based. For example, you can't pump ethanol through many pipelines because you can't readily separate ethanol from water like you can with oil, and the materials used in the pipelines and pumps often aren't ethanol-compatable.
As far as production tech goes, it's also a mixed bag. All of the studies I've run into except those by one person (Pimental) show a net energy positive. Of course, whether it's net energy positive or not isn't important. Worst case, you burn a bunch of coal to produce ethanol, since you can't shove coal in your gas tank (but we have hundreds of years supply -- it's really an undervalued natural resource of ours). What matters is how much it costs to produce and deliver it to market.
Anyways, back to my original point: if we can A) produce it without increasing our oil imports, and B) use it to reduce our oil imports, it'll be a nice way to cut funding to terrorist states that want to kill us all -- at least until we can get better fuels.