Ethanol contains water that distillation cannot remove.
I dunno 'bout that!.........
Posted on 03/12/2008 11:25:05 AM PDT by JZelle
One of the many mandates of the Energy Policy Act of 2005 calls for oil companies to increase the amount of ethanol mixed with gasoline. President Bush said, during his 2006 State of the Union address, "America is addicted to oil, which is often imported from unstable parts of the world." Let's look at some of the "wonders" of ethanol as a replacement for gasoline.
Ethanol contains water that distillation cannot remove. As such, it can cause major damage to automobile engines not specifically designed to burn ethanol. The water content of ethanol also risks pipeline corrosion and thus must be shipped by truck, rail car or barge. These are far more expensive than pipelines.
Ethanol is 20 to 30 percent less efficient than gasoline, making it more expensive per highway mile. It takes 450 pounds of corn to produce the ethanol to fill one SUV tank. That's enough corn to feed one person for a year. Plus, it takes more than one gallon of fossil fuel — oil and natural gas — to produce one gallon of ethanol. After all, corn must be grown, fertilized, harvested and trucked to ethanol producers — all of which are fuel-using activities. And it takes 1,700 gallons of water to produce one gallon of ethanol. On top of all this, if our total annual corn output were put to ethanol production, it would reduce gasoline consumption by 10 or 12 percent.
Ethanol is so costly it wouldn't make it in a free market. That's why Congress has enacted major ethanol subsidies, about $1.05 to $1.38 a gallon, which is no less than a tax on consumers. In fact, there's a double tax — one in ethanol subsidies and another in handouts to corn farmers to the tune of $9.5 billion in 2005 alone.
(Excerpt) Read more at washingtontimes.com ...
I’ve been saying this about the ethanol scam for years, and getting roundly criticized by the alcoholics here on fr for saying it.
I wonder if the general public will start to turn on ethanol. It’s about time the facts started to come out. But, I’m sure this will be denounced my the pro biofuels crowd as just another big oil lie.
It is a scam and with food costs skyrocketing do you see a single politician saying the scam should be ended?
Ethanol also does not burn completely in an engine and reduces mileage. There are also more emissions from engines burning it. This includes 10% gasahol blends. (Now in all regular gas)
This is becoming a real mess and will get much worse.
Walter Williams is a great economist, but the “facts” claimed in the article aren’t really.
Ethanol contains water that distillation cannot remove.
I dunno 'bout that!.........
EFB Ethanol Fraud Bump
Even the corn farmers see little of the price increase because its going to market traders and ethanol producers.
I was wondering when you’d show up and start with the pro ethanol lies.
Let’s burn food product!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
If you’re walking, you’re easier to control. Nothing insane about it.
From first-hand experience, ethanol burns at roughly twice the rate of gasoline, and weighs considerably more per gallon.
In other words, putting ethanol in your car is considerably less economical, both because of the sheer inefficiency of burning ethanol and because of the added weight to your car bringing fuel mileage down even further.
95% ethanol 5% water is an azeotropic mixture than can not be further purified by simple distillation, but has to distilled with added benzene to get to 99%
It would be nice of you to present the facts, rather than a one liner.
CSSJR
If we do not wish to lose our freedom, we must learn to tolerate our
neighbor’s right to freedom even though he might express that freedom
in a manner we consider to be eccentric.
A new oil reserve was just discovered off shore in South America. It dwarfs all other reserves currently known.
They will not hesitate to produce it and because we have stopped drilling for new reserves, they will enjoy the benefits of the rising prices.
Oil should hit $150 by the end of this year. What most people fail to realize is, even if we eliminate it to fuel our autos, the need for it will not stop. The World relies on it for many other things than just fuel.
One of the ethanolheads has already posted. I’m sure he’s on the government’s ethanol money teat. Nothing else would explain his blind worship of the stuff.
Yep, have you seen the price of vinyl siding recently?
Somehow, the process of burning our food for fuel demonstrates the sorry state our society has come to.
Here is the answer explained better than I have ever seen:
http://www.hillsdale.edu/news/imprimis.asp
What you said!
Funny. The word for Gasoline in German is Benzin..............
Which lies would those be?
More ethanol ignorance. I live in the middle of where it is being produced. The water vapor emissions from the plants alone, create their own weather systems around the area.
The feasibility of this ignorance will only become more obvious with time.
With due respect to Dr. Williams, no one seriously believes that corn is a good feedstock for ethanol fuel. The focus is now on grasses and waste cellulose. In my opinion even that doesn’t make sense.
Hillsdale’s Imprimis should be regular reading among Freepers.
Since when have the facts mattered to the government or the general voting populace? The facts are that Obama would be a completely empty suit if it weren't for the ideas of Karl Marx. Hillery is power hungry harridan, and McCain is a corrupt liberal posing as a moderate. Do any of these facts matter? Apparently not.
Make ethanol from switchgrass instead of corn.
“Test plots of switchgrass at Auburn University have produced up to 15 tons of dry biomass per acre, and five- year yields average 11.5 tons—enough to make 1,150 gallons of ethanol per acre each year.”
http://bioenergy.ornl.gov/papers/misc/switgrs.html
The ones you’ve posted in the past about ethanol being a viable motor fuel. Or do you now agree that it’s nothing but a taxpayer swindle?
Gasoline for burnin’. Ethanol for sippin’.
But they arent making ethanol from switchgrass and waste grass, they are making it from corn. People keep talking about how corn is a ‘step’ to ethanol from switchgrass and waste products, but all I ever see is ethanol from corn. Where is this elusive ethanol and why didn’t they make it in the first place?
There are other taxes: 1. Higher food prices 2. Lower gas mileage 3. Ethanol blends may have a deteriorating effect on the rubber components of an engine. It is time we conclude that we have been taken for a ride with this bogus fuel. The only way to go is Algae derived diesel. Where is my popcorn?
I'm afraid the scam of "Global Warming" is battling for the title; but the ethanol joke is a close second.
Don’t know which is the biggest scam. Human caused global warming or ethanol. They both will kill our economy.
I’m referring to the C6H6 version.
How come, with algae technology now producing diesel are so many many fellow Freepers not talking one word about it?
It is time we yell the the high heaven that an alternative to alcohol works. And it can be piped rather than trucked to our gas pumps. That my folks, is a big difference.
The switch grass hoax has long since been exposed for the scam it always was.
The Auburn study cooked the books to keep grant money coming in to the University to further fund the study. There is also very little supporting data to show all of the hidden costs or have those costs been included in the actual outcome of what the results of the study claim.
Put the same resources into actual production based on private enterprise and the results would be very different. The same problems are being seen in the corn ethanol stupidity. Without government subsidies, the costs to produce it would make it impossible for the public to afford it. It takes one and one half units of energy to produce one equivalent unit of ethanol. It’s a joke.
Anyways, I want a food stamp card for beer! The gooberment is putting me into a beer poverty state and I want help!
Beer drinkers unite!
The water necessary to grow a bushel of corn comes from rainfall.
It takes nowhere near a gallon of fuel to produce a gallon of ethanol. On my farm, it takes about 10-12 gallons of diesel to grow and harvest an acre of corn, my average yield would produce about 600 gallons of ethanol per acre (as well as 3,600# of dried distillers grain).
People don't eat the type of corn used to make ethanol, but the 450# referred to by Dr. Williams can still be used as livestock feed; in fact, it makes a much more digestible feed than the raw corn did to begin with.
Any government subsidy distorts the market, but Dr. Williams seems to be adding what he perceives to be the value of various subsidies which are, in fact, mutually exclusive. For instance, since the advent of ethanol, the market price of corn has eliminated direct production subsidies; yet, most articles by non-agriculture writers will add together the level of the perceived production subsidies with the amount of the ethanol blenders credit (which is paid to oil companies, rather than farmers)
That sort of thing.
I will graciously concede, though the latter is a direct result of the former.
I will graciously concede, though the latter is a direct result of the former.
In another life I’m sure he said public housing slums are an investment in our future that will pay off.
We are in the Ethanol Recession.
Ethanol is driving up the cost of everything, particularly food and fuel, and squandering our natural resources.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.
