flynn23 wrote:

The greens, hawks, and farmers helped convince the Senate to add an ethanol provision to the energy bill—now awaiting action by a House-Senate conference committee—that would require refiners to more than double their use of ethanol to 8 billion gallons per year by 2012. The provision is the latest installment of the ethanol subsidy, a handout that has cost American taxpayers billions of dollars during the last three decades, with little to show for it. It also shovels yet more federal cash on the single most subsidized crop in America, corn.

I'm pretty certain that the anti-ethanol article that I meme'd here is being generated as a salvo targeting these groups and probably aiming squarely at ADM, the nation's largest corn producer. I'm all for battling it out from a market perspective, but with so much at stake, is it really worthwhile to battle ideologies?

I'm inclined to agree with you, flynn. Almost all alternative technologies and fuels simply don't stack up when compared to coal and oil because of their high abundance and energy content, respectively. The point should not necessarily be to make tons of money off the venture into biofuel, but to rather change the thinking about transportation as a one-woman man. It also proves to the world that America, with her abundance of crop land, can hold her own if oil disappears from the global landscape.

{snip}

Now don't make me whip out my economist hat and tear that to pieces. There's no fucking way that gasoline is nearly 1/5 the energy cost to produce than ethanol. Not unless you are not factoring in things like economies of scale, depreciation, and existing plant.

Actually, yes, there is a way. It is simply a question of technology efficiencies and time. Oil has been used universally for over a century, yet ethanol has only been dappled in for a fraction of that time. Harvesting corn and processing it many times to get ethanol has significant energy implications. However, most of the people I've worked with at Georgia Tech feel that, with significant technology leaps, corn will be the next transportation fuel, not hydrogen, because we're so much closer to the technological breakthrough required for wide implementation. I don't have any personal feelings about either fuel, but I do think that using corn to power our cars would only serve to piss off more of the world in which several million go hungry each day.

-janelane, cautiously

Actually, yes, there is a way. It is simply a question of technology efficiencies and time. Oil has been used universally for over a century, yet ethanol has only been dappled in for a fraction of that time. Harvesting corn and processing it many times to get ethanol has significant energy implications. However, most of the people I've worked with at Georgia Tech feel that, with significant technology leaps, corn will be the next transportation fuel, not hydrogen, because we're so much closer to the technological breakthrough required for wide implementation. I don't have any personal feelings about either fuel, but I do think that using corn to power our cars would only serve to piss off more of the world in which several million go hungry each day.

That was my point with depreciation. It can only cost that much less because it's been around for 100 years and most of the investment is already sunk cost that's been depreciated. I disagree that corn made ethanol is a viable alternative, even as a stepping stone to other technologies. Ethanol has serious implications that make it undesirable, most of which are detailed in the articles. The one true benefit of pursuing it, as you mention, is that it would serve notice that the US doesn't need any help with its energy needs. China would undoubtedly have to change strategies.

My original post was to highlight the fact that if you're going to attack ethanol, use a line of reasoning that isn't full of complete bullshit. There's plenty of good reasons to not use ethanol. Why resort to stupidity?

flynn23 wrote:

The greens, hawks, and farmers helped convince the Senate to add an ethanol provision to the energy bill—now awaiting action by a House-Senate conference committee—that would require refiners to more than double their use of ethanol to 8 billion gallons per year by 2012. The provision is the latest installment of the ethanol subsidy, a handout that has cost American taxpayers billions of dollars during the last three decades, with little to show for it. It also shovels yet more federal cash on the single most subsidized crop in America, corn.

I'm pretty certain that the anti-ethanol article that I meme'd here is being generated as a salvo targeting these groups and probably aiming squarely at ADM, the nation's largest corn producer. I'm all for battling it out from a market perspective, but with so much at stake, is it really worthwhile to battle ideologies?

Of course, it really gets thick when you see this:

The two scientists calculated all the fuel inputs for ethanol production—from the diesel fuel for the tractor planting the corn, to the fertilizer put in the field, to the energy needed at the processing plant—and found that ethanol is a net energy-loser. According to their calculations, ethanol contains about 76,000 BTUs per gallon, but producing that ethanol from corn takes about 98,000 BTUs. For comparison, a gallon of gasoline contains about 116,000 BTUs per gallon. But making that gallon of gas—from drilling the well, to transportation, through refining—requires around 22,000 BTUs.

Now don't make me whip out my economist hat and tear that to pieces. There's no fucking way that gasoline is nearly 1/5 the energy cost to produce than ethanol. Not unless you are not factoring in things like economies of scale, depreciation, and existing plant.

Having lived in Iowa for quite a while (I'm not sure what the actual state plant it, but it may as well be corn) and not too far from a huge ADM plant, ethanol was first pushed really heavily there about 20 years ago. The bottom line on my experience with it is, your milage goes down, and it scours every bit of gunk out of the injectors and everything else, meaning if you've been running on non-ethanol and get a tank full, when it's gone, you need to get an oil change. That's all at a personal level.

As far as at a national level, it's a loser, if you're running everything on a gas/corn blend. It might pay off if the tractors ran on alcohol, but they don't. All it does it give the farmers a place to sell all the extra corn they're growing. It's not especially green because of all the gas burned to make the stuff in the first place, and because of the side effects (lower milage, everyone needs an oil change).

Where there may be a better route would be things like plant based plastics. That would allow a greater percentage of those non renewable fossil fuels to be used as just that, fuel, and decrease the amount used by taking it out of that area of production. That part is just a thought.