Paul
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http://money.cnn.com/2006/04/19/Auto...reut/index.htm

 

I saw something about ethonal cars in a recent episode of The Amazing Race on CBS. I believe it was an old style VW Bug in some foreign country. I don't really understand the whole thing though.


So instead of gas stations, we'll be getting ethanol stations?

 

Not Ethanol stations but stations that sell a gas/ethanol blend. By doing so they reduce the actual gas content and replace it with ethanol (a renewable energy made from corn). GM is using up to 85% ethanol 15% gas in a bunch of their vehicles. This would help us in the neverending quest to reduce relience on foreign oil.
Thought I hit the pertinent facts with this.

Someone correct me if I am wrong though.

 

Could this be in part to poise Toyota to take over GM??

 

I hope toyota means 100% ethanol not this sorry excuse of a half breed! Its been done before and won't be difficult to replicate on a mass scale. With todays technology the only thing holding us back is the oil tycoons. Sorry if i sound crazy I'm just itching to get a stil in my backyard and help american farmers rather than some arab millionaire get rich. You want to talk about a win win situation. Don't even get me started.

But seriously folks with gas prices on the rise for noooo aparent excuse how long will you put up with it?

There are a couple LEGITAMIT concerns with using 100% ethanol. Its difficult to start in cold weather and it is corrosive to SOME materials(even if there are any in our cars) One could also be concerned with people drinking it. Go down to the pump and get LIT for 20 cents.

We can only hope....or petition to our senators.

 

85% 15% mix is todays ethanol standard. Usually its 10c cheaper to pump but the gas mileage is lower. Averaging it out its the same cost of gas. However, if the demand goes up for ethanol and they start to produce more of it I assume prices would go down.

 

I didnt think that milage suffered from it? Thought if anything it got slightly better because it was a cleaner burn then just straight gas.

 

Why ethanol. Corn is ok but what about feeding people. Why not biodegradable diesel which is just ____ from food we don't eat. Much more logical. I think its called biodegradable diesel. My uncle was talking to me about it.

 

Damn how could i forget. Milage with 100 percent ethanol is worse. Noticably worse. It needs an 11:1 air to fuel ratio rather than the standard 13:1. However the fact that it SHOULD be inexpensive will offset this.

What will people eat? Corn if they want. Our current supply of corn isn't enough to run everyones vehicles off of right now anyway. We will need to build more farms. Maybe use imminent domain on some strip malls and WAL-MARTs...God that would be the day.

 

^^^^ I read an article in Car and Driver about a year or so ago about a VW Golf that ran solely on leftover grease from fast-food fryers. Pretty interesting... I think we're a ways away from it being common though.

 

Maybe this is why GM is only using the 85/15 blend? They understand that the pure ethanol is bad milage wise, so they use the gas to counteract the poor milage and harder starting from just ethanol. Just speculating here, so be easy on me if I am totally wrong. Im new to the whole deal, just know little bits here and there.

 

Nevermind, I just took like 45 seconds to do a little research adn you were right. Here is a small info about e85 and mileage.

What is the range of a flexible fuel vehicle?

Response:

Ethanol has less energy content than gasoline. However, E85 also has a much higher octane (ranging from 100 to 105) than gasoline. FFVs are not optimized to E85, so they experience a 10-15% drop in fuel economy. This will vary based on the way one drives, the air pressure in the tires, and additional driving conditions..

For comparison purposes, aggressive driving habits can result in a 20% loss and low tire pressure can reduce mileage by 6%. Research indicates Ford FFVs experience a 5% horsepower gain on E85. The range of any particular vehicle is dependent on the size of the fuel tank and driving habits. Current Ford Taurus FFVs have an 18-gallon fuel tank and will normally travel 350 miles between refuelings.

 

The VW that ran on fryer grease, thats what they call bio diesel. Watched a special on it on the show Dirty Jobs. They guy got companies to just donate the grease to him, so it ended up costing him like $.20 a gallon. And he got awesome mileage. Was pretty cool to see.

 

bio diesel would be way better than corn. Just use all the left overs of waste from resturants etc. Wonder how great the gas millage is. Hybrid bio diesel?

 

Biodiesel??? hmmmm I've heard good some really good things. It would be awesome to power our cars on waste. I personally would opt for the ethanol for a performance stand point. Anyone know of performance gains on Biodiesel? Performance and Diesels generally aren't labeled together is why I'm asking.

 

They are reshowing the Bio Diesel portion on the Dirty Jobs show on April 30 at 4:00pm. Maybe your questions can be answered by watching it there. Its on the Discovery Channel for those interested.

 

I kid you not: BioWillie: www.wnbiodiesel.com

I have no idea what this site looks like, as my firewall at work is a gigroutous killjoy.

 

I think one of the problems with Bio Disel might be the limited supply. A wholesale change over from gas to bio disel would be next to impossible to supply with leftover grease from the food service industry. I mean, sure, it seems like a lot but not all our restaurants can keep up with our demand.

 

To put the ethanol craze in perspective, the US already converts 14% of its corn crop to ethanol every year, producing ~3 BILLION gallons of ethanol. The US uses 120 BILLION gallons of gasoline every year, however. This translates into less than 3% of total US fuel requirements met by ethanol. Then, you have to factor in all the diesel fuel farmers use up driving tractors to plant, cultivate and harvest the corn in the first place.

To get even 10% of our fuel from ethanol, the US would have to convert 56% of our annual corn crop to ethanol, an insane number.

We could do better if every person in the US went to a vegetarian way of life (most corn is used to feed livestock, after all) and suburbs were plowed under while we lived in high-rise apartments. However, the US will never be able to wean itself off of foreign oil using ethanol.

 

^ Yup. Also a bacteria/virus can wipe out acres of corn fields which could result in even higher fuel cost. Politics will come in to play as well. Corn producing states can easily boost profit and taxes into their state coffers by selling corn to Corn-to-Ethanol companies a higher price than normal. Corn-to-ethanol companies will pass cost to consumers. The American Corn Growers Association would then be the next OPEC.