For all of you ethanol nasayers

"Switchgrass" was in the State of the Union speech, in this context. Perhaps the first time that word was applauded in the halls of congress.

I better read up on cellulose fermentation, and see if anybody it looking at tumbleweed. Now _there_ is a plant that will grow on hardly any inputs.

 

Iogen seems to be leading with industrial-scale enzymes for this. Fermentation of sugars to ethanol is more familiar in connection with "adult beverages". If we start with starch or cellulose, there are some chemical steps to get to sugar.

Tumbleweed was mentioned in a list of potential plants in a Calif. study (2000 or 2001). They didn't do anything with it. I think an advantage is that you don't "grow" this plant, just collect it on downwind fences, etc. Dry matter production seems to max out at 3 tons per hectare year. Very optimistically, this becomes 150 gallons ethanol.

 

Corn is highly subsidized by the feds, that's why it keeps getting pushed for this purpose.

 

With as much "Eco-friendly" image as Toyota is trying to spew nowadays, you'd think they would come up with an E85 modification to the Prius, then arrange to distribute E85 in select markets (perhaps at their dealerships or partner with a top tier gas supplier). Sure it would cost $4/gal., but I'd fill up on that. Why does everything have to take an act of congress in order to happen in this country

 

How can the benefit be so marginal??? Growing corn fixes carbon atoms from the air (CO2) and turns it into glucose (C6H12). Burning Alcohol/glucose returns that carbon to the air. Net effect is zero to the atmosphere.

Pumping oil out of the ground and burning it just releases carbon into the air that would have previously just stayed in the ground.

 

I think the idea is that when you also include the negative effects of converting corn into ethanol into the equation, than ethanol is only marginally beneficial.

I would also be interested in learning about more efficient ethanol production possibilities - if it's there, I hope the market finds it.

 

They actually do better. The catch is that the beets must be processed immediately after harvesting, since breakdown of the sugar within begins the moment after they are plucked from the ground.

 

Sugar Cane must be another candidate. Brazil was running fleets of E100 cars (by FoMoCo) back in the 1970s, using this abundant domestic crop.... Wonder where those cars are today? Cane might grow in parts of the southern USA okay (?) ...it seems to like Cuba. But certainly the sugar beet farmers would appreciate a hot new market....

http://www.berkeley.edu/news/media/release...6_ethanol.shtml

I didn't see the link anywhere....

 

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(cnsxhth @ May 16 2006, 01:52 PM) [snapback]256350[/snapback]</div>

Brazil has acheived total independence from oil importation. All of their cars now run on E100. However, they do have a few advantages over us in that regard. They don't have huge requirements for heating of buildings, they are able to grow sugar cane (which is apparently a very efficient means of production- I've read a few reports that range from 6 to 8 times as much energy obtained as what was required for production), and they can run on E100 down there. I think for cars in North America, 85% is as high as you can go with the ethanol and still have engines that start easily in cold weather.

 

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(larkinmj @ May 16 2006, 02:07 PM) [snapback]256365[/snapback]</div>

You might want to double check that. It's simply not true.

Last stats I saw were that Brazil had replaced about 40% of it's gasoline use with Ethanol.

However, as far as I know it still imports oil, and runs a lot of diesel.

They have recently made some internal oil finds that seem to have decreased their imports though.

Also, consider this.

"The ethanol program also led to widespread replacement of small farms and varied agriculture by vast seas of sugarcane monoculture. This led to a decrease in biodiversity and further shrinkage of the residual native forests (not only from deforestation but also through fires caused by the burning of adjoining fields). The replacement of food crops by the more lucrative sugarcane has also led to a sharp increase in food prices over the last decade.

Since sugarcane only requires hand labor at harvest time, this shift also created a large population of destitute migrant workers who can only find temporary employment as cane cutters (at about US$3 to 5 per day) for one or two months every year. This huge social problem has contributed to political unrest and violence in rural areas, which are now plagued by recurrent farm invasions, vandalism, armed confrontations, and assassinations."

 

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(Tempus @ May 16 2006, 02:57 PM) [snapback]256396[/snapback]</div>

You may be right about that. I heard the quote about total energy sufficiency and E100 cars in a report on NPR a few weeks ago.
Generally, any kind of monoculture is problematic. Brazil also is now a large soybean producer (I think it's now the largest, but I'm not sure), and the soybeans are grown by big agricompanies, further exacerbating the deforestation problem.