Is E85 a distraction, a red herring?
AutoblogGreen reader and independent blogger James sent in a link to a post he did claiming that not only is ethanol (or, more accurately, E85) not part of the solution, it's actually part of the problem because growing the biomass to make ethanol takes so much energy. Since driving a car on ethanol results in lowered miles per gallon, focusing on ethanol (and hydrogen) is actually a distraction from automobile technologies - like plug-in hybrids and EVs - that actually show promise in reducing CO2 emissions and reducing reliance on oil. James' piece touches on a lot of the important issues in the alt-fuel debate, including political and corporate interests. Plus, it always warms our hearts to see AutoblogGreen's exclusive content getting attention by other blogs.
[Source: Alternative Energy Blog, submitted by James]
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
prattacus 4:16PM (7/27/2006)
I always find it hard to distinguish people who are critical, but ultimately part of the solution, and people who are needlessly contrarian and antiestablishment.
I find the E85 debate (and liberal politics these days) is really harangued by a bunch of people who are anti anti. Maybe they don't even like capitalism as a civilian ethos. Maybe they want to live off the grid. I don't know. But come on, it's not realistic.
We need realistic solutions. E85 is a realistic stop-gap solution to a lot of problems, including crazy Middle Eastern countries.
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gemorris 4:46PM (7/27/2006)
How can E85 be considered a solution if it takes more of that "crazy middle eastern oil" to grow crops to make an equivalent ammount of energy than if you just burnt the "crazy middle eastern oil" in the first place?
If being anti-E85 shows liberal bias, than reason and rationality must be liberally biased as well.
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Stphane Dumas 9:32PM (7/27/2006)
Looks like we're more and more in the "alternative fuels wars" electric vs biofuels a la Betamax-VHS war of the 1980s.
Ming, a poster at GMInsidenews.com mentionned at http://www.gminsidenews.com/forums/showpost.php?p=696711&postcount=21 a article from the Washington Post about the "ethanol promise", more specifically cellulose ethanol, you can read the entire article at http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/07/21/AR2006072101205.html I don't know however how long the Washington Post will keep it in their archives -_-;
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Engineer-Poet 10:17PM (7/27/2006)
Looks like I can't even post a test comment to see what formatting is allowed here (there being no comment preview). How gauche.
Roughly half of James' piece was taken verbatim from an e-mail I wrote to a correspondent of his, so if you want to talk about the political leanings of the analyst you talk to me.
Here's the case against ethanol, in a nutshell:
1.) Ethanol from corn is barely energy-positive, and that appraisal assumes that someone is willing to pay (fossil) energy to make the byproducts for animal feed. Even if you turned the entire US corn crop into ethanol, you could only replace about 1/7 of US gasoline - and that's before deducting the fossil inputs.
2.) Ethanol from biomass is better on paper, but nobody's run even one plant at commercial scale yet and even the US's hypothetical 1.3 billion tons/year of waste biomass can't replace the gasoline the nation uses. This doesn't touch petroleum demand for diesel, heating oil, jet fuel, petrochemicals, or asphalt. It also doesn't touch the demand for coal and gas.
Given all those negatives, the hype about ethanol looks mighty strange - until you see who's cashing in on it. Archer Daniels Midland (billions in subsidy money). General Motors (millions in avoided CAFE penalties via the "flex fuel" loophole). And the oil companies keep people driving cars which will be petroleum-compatible and absolutely dependent on some kind of liquid fuel.
Lest I make myself sound like a doomer, I am anything but. We just need several times as much efficiency as the internal combustion engine provides - and it looks like we can get it, with technologies like batteries and direct-carbon fuel cells. But going that route means the end of the oil companies. They have to know this, so they will pay shills and our stupid pols to promote anything that keeps their business model alive; the rest of us don't matter.
For more info, try scanning these:
http://ergosphere.blogspot.com/2005/09/faq.html
http://ergosphere.blogspot.com/2005/12/reference-library.html
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Sheniferous 11:10PM (7/27/2006)
Why is GM throwing itself behind E85? Replace a few hoses, tubes, and seals, reprogram the ECU a bit, and swap out a part or two and voila! You've created a "green" image without actually *doing* anything!
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Stphane Dumas 9:39AM (7/28/2006)
GM is the only one going full speed ahead althought Ford, DCX and Nissan will join the parade but Toyota will plan to join the E85 parade for 2008 too! Here an article dated from April 2006 http://www.theautochannel.com/news/2006/04/19/004386.html Autoblog mentionned it as well http://www.autoblog.com/2006/04/20/toyota-to-venture-into-e85/
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Michael 10:02AM (7/28/2006)
This issue has been politicized, but the truth has nothing to do with the right or the left. People who think we can replace gasoline with ethanol, or even E85, have no idea of the scale of the problem. In 2005, we used an average of 383 million gallons of gasoline every day in the US, and that number is going to increase this year. We'll never produce enough ethanol to provide everyone with E85 at our current consumption level. Never. Maybe E10 if we reduce our consumption, but I see no evidence that we've begun to do that even with $3/gallon gas. Here's a chart of US gasoline consumption over the years: http://tonto.eia.doe.gov/dnav/pet/hist/mgfupus2a.htm
I think ethanol can be a good thing and can help us to reduce our dependence on oil imports, but we need to be realistic. It will only play a small role. I wish people would stop with the political, right vs. left bickering and focus on real solutions. Run the numbers and find out what's possible and what's not.
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tbyron 3:03PM (7/28/2006)
In TODAY's world, there are NO magic bullets that can solve our problems. Arguing whether or not ethanol is a total solution is somewhat disingenuous. Increasing our use of ethanol can help but as part of a broad effort that includes conservation and use of other alternatives to reduce our dependency on unstable and unfriendly nations for our energy supply.
Also, these pure comparisons of energy use in the production of fuels can miss the point, or at least obscure the reality. Although the energy required to produce ethanol is a substantial amount of the energy eventually produced, give some credit for the source of that energy. The natural gas used at almost all ethanol plants is a large amount of that required energy...it does NOT come from the Middle East or Venezuela.
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prattacus 5:19PM (7/28/2006)
It seems to me that many of the anti-E85 arguements are heavily "snapshot of today" dependent.
The market of the US is very strong and very persuasive. A real need for E85 could easily shift the house or senate into approving the growth of commercial hemp. More $$ could also recalibrate the tariffs against foreign ethanol from more favored nations.
The arguements NEVER consider the dynamic nature of our economy and of our laws and politics.
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Engineer-Poet 9:25PM (7/28/2006)
Arguments based on physics and chemistry wouldn't change with the winds of opinion or business cycles.
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Daniel Webb 12:39AM (7/29/2006)
Michael: Most environmentalists don't have the ability to "run the numbers". Very few engineers are environmentalists in the sense of the loud-mouth environmentalist activists. Honestly, unless there is a carbon emission tax, coal is going to be our main energy source in the next 50 years.
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Engineer-Poet 10:19AM (7/29/2006)
There's also the possibility of a de-facto "tax" from legal judgements against carbon emitters. You'll start seeing the suits as global warming becomes less and less deniable.
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Alternative Energy Blog 11:28PM (7/29/2006)
"It seems to me that many of the anti-E85 arguments are heavily "snapshot of today" dependent."
Nope. The ICE engine has been refined for over one hundred years. Burning fuels in an internal combustion engine is still only 15% efficient. Electric vehicles are simply vastly more efficient.
"More $$ could also recalibrate the tariffs against foreign ethanol from more favored nations."
Even Brazil has only managed to displace 10% of its oil consumption with ethanol. See:
http://i-r-squared.blogspot.com/2006/07/vinod-khosla-debunked.html
And Brazil has 1/7th of the per capita energy consumption of the U.S.
"The arguements NEVER consider the dynamic nature of our economy and of our laws and politics."
Obviously to say "never" is untrue, in this case as in others. When it comes to the nature of U.S. economics and politics, it is very important to take into account the influence of various powerful lobbys (e.g. agriculture, automakers, coal, oil etc.) and the difficulty in changing an industry once it has been heavily subsidised. This is taken into account in the argument.
James
Alternative Energy Blog
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Ngai Zhang 9:51AM (8/01/2006)
As far as more deadly chemicals to mass produce the corn, or the 1/2 gallon of oil needed in the plane to spray the pesticide, none of that is needed.
What about gene-altered corned?
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MikeW 9:08PM (10/11/2006)
Maybe the ethanol lobby should set realistic targets for ethanol use.
E50, good for year round use, no E70-E85 switching. Cold weather starting down to -50F
How many people use 'all season' tires? Jack of all, master of none.
Good marketing there.
The marketing could be half gasoline-half 'corn'
GM & Ford's marketing is already heavily 'cornified'
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