what??

nobody is forcing me to use it when it is the only fuel available? the only other option is to not drive then! when the government says use this fuel or stay home, that, to me, is forcing me to use it. we're forced to use ethanol, at least i and many others are, and i don't like it. my car wasn't made for it and i don't like the fact that it can be corrosive or damaging, not to mention it costs me more money every week due to less fuel economy.

i'm not arguing that it's not a good fuel. my car just wasn't made to run on it. while it may be a good fuel for a prius, it doesn't belong in an f-body.

 

this is a great post. very, very informative.

this is my beef with ethanol. it's the fuel of the future - for cars designed for the future. all it is to us f-body guys is lost mpg and power. i feel like there should be an option at gas stations. most of the stations around me have AT LEAST 4-6 pumps. make half ethanol. our cars just plain run better on normal gas.

think of it like this: imagine if tomorrow, the only gas made was regular 87 octane. wouldn't you be pissed? yes, our cars CAN run on regular, but we'll lose power, fuel economy and be overall bad for the interal parts over long periods of time. it's the same principle with ethanol gas.

 

Choco,

I am sure someone has done the studies to determine how long a 1990-2005 car with typical fuel system will run with 10% ethanol without ill effects. That's probably why they stopped at 10%

Or maybe it is a state government plot to eliminate all older cars and get ethanol only cars in the pipe line....but who knows. Oh wait, George W. is still in office....what was i thinking!

I have some friends race engines that use Methanol....almost the same as ethanol, just made with wood(correct me if i am wrong). They run upwards of 14:1 comp. were as the guys that are running race gas usually run lower compression, around 12.5 or 13:1. But they do still burn more methanol that gas, but from what i have heard, Gas has the higher energy content followed by ethanol and then methanol.

So yea, if you design the engine to run "Specifically" on the fuel, there will be much less performance loss if any.

The 10% gas stations may be tied up by the state, the state may require all your stations to stock E10.

My gripe would be the jump from E10 to E85....no one is sure there is enough capacity to supply the demand. But at least it will be a slower transition while the infrastructure get put in place.

 

okay hold up, this is what i'm trying to say. i realize that 10% ethanol gas is not going to blow up my car or melt its internal workings overnight. i'm mad about several things:

1.) no one knows what truly long-term effects will be on all motors. they never did the tests on every car out there and who knows what an LS1 car will be like 10 years down the road.

2.) i'm mad that there is ANY downside to ethanol. lost mpg, lost power, reduced timing, increased rubber part wear...this stuff still happens. that's why i'm so upset. we're being basically forced to use a fuel that damages our cars and wallets. it shouldn't happen.

3.) i feel we should have the option to use ethanol or not at all gas stations. until cars are ~95% converted over to ethanol, we should have the option.

 

Someone is really getting their panties in a bunch over this! I can't even imagine how you might have acted if you had a '69 Firebird in the early 70's when they started to get rid of leaded gas! Its amazing how those older cars that "required" leaded gas are still out there on the roads running around just fine. I wouldn't worry so much about the long term effects of ethanol. Its kind of a moot point, similar to the crazyness people go through over the synthetic oil arguments...seriously..when was the last time you had an engine failure using decent dyno oil?.....and are you really going to keep your car for 20 years and 300K miles?

 

The question most should ask and don't is this?

Is the cost to produce one gallon of ethanol (corn as the source) and sell it at a profit cheaper than the same cost to produce one gallon of gasoline?

The cost to produce ethanol is subsidized by the government (our tax dollars) so the true cost of ethanol at the pump doesn't take into account the tax dollars in subsidies that are not reflected in the cost of one gallon of ethanol distributed in 10 gallons of gasoline (at a 10 percent mix).

Ethanol as a substitute for gasoline is a hoax advanced by our government.
We will never ever be able to grow enough corn to produce enough ethanol necessary for the the daily consumption of gasoline in this country.

And if you start using the land to grow corn for ethanol and instead of for feed for animals (chickens,pork, and beef) the cost of those products will go up.

Strange people we are. We complain about $3 for a gallon of gasoline but nary a complaint about making a visit to McDonalds to shell out nearly $5 for a 1/4 pounder cheese burger.

How many gallons of gasoline do you think went into the cost of production from start to finish (beef and wheat and potatoes) to get you that $5 cheeseburger with fries?

And what will the cost of the cheeseburger be when we start using the land to grow corn for ethanol rather than using it as it is used now to grow feedstocks for either beef or to grow wheat?

Ehtanol and electric cars are a hoax. We should using our resources instead for hydrogen cars (water) as a fuel or other technologies.

 

I had my car tuned with E93 in the tank. I recently embarked on a road trip to KS and got 28 mpg on the highway with the Ethanol based fuel. But got gas in WV and mileage dropped to 24 the rest of the trip until I got to KS and was able to get Ethanol based fuel again.

 

On this you are correct. We have already begun importing ethanol from Jamaica and other countries, which is part of the reason it costs so much. The other reasons have to do with it absorbing water, so it does not get to be put into pipelines, and must be trucked.

On this you are partially incorrect. The oil industry does not have anything to do with the production of ethanol. The primary producer in the states is Archer Daniels Midland, and they produce 25% of US domestic supply. Oil companies actually have to pay more to buy the ethanol to mix with gasoline (if they have refining arms) or pay more for gas to their supplier if they do not. Make no mistake, the oil/refining industry does not benefit from ethanol.

The corn growers do. It is a market for extra product. Corn however, is the least efficent product that can currently be usedto make ethanol, but comprises nearly all of the current feedstock for our plants. Why are we making ethanol the worst and most expensive way? That is another question. Sugar is more efficient per acre, and celluose based variants like switchgrass are more efficient still.

Finally, ethanol use is mandatory in the United States, per the "Energy Bill" which was passed earlier this year. All brands, all grades must contain a percentage of ethanol, as an oxygenator for aiding combustion, by law. This is meant to replace MTBE, which was similarly hastily passed before anyone figured out that it loves to hang out in the water table and is carcinogenic.

E85 is not mandatory, but a little lobbying from ADM and the corn growers and boom - the big three start making a bunch of flex fuel vehicles and virtually hailing corn ethanol as the fuel that is going to save America.

Ethanol made from something else could be a useful part of the mix that we use in the future, provided its not made from corn. The opportunity cost that dland got into slightly is a big part of that. Our current maxium output of ethanol without buying from someone else is about 4.5B gallons. GALLONS. Our gasoline use in 2004 was 134B gallons. Remember, there is less energy in ethanol so those 4.5B gallons are really more around a third less, roughly 3B gallons. Think about how much corn we would have to grow to supplant all gasoline with ethanol, and even with modern farming we would pretty much all be farmers. I did some research on this. Here is the output of ethanol in gallons per acre"

Corn 330
Sugar 630
Switch grass/cellulose 1150

These are all high averages from a number of tests I found. But it does not take a scientist to see that corn is the least productive method available. I found several corn studies and used the highest, sugar I found a couple, mostly on studies from brazil and the switchgrass was a test by Oakridge National labs.

The true kicker here is that Saudi can make the most ethanol in the world, but it is a petrochemical byproduct for them, so it is not "clean" or good for the earth..etc. But they can make the most, and sell it the cheapest. And I doubt that there is any language in the legislation that mentions not using "clean happy natural" ethanol instead of "cheap, petrochemical, imported" ethanol from Saudi.

I found a lot of information about plants, output, scheduled construction and feedstock here:

http://www.ethanolrfa.org/industry/resources/

Take a look for yourself - ethanol is not all it is cracked up to be as we are currently doing it. At this rate we will be importing more than we produce of yet another "mandatory" fuel.

 

ethanol's a money generator for the government. it's all subsidized, all bullshit. they hide the true agendas behind a smokescreen of environmental protection. it's not about cleaner air standards, it's about more tax dollars. some people in this thread realize this. the rest of you guys, i'm sorry, are just naive.

the same people that believe the push to ethanol is strictly for emissions are the same people that believe global warming is real. global warming is also a hoax. the sun is 30%-40% brighter now than it was in 4.5 billion years ago scientists say. in another billion years, it should be 11% hotter making earth an uninhabitable greenhouse. in 5 billion years, it will swell so large, it'll vaporize earth. the sun's making things hotter, not us. it's all BS...and so many people believe it.

new oil wells are discovered on a daily basis. every day oil is being made in the earth. the earth's core has been cranking along at 1000* celcius for billions of years. the earth's crush shifts and pushes all kinds of new goodies to the surface. everything on earth is recycled. conventional oil has nothing to do with dinosaurs. all lies, all hoaxes, no shortages anytime soon. believe whatever you want. the government doesn't care about you.

 

I run my race car on ethanol, my dad is planning on doing the same for his car. I'm not sure what the actual percentage of what I buy is ethanol but I know it's a large amount.

I guess because of the fact the regular cars aren't burning the enormous amount of fuel that I do they won't have to worry about milking the oil? I know it's not a concern with the E85 but I just wonder as more and more ethanol cars get out there what the mix will be.

 

Thats exactly my point. Its all in the tuning. Ethanol isn't "bad", you just need to have your vehicle tuned right in order to take advantage of it.

Using 10% Ethanol in a vehicle tuned for 100% gasoline obviously isn't going to be optimal for performance or fuel economy. The vehicle needs to be set up correctly for the fuel that you are running.

 

even if you can fix the performance and fuel economy portions of the problem, it still doesn't change the fact that it's corrosive to seals, hoses and other parts not designed to bear the corrosive properties of ethanol. even when tuned, it's a negative for the motor.

just another government scam. dlandsvZ28 is correct. we should be putting our resources toward designing cars to run on different fuels. why isn't it happening?

cars 100 years ago ran on water. they were steam powered. they were so torquey, a steam powered car hit a top speed of 127mph over 80 years ago. my old V6 firebird topped out at 113mph with the governor! it's all a scam. there's no oil shortage. there is no need for ethanol. there is no global warming. if it were true, there would be alternative fuels out there. why don't they do it? they get more money out of you this way. they were screaming "oil shortage" in the 70's. demand is ridiculously higher than it was then but we still produce. put 2 and 2 together. it all spells out the government is lying to you...or they just don't care.

 

Not to start a big spat on global warming or hyjack the thread, but think about it....

We use oil from the ground...its organic (carbon) based. It gets there by plant and animal material getting compressed over time not by the natural tectonic plate subduction (although plant and animal deposits could get pulled in with it at this point) and regeneration. We burn it and spew it back into the air as CO2. Now the only thing that absorbs CO2 is trees and plants. Now consider the reduction of forests around the globe due to urban sprawl or what every you want to call it....and then the logging of the Amazon rain forest(which by the way absorbs the most CO2 of any region on the planet)... so you basically are putting more into the system than is being taken out. CO2 has a insulating effect, so the more you have the more it insulates. Now, what happens when you expose more water (darker color) in the arctic (ice and snow reflect light)? You have an expanding cycle. The more water and ground that is exposed the more heat is absorbed.....can you see that? This makes perfect sense to me.

Don't forget about the China and other newly industrializing nations. Their pollution standards are much lower and their need for energy is higher (and increasing). Do you not think this may have an effect on climate?

I agree, ethanol is not the magic bullet and the big 2 American car companies need to get their heads out and drive the development of fuel cells, cold fusion or what ever the next big thing is going to be. They are the only ones with the resources to produce such vehicles as the days of Johnny Homeslice developing an new type of engine in his garage are long gone.

 

Petroleum will probably drive cars for most or all of the life span of anyone old enough to be on this board. There is several hundred years of reserves (including tar sands) at even the most aggressive expected use.

Second, with diesel or HCCI, regen braking, aero advances, lighterweight construction, etc. cars will be in the 50-80mpg range (my opinion) within 10 years or so.

Third, before we talk about global warming, tell me why this interglacial period is colder than previous interglacial periods? And for that matter, are we going to try to control the environment as we enter the next interglacial period (not that far away)?

 

we know very little about how oil is made. it's all theory. we weren't around 2 billion years ago to watch these things happen. all i can tell you is the earth is just a giant recycle bucket. whatever we used will be returned in some way, shape or form. we could very well be using oil faster then it's being made but one thing is for sure: oil was made today, and on a global scale, probably quite a bit. the earth's crust is constantly shifting and turning new things into the center of the earth.

think about it: scientists say that the oil today is "dinosaur oil". look at how deep oil is. it's sometimes miles below the surface. archaeologists only have to dig a few hundred feet in many instances to find dinosaur bones. that means in the millions of years dinosaurs have been extinct, their remains are only a few hundred feet below us. oil is miles below us. that means that that oil was made billions of years ago before dinosaurs. a lot of the information we get fed is bullshit and perpetuated to cause crisis and oil scares and price hikes. they said we were running out of oil in the 1970's. today we pump more oil than ever with no sign of running out. they find new oil wells all the time.

it's because global warming is due to sun cycles, not human beings. it's all natural. michael savage was reading some record temperatures and hottest summers on record a few days ago. we're talking about 130 degree temps! they all had one thing in common: they were 100 years ago. the beginning of the 1900's is historically hotter than the beginning of the 2000's. global warming = lies perpetuated by the government to up prices and get votes.

if anyone is interested, i study cosmology as a hobby quite a bit and i have quite a bit of info relating the ice age to the sun's journey around the center of the galaxy (well, it's rotation along the galactic spiral arm, we don't actually rotate around the core of the galaxy).

 

Ethanol is not good for the government. The government makes a killing on the oil and nat gas industry. Example: In 2005, E&P operations accounted for 7-8% of Oklahoma's state economy by industry. But the energy industry will end up paying over 20% of all taxes collected in OK for 2005. Not only is it disproportionate, but it happens at exploration, production, transport and sale. Agriculture is subsidized - yes. So then how does the federal government make money on that? That is a cost to them. It is in the gov't best interest to get every industry standing on its own two feet in the free market so it can then tax the revenues.

The feds also collect on E&P and sales of gasoline, but let us not forget also income tax on the businesses and employees of those companies as well. Oil and gas are great for the government's budget - state and federal.

The reason more 'Johnny Homeslice' (nice, btw) things aren't happening at a wider level is that there is no market/acceptance for them. Ethanol generated the key amount of investment to get producers, the government, car manufactures and the general populace to think it was a good idea, enough to make some money, and they did this by capitalizing on MTBE needing to be phased out. And now, ethanol is mandatory. So obviously there is a market. As much ethanol as can be produced in this country for the forseable future will have a market. That does not even count E85, which is not mandatory. That's just the basics, once the demand was generated and indeed mandated, the supply must come.

As an exmaple, we have solutions that already exist, producers make them, and they are widely available, but are not in wide use. Take diesel: no one is looking as closely at diesel, which has more energy per gallon than gasoline, and can be made successfully from a much wider variety of feedstocks. Sure you can get it from oil, but you can make bio diesel from lots of things. Things we have lying around here. But the demand for diesel vehicles is limited here. We think diesel is only for trucks. In Europe, they artificially increased the demand for gas alternatives by taxing the hell out of gas - and now diesel engines are 50% of the european fleet. Their gasoline usage is DECREASING, even though they have more cars on the road than they did. By keeping our gas prices low, we have done ourselves a disservice.

It's not a conspiracy, it is a collusion of consumers, suppliers and producers that ever gets anything off the ground into the market. I will say the government is foolish to not explore other options more fully, and to have legislated ethanol when we cannot make enough to not import it. That was just dumb, and caused spotty outtages across the country of gasoline, not because there was not enough gas but instead there was not enough ethanol to mix into gas. It is just one more choke point to getting gas to market, and one or two companies control the vast majority of the what is made domestically. ADM makes 25% of ethanol in this country.

 

DavidNJ, Different scientists (like politicians) can argue it either way in their favor. How far is this data going back? We haven't recorded temperature long enough to say much about interglacial periods. Also, what is the mean from which we are taking the standard deviations....doesn't float if your mean is going up the whole time. Sure the standard deviation can go down over time, but the meat of the matter is the average temperature of that time.

Also, "50-80mpg range (my opinion) within 10 years or so."....wow, that much eh?...they have done so much in the past 20 years already, i can't wait.

Choco....so you’re saying that the center of the earth is just a big pool of oil, waiting for us to tap it?

As for sun cycles...what happens when you keep wearing your winter coat through the summer?..... winter coat=more CO2 content in the air...you keep getting hotter and hotter until you pass out because you can't get rid of the heat, that is unless your summer is very short then you may make it to another winter. Many cycles occur in nature, even cooling cycles. But on average, since man started recording temperature, it has been going up(maybe .5 to 1 deg.). And that is due to the increase in CO2 being produced around the world.

 

Basically...from the stuff i have read here and from my opinion, oil is not gonna be a freakin problem as far as running out. Think about it, all the dead **** that is underground, its not gonna be running out anytime soon. The problem is that the most oil-rich parts of the globe are supposedly are in the countries that are not our allies.

Ethanol initially seems ok, but who knows. It seems like a temp fix and I see it spikin here in a couple years and then we will need to begin using whatever fuel source (or other mode of transportation) is discovered and improved upon over the next 15 years.

As far as this global warming BS...give me a break...cars account for very little of what is put up into our atmosphere (which is massive anyway), you want to bitch about that look at the factories. and why bitch anyway? does it really cause that much of a problem? The earth goes through natural cycles and can adjust to us because its natural and things in nature tend to adapt...deal with it freakin liberals.

 

ChocoTaco369:
i hate people like you.

not for what you've said in this thread.. but because you spout off a bunch of things about subjects you obviously know nothing about.

i just thought id share.. maybe it'll make you reflect inward on what you're posting, and you'll think enough to ask yourself "do i really have any knowledge or training on the subject??" before you hit that post reply button.

 

instead of bitchin....whats your opinion on the subject of the thread instead of wasting space mrdude_1?