ok I talked to my dad to get some info on ethanol since he knows a little bit more than me on oil related stuff. I wanted to share some of the negative points and try to give the other side to this since it seemed like most people thought it was the new super stuff.

ok I dont have much experience in oil industry but my dad was HS&E for Shell for awhile. (now HSE mgr for a refinery cataylist co.) I talked to him earlier about the ethanol stuff...
obivously oil companies are a little biased in their favor...
I tried to summarize the info

Back in the day when lead was getting axed they started using MTBE as a gasoline additive, this originally increased the octane so replaced lead and was a good thing. Another benefit was that it increased the oxygenation of the fuel so it burned more completely -> better emissions. So MTBE is used...
Without listing all the good things, MTBE has problems with leaking into water supplies and contaminating water, this is of course a bad thing and is why they are starting to get rid of it...
Gas companies are content with using MTBE and would prefer not to change and have to spend money switching...

-Ethanol is a newer additive made from corn basically... It takes energy to produce however.

-It has a lower octane level than MTBE so it actually requires something else to raise the gasoline octane up. (where you at Ben?)

-It is completely soluble in water. Biodegradable = good, water accumulation in storage tanks = not good. In refineries this means water will form at the bottom of tanks. Because of this the ethanol must be mixed with gasoline just before transport (tanker trucks). It isnt used in pipelines like normal because of corrosion problems. Seperate tanks are needed to store (cost).

-Has a high Ried Vapor Pressure (RVP) -> causes gasoline containing it to evaporate at a higher rate -> air emmissions/ pollutants

-Many of the EPA air standards are made with what is achieved with MTBE which is lower than with ethanol... they often have to grant waivers for obtaining the required emission rates when they test/use ethanol.

(heres a copy and paste because I didnt feel like summarizing)
If the oil companies had their way, we would not use it. So why are we using it??? Politics. For the farmers, this is a great new use for their products (corn) and gives them a more steady market, and more income. Plus, the government subsidizes the farmers to grow corn, so they REALLY like this idea. The farm lobby has been pushing the EPA to REQUIRE the use of ethanol in gasoline. To their credit (and I don't often give EPA much credit) they have resisted, but since the use of MTBE is now being prohibited, there aren't many other choices for providing materials in gasoline that meet the oxygen mandates.
The congressmen and senators get lots of pressure from the farmers and their lobbyists to support the use of ethanol in gasoline, or they threaten to vote them out of office, plus what congressman doesn't want to appear to be supportive of farmers.

So basically my conclusion is that this ethanol is just a replacement additive to MTBE in gasoline. Im not sure if companies are trying to use 100% ethanol or if that is practical, but thats not what is happening now, its only a % in the normal gasoline mixture. (I think e85 would be 15% ethanol??)


So just trying to give the other side to the story as seen by an oil company bias.
Please comment

 

Sounds like we are going to be paying more for shittier gas to me..

 

thats how i am feeling

 

We are all screwed either way. So with higher gas prices we should all get 2 $ an hour raises lol. I dunno I think it is all going to come down to who lines the congessmen and senators pockets the most, after all it is election time soon.

 

Totally one sided as you stated, and not entirely true on all points. It will be a ethanol / gasoline mix like you stated. It will and does run better but will give you slightly worse fuel economy. Ethanol is nothing new, and I will elaborate further tommorow. **** transport phenomena...

 

I think the price of production should be about the same, so shouldnt affect the price of a gallon too much I dont think. The main thing would be to build the market up it will cost the producers money to get it going the (plants, storages and whatnot)

Apparently MTBE is going to be stopped so the best other option is ethanol now.
Its not like it is bad but it's just being marketed like its the new best thing, when really its not a whole lot better and a lot of changes will have to be made.

One thing I found interesting is the EPA regulation for air pollutants, the current reg. may have to be changed to increase the amount of pollutants released by the gasoline vapor, if ethanol becomes the main additive. This isnt a big deal though I just thought it was interesting.

Hopefully I wrote all factual info, if theres anything to argue sombody say something

 

I asked you a question in my thread go read+answer it asap.

 

I work here in NE. where they have been using Ethanol for yrs and it is used in their Plus gasoline and Plus is cheaper then reg unlead. So it will be the same in Texas. You will find that if they use Ethanol in the mixture of gasoline, you will be paying less at the pump. So if your worried about the price of gasoline after Ethanol is used, don't be!!!

 

Ok so I actually have done a lot of research on this, and written a few published editorials about ethanol, and I know what some of the broad ranging effects will be. What I don't know is how it effects us (see my post elsewhere on effects of ethanol on varios cars, its a chemestry question so I do not know the answer).

Ethanol is alcohol made from biological material. In the US, that means corn right now. Corn is one of the least efficient materials to make it with, sugar and switchgrass are better. That means we are paying more than say, Brazil, who can make nearly double the amount per acre than we can with corn.

Ethanol was originally designed to replace MTBE, because MTBE is some sort of pleasantly poisonous material that gets into the groundwater and gives us cancer. They are both oxygenators - they raise octane, so they increase the amount of charge that burns, and burn more thouroughly. Less emissions blah blah, horray.

As it happens, ethanol chemically has less energy than gasoline. I asked a refiner and he said around 25% less. So if you ran on pure ethanol, like they do in Brazil, the number two refiner of ethanol in the world (they use sugar), then you go 25% less distance per gallon. But like I said I do not know how that effects our cars but I have a feeling FI cars might see a slight benefit from it.

We are only capable of producing about 4billion gallons a year max with our current facilities in the US, projected building expands that to 6.0, but no timetable is given for the 33 or so facilities to either be expanded or built. The mandate in the recently passed energy bill is 7.5B galoons by 2012. We already imported about 435M gallons last year, mostly from Brazil, Costa Rica and Jamaica. If we do not build more capacity, we will import more. Therefore the cost of the stuff right now is going to go up, and anyone who can make some will be gauranteed a market currently. But because of legislation, demand is going up. Refiners are not a fan; the guy I talked to said he buys it for 2.40 and sells it for 2.20.

On the upside, if we could make a really sizable volume of it, we could displace "foreign oil." For what that is worth. Essentially it is just another fuel source, and diversifying sources is good for us no matter what. It will take a while before the price of ethanol and gasoline find a happy balance, but right now E85 (purest available in the states to run on, must have a car that is designed to do that) costs anywhere from .10 to .40 less than gasoline. But as the mandatory demand increases, and we are not able to meet that demand, we will either import more or have to pay more. Not only that, but because they have to mix it into regular gas before they can sell it, this adds a complication and point of constriction to refining that is driving the price up as we speak, and could potentially be a choke point later.

The problem is that whole part where you go less miles on the same volume; so it needs to be priced lower than that to actually be cheaper than gas. Otherwise, it is more expenseive to go the same distance on E85. Obviously, since gasoline is only going to be mixing in at a fraction of that, milage will be reduced by less.

It is my opinoin that if we want to be serious about ethanol for the reasons people say we should, we would make it out of the most efficient material, and not just keep it a corn operation. IT is possible to make it currently out of cheese whey and even beer byproduct. Coors has a JV with some company and they make 1.5M gallons a year with beer byproducts.

It could eventually be really important to our country, but for now its just a blending agent, and to a lesser degree, a fuel for the north/midwest.

One more thing - one company- Archer Daniels Midland - makes 1/4 of our domestic supply. Any idea what that makes ADM? I'll put it to you this way: the only other public company I can find that makes ethanol has not even finished building their facilities.

The numbers I quote are mostly available here: http://www.ethanolrfa.org/industry/resources/

That seems to be a descent reference point for newer numbers..the DOE does not have a lot of up to date numbers on ethanol available currently.

Hope this info is useful to everyone, at least by rasing questions.

Just what I have found.

 

good info, thanks for adding

 

E85 is 85% ethanol and 15% gasoline.

Pick up this months Popular Mechanics, it has a nice article on alternative fuels. MTBE causes cancer or we'd still be using it. Then again it was widely suggested 10 years ago that it was deadly but the oil companies shoved it down our throats anyways.

 

I was wrong about the %, I didnt know it was that much.
I have to wait untill I go back home to get all my magazines... they are always waiting in a big stack.
Normally people dont contact MTBE enough to cause problems, but when accidents and tank leaks happen it gets in water supplies and thats where the problems come from.

 

sounds like a bad deal for most and a good deal for some. S.O.P.


Thomas

 

Good deal for anyone in the oil/gas industry as they can justify raising the prices even more. Bad deal for the consumer.

 

Who are you talking about, specifically?

 

Just a general rant. I rather enjoy my $300 a month gas bill from Valero!

 

I see. Well Valero is the number one refiner in North America, but hardly controls the price of oil or gasoline. Even in their own stations, their station operators are essentially franchisees, and they pay Valero market price for refined products, like a corner dealer pays a wholesaler for smack, and passes any costs onto the consumer.

And if anything, refiners dislike ethanol as much as anyone, since they are forced to now buy and mix it into gas, cost be damned. You don't expect them to just eat that cost, do you? The head of Fina the other day mentioned that he buys ethanol for 2.40 a gallon and sells it mixed in gas for the equivalent of 2.20. Not so good for him.

 

The hotter the air comming into your motor, the more prone to knock you are. (duh) Ethanol has a much higher latent heat of vaporization then gasoline. Ethanol will therefore require more energy (heat) to be abosorbed from its surroundings in order to reach its vapour state. Guess where this extra heat being absorbed will come from . The ethanol will infact lower your engine temps / air temps as it absorbs this energy and allow you to run more boost (add more heat) to make up for this heat loss.

Ethanol is an oxygen containing or "oxygenated fuel" that requires less oxygen in the air to burn. Pure ethanol is 9:1, while gasoline is 14.7:1 . E85 which has been previously mentioned, is 85% ethanol 15 % gas. This will make ~ a 9.8:1 ratio. As you can see more fuel is needed, and thus your loss in gas mileage. Ethanol has a lower energy density than gasoline, but the increase in fuel required makes up for this difference. (no power loss)

To run an ethanol based fuel in your car, you will more than likely be needing a fuel system conversion. Ethanol (any alcohol) will eat certain rubbers IE stock gaskets / seals that aren't ethanol compatable. Ethanol will also slowly corrode aluminum over a long period of time. Anodizing or coating aluminum will protect it from this corrosion.

I'm leaving a few things out, but hopefully you get the jist of how it will effect your cars performance. I can ask some specific questions to people much smarter than I if you have any.

Cliffs: Lowers engine temps. It's corrosive to certain things. You will have a decrease in gas mileage. The supply is reliant on a crop which fluctuates with our seasons and the weather they provide.

 

That' the best car tech oriented info I have seen yet. Thanks for posting that up. I had a feeling that would be the case. Here I come FI.

 

Many of you miss the point that the oil comapnies didn't force MTBE on you. The Fed's forced MTBE on the oil companies. So go curse the EPA. Also, lead was gone long before MTBE made an appearance. My father worked in labs for Exxon, so I remeber distinctly when that garbage made its first appearance.

In addition, I had buddies working for Fluor and other shops who had to build MTBE plants. Nobody "wanted" MTBE. Its garbage.

Now, someone who is rational posted on Brazil. Yes, sugar can is used to make alcohol there. All cars sold there (even GM cars) are flex fuel capable.

Brazil makes all its own fuel. The little ammount of crude they need can come from domestic reserves.


Now, expand your thinking. Right now, the price point makes ethanol uncompetitive unless oil stays over somewhere around $30-$40 barrel. But, immagine instead of spending money on trying to try and promote peace in the volatile regions where we have to get our oil from that we re-invest that money into irrigation systems to ensure farmers get the water they need.

We put the heartland of America to work raising feedstocks for alcohol based fuels. The oil we produce domesticaly is basically enough to supplant our domestic needs. In other words we become self sufficent. So, when there are upheavals, who cares...

There is something to be said about our "national security" from that standpoint.... I don't want to have to depend on Nigeria Warlords, Bananna Republic Dictators, or folks who have spent to long in the heat going crazy for my fuel needs when they can be met domestically.