the epa has approved 15% gasahol

Dune said:
By the way, bio-diesel is primarily diesel, with from 1-20% vegetable oil added. The best case is 20%, still burning a lot of diesel.
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actually, best case is B100 grade, which most modern farm tractors and vehicles can utilize....B20 capacity is now standard equipment on all Chrysler diesel engines......

interesting note, did you know the first flex fuel vehicle was the Ford Model T made between 1907 and 1928?......it's carburetor was specifically calibrated to work on either ethanol or gasoline or any mixture of the two.....
 
best idea I've heard so far is a proposal the Japanese were working on....

ethanol from seaweed grown in salt water.....imagine huge floating seaweed farms harvesting cellulose for ethanol production on one end, harvesting farmed fish at the other....makes me want to go out and buy stock in the company....

http://pinktentacle.com/2007/03/seaweed-as-biofuel/
 
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PostmodernProphet said:
best idea I've heard so far is a proposal the Japanese were working on....

ethanol from seaweed grown in salt water.....imagine huge floating seaweed farms harvesting cellulose for ethanol production on one end, harvesting farmed fish at the other....makes me want to go out and buy stock in the company....
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You could never site this off any coast in America. Remember Ted Kennedy's battle with windmills?

Good idea though. Do they recycle the fish poop to fertilize the algae?
 
Mott the Hoople said:
Good post SF...and no anti-liberal rant (are you feeling well?). That emphasises my point. There are better crops that can be used on non-arable land for biofuel production then corn or sugar cane or other food crops.
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Let the market decide which crops to use. My beef (no pun intended) is using valuable farmland to grow fuel, a much less valuable commodity than food.

Who's SF?
 
Damn Yankee said:
Do fish eat that crap?
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uh, yes.....one of the most common edible herbivore fish is the talepia.....

carp also, but it is less popular in the US.....it is a mainstay in China and Japan.....grunts and croakers are also herbivore food fish.....and lots of fish are omnivores......
 
Mott the Hoople said:
Using food crops to produce fuel grade alcohols doesn't really make a whole lot of sense. It's neither cost affective or sustainable in the long run. There are cellulosic plants well suited for producing alcohol that will grow on non-arable land which are much better suited for this purpose. Using crops like corn is important in that it can begin to produce the political and economic will to create the infrastructure for alcohol production and distribution by getting the buy in, economically and politically from farmers and agribusiness.
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http://www.solixbiofuels.com/

an example....
 
PostmodernProphet said:
actually, best case is B100 grade, which most modern farm tractors and vehicles can utilize....B20 capacity is now standard equipment on all Chrysler diesel engines......

interesting note, did you know the first flex fuel vehicle was the Ford Model T made between 1907 and 1928?......it's carburetor was specifically calibrated to work on either ethanol or gasoline or any mixture of the two.....
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Sure best case is B100, which ANY diesel can run on with only minor modifications.

Real case is that B20 or less is what is being used, still eighty percent imported carbon releasing fossil fuel.

Interesting note, any gasoline engine ever made can run on alcohol, either ethanol or methanol with minor modifications.
 
PostmodernProphet said:
a much cheaper, domestic fossil fuel....as is natural gas, another source of electricity.......
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A cheap, dirty fuel which is destroying the enviroment it is mined in, contributing to global warming and poluting the earth with deadly mercury and causing acid rain. Far worse than that though is that coal is an unbeleivable resourse for manufacturing and burning it should be criminal.

Natural gas should be used as a bridge fuel for transportation till electric is further developed, not wasted in a false circular ethonol economy.

http://blog.heritage.org/?p=6300
 
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Dune said:
A cheap, dirty fuel which is destroying the enviroment it is mined in, contributing to global warming and poluting the earth with deadly mercury and causing acid rain. Far worse than that though is that coal is an unbeleivable resourse for manufacturing and burning it should be criminal.

Natural gas should be used as a bridge fuel for transportation till electric is further developed, not wasted in a false circular ethonol economy.

http://blog.heritage.org/?p=6300
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it is far more expensive to modify vehicles to operate on natural gas than to modify them to run on ethanol.....

and this "false circular ethanol economy" claim is oil company propaganda.....

ethanol makes use of things that were otherwise going to waste, and despite what you claim, corn was in fact something going to waste in the late 1990s, and turns it into energy that reduces our reliance on imported fuel......

this is what you used to see in the Midwest even ten years ago....we had so much corn we didn't know what to do with it....prices were under $2 a bushel....

341702865_3673932fd8.jpg
 
PostmodernProphet said:
it is far more expensive to modify vehicles to operate on natural gas than to modify them to run on ethanol.....

and this "false circular ethanol economy" claim is oil company propaganda.....

ethanol makes use of things that were otherwise going to waste, and despite what you claim, corn was in fact something going to waste in the late 1990s, and turns it into energy that reduces our reliance on imported fuel......

this is what you used to see in the Midwest even ten years ago....we had so much corn we didn't know what to do with it....prices were under $2 a bushel....

341702865_3673932fd8.jpg
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When you start making it from waste, great. Right now it is being made from food.
 
PostmodernProphet said:
yes....or change the gaskets......if you want to drive an antique, take care of it....don't expect the world to remain static for your benefit.....
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I'd sell the car but it's a real chick magnet. Occasionally, I've been at a red light and women crossing the street have come over to talk with me. Using canes or pushing their walkers they told me their Buford or Homer or Elroy had a car just like that when they first dated. Then they'd take a furtive glance at the big back seat! :whoa:
 
Damn Yankee said:
Anyone who's driving a classic or antique car and hasn't torn the engine down to replace the cork gaskets is dealing with a huge leaker anyway. :palm:
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The original flat head engine was rebuilt but not the carb. The carb is the only thing that hasn't been rebuilt. That will be my project this year. I have the gasket kit.
 
Dune said:
When you start making it from waste, great. Right now it is being made from food.
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you're having trouble understanding this aren't you.....corn, in the US, was going to waste.....if it had value as food it wouldn't have been lying on the ground going to waste....corn currently has value....not because it's needed as food, but because it can be used to produce ethanol......

I will repeat what I pointed out earlier.....the greatest part of US corn production goes for animal feed......the brewer's mash which is the by product of corn ethanol production is still valuable as animal feed, in fact is a better animal feed than the unprocessed corn.....thus, none of that portion of US corn production used for animal feed causes an increase in the cost of our food.....

the second largest portion of US corn production goes into corn syrup.....the primary use of corn syrup from US corn production is canned beverages......the cost of your can of Coke, if corn prices tripled, would rise three cents.....thus none of the second largest portion of US corn production used for corn syrup causes a significant increase in the cost of our food....
almost none of our US corn production is exported to third world nations to feed starving people....thus, the use of US corn production for ethanol has no impact on the number of people starving in third world countries.....

now you can try to refute that if you wish, but you cannot ignore it and pretend ethanol causes world hunger or causes you any hardship.....even if you had a johnny cake addiction, your corn meal would cost you 75 cents a day instead of a quarter....{and that's factoring in the grocer's profit, the cost of transporting it to your store, the cost of packaging, and the cost of processing.....the farmer's share for the raw corn is around a nickel}......
 
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the simple fact is this.....the cost of the petroleum used to ship your food from the processor to your local grocery store contributes more to the cost of your food than the corn used to make the ethanol that replaces it.......
 
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