[mdlug] Automotive technical info wanted (only slightly off topic)

[Michael S. Mikowski]

To expound on Aaron's point just a little, since ethanol is /distilled/ 
many, many BTU's are used just heating up the vats of corn mash.  And 
then there is the fertilizer, pesticides (from petroleum!), harvesting, 
distribution (pipelines don't work as they contaminate the fuel).

On Monday 07 May 2007, Drew wrote:
> At 08:21 PM 5/6/07, Aaron Kulkis wrote:
> >Drew, you do realize that Ethanol production consumes more BTUs
> >of energy than it produces... :-/
>
>      I know a bit about the ethanol boondoggle being foisted on us by
> the powers-that-be.
> I've been at this alternate energy search for quite some time now.
>
>      It is true that the way they are doing it is a loser, easily
> confirmed by actually pricing
> the stuff at Meijer. It is known that E85 has two thirds the BTUs per
> gallon as straight
> gasoline, but it is priced at way over that mark.
>
>      However, there are reasons for considering an ethanol-capable
> drive anyway:
>
> * Ethanol can be made from other things besides corn. For one thing,
> I've come across a procedure
>    for breaking down the cellulose in wood pulp by means of sulfuric
> acid, to provide raw material for
>    the yeast to work on. (Cellulose is polymerized sugar.)
>
> * Methanol. is even easier to make, technologically; the process is
> called "destructive distillation
>    of wood. And its behavior is similar enough to the two-carbon
> variety of alcohol that a flex fuel engine
>    *might* be able to digest it, particularly if it's in a gasoline
> blend. (I hear that 4-carbon alcohol
>     (butanol) can be used as-is on gasoline-only engines; though
> there might be some pumping
>     problems below about 25 degrees C (77 F).
>
> * In any event I'd like to get away from having to *buy* the fuel, or
> at least instead switch to buying
>    from someone who doesn't know what they've got and will charge
> considerably less per BTU.
>    I really wanted diesel drive, along with the $70 kit for adapting
> it to burn used cooking oil. Or better
>    yet a steam engine, stirling engine, or similar external
> combustion burn-anything. But again it's
>    something I didn't get much choice on. (A gas turbine might work
> out, but that's for a different
>    topic.) This means that what Meijer charges at their E85 pump may
> be more or less irrelevant.
>
>   (Come to think of it, Meijer also has a natural gas pump, the price
> on which is listed in "$ per
>    gallon equivalent of gasoline", and was set to $1.99 when I looked
> last week. I wonder how
>    accurate the number is, and how much a conversion would cost...)
>
>
> ----
>
> - Drew.
>
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-- 
Mike
www.dynaorg.com