Hidden costs of ethenol

On Fri, 29 Jun 2007 04:28:15 -0700, Denny wrote:

Roger, an unsolved issue with alcohol is that smog is produced... I
have not done the reading to see what the solution to that is likely
some form of catalytic convertor so I'm not going to claim it is a
deal breaker, but it is significant...


My understanding is it is a great Ozone producer. I'm not sure how
that works our chemically...chem 111 and 112 were a long way back.

So as with the new energy efficient light bulbs which contain mercury
we are exchanging one pollution problem for another.

For the ethanol lovers, I am not against ethanol just against muddy
thinking...
TO get ethanol for vehicles you:
*haul seed and supplies
*plow

Don't forget, disk, pack, and drag

*spray pesticides and herbicides
*fertilize
*plant
grow awhile
*knife in nitrogen

Don't forget cultivating.

grow a bit more
*herbicides / pesticides again
grow awhile more

Corn takes a lot out of the land. or rephrased, it's depletes the soil
and its success depends on a very narrow range of growing conditions.

*harvest
*haul
ferment

Several handling/separation/pumping steps

*distill
*haul it again
mix with gasoline, or whatever hybrid fuel you make
*haul it again
and finally pump it onto your vehicle

Every step that has an asterisk uses fuel or chemicals or fertilizer
dependent upon petroleum...
The fuel of your grandchildren will be a hydrocarbon product made from
coal, not corn...

For the optimistic, the current "net energy gain" for corn alcohol
_in-a-*good*_growing_year is about 33%. that means for the equivalent
of every two gallons invested we get 2.66 gallons out. Or IOW we
gained a whole 2/3 of a gallon. So we have a 33% gain, but that
doesn't take into account labor. When labor is added in the true price
of that corn alcohol is astronomical whether we pay for it directly at
the pump, or through subsidies to the grower and processor.


denny