re
"Any plant based fuel grown in soil is
subject to all kinds of vagaries - blight, drought, locust plagues"

Brazil does quite well with cane ethanol , very successful at it, for
running cars there.
Big National Geographic story on it a few years ago.
The processing plants even generate their own electricity from the fuel
they produce.

not saying it's perfect or a panacea  ...just that at least that one
country has done a lot in the direction of not using fossil fuels for cars.
I believe they are a net exporter of petroleum even.

On 9/2/2013 11:21 AM, JRodgers wrote:
> Nice write-up, Marc.
>
> My experience with alcohol based fuel - Methanol with a dash of benzene
> for ignition and combustion mixed with a bit of castor oil for
> lubrication!  Works great - for model airplane engines!!
>
> But with cars and the like - no experience. BUT -  it's an engineering
> problem primarily so far as the engine is concerned, and I'm sure that
> inventive minds is working that out even as we discuss the issue.
>
> But - I perceive a problem. Any plant based fuel grown in soil is
> subject to all kinds of vagaries - blight, drought, locust plagues, you
> name it - it's gonna happen and result in fuel shortages.  I consider
> corn based fuels for any long term application to be sheer folly. Feed
> stock corn may be working for fuel for the time being - but you are
> right - at the very least it should not be considered part of the food
> supply as well. Virtually all feed stock corn nowadays is GMO corn  and
> I don't let that stuff anywhere near my dinner table. In fact - I don't
> even like meats from livestock that have been fed feed stock corn
> because its all GMO these days.  I look for grass fed if I can find it.
> But that is a separate issue. The use of vast regions to produce nothing
> but corn for fuel, and the huge water consumption to grow it and then
> process it, are going to become very limiting factors in using it for
> fuel production. That kind of use and consumption is one more step
> towards screwing up the biosphere in which we live - and after a point -
> it will become unlivable. And we are moving relatively rapidly in that
> direction, IMHO.
>
> John R
>
> On 9/1/2013 10:03 PM, Marc Perdue wrote:
>> I have been told that people shouldn't listen to my comments about
>> ethanol because I was actually in the business of producing ethanol
>> for fuel for a time. I just wonder if anybody else here would actually
>> go into such a business without doing their research first and finding
>> out if it makes sense. I sure wouldn't, and didn't.
>>
>> A lot of emotional arguments have been made here about why we should
>> hate ethanol, claiming there's lots of studies that have been done
>> supporting these arguments. Fine. Cite your sources. My information is
>> from actually doing the work in the field. I do happen to agree that
>> we shouldn't be increasing the amount of ethanol in our fuel, but my
>> reasons are different. Ethanol is not the right renewable fuel source
>> to replace gasoline; we need a radically different solution to our
>> transportation problems. Ethanol can help in the interim, but it's no
>> long-term solution. Incidentally, I'd be willing to bet that a Vanagon
>> could be easily converted to run on 100% ethanol, if one wanted to.
>> But I'm not recommending that.
>>
>> At any rate, you use what feedstock makes sense for you, economically
>> and given your plant setup and what kinds of feed stocks you can
>> process. Beets and sugar cane are much easier to produce ethanol from
>> because you don't have to break down starches to produce sugar, as you
>> do with corn. Much of the energy of ethanol production using corn is
>> in the process of cooking the corn to break down the starches into
>> sugar. We used a number of different feed stocks, including waste
>> brewex from Anheuser-Busch, government-surplus milo, as well as corn.
>> The other feed stocks did NOT produce other useful products, so they
>> tended to be less cost-effective.
>>
>> The ethanol used as an oxygenate in gasoline comes from many different
>> feed stocks, though it is primarily corn in this country. It is
>> something we know how to grow well.
>>
>> Regarding it taking away from the food channel, you have to keep in
>> mind that the corn used to produce ethanol is feed corn, which is fed
>> to cattle. If you take only that corn and don't increase the amount of
>> corn grown just to produce ethanol (granted, a big if...this is just
>> for the sake of discussion), you are making no net change to the food
>> channel. The reason is that you take a bushel of feed corn and produce
>> not only 2.5 gallons of 190-proof ethanol, but you also have a
>> higher-grade, more easily digestible feed stock for cattle and other
>> livestock. This also addresses the other issue, which is true, that it
>> takes more BTUs to produce a gallon of ethanol than is actually in
>> that gallon. BUT, you are not only producing ethanol, you are
>> producing other products at the same time. You have to look at the
>> whole process holistically, not just at the production of ethanol
>> alone.
>>
>> Regarding the amount of water used in the process, that is a concern
>> and an issue that needs to be addressed in the short-term, while we
>> find other fuel sources for our cars, or develop entirely new means of
>> transportation. The use of ethanol in gasoline is only a temporary,
>> transitional method to reduce the use of the very toxic, very bad for
>> the environment MTBE.
>>
>> I've already written on this list about the BTU content of ethanol and
>> run the numbers to look at differences in mileage of gasoline versus
>> gasoline with ethanol. Kim Brennan's observations are very interesting
>> and I think he is onto something with regards to the setup of the
>> engine management system. I'd like to see more data on that. The
>> results I've seen in my van, an '87 Westy with auto tranny and Boston
>> Bob big valve engine, are much more in line with what you'd expect to
>> see, mileage drop of 2-3%. I have not had any issues with the fuel
>> system of my van that I can document as attributable to running
>> gasoline with ethanol in it. I most certainly have had issues in lawn
>> mowers and other such equipment, as has been noted here before.
>>
>> Ben, while this is, or can be, an emotional and/or loaded issue, I'm
>> not so sure it's a political issue. We all want to be sure we can have
>> this particular means of transportation, which our Vanagons represent,
>> that afford us a particular lifestyle, whether it be going to and
>> camping out at music festivals, like I do, or any of the myriad other
>> uses which we on this list put our vans to. This lifestyle is very
>> important to us all and I feel it's important to be having on-going,
>> open, reasonable, and informed discussions about transportation
>> alternatives so that our voices and ideas can be part of a solution,
>> one that has us in mind.
>>
>> Marc P.
>>
>>
>> On Sun, Sep 1, 2013 at 10:56 AM, Dennis Haynes
>> <d23haynes57@hotmail.com> wrote:
>>> I think we use the corn based stuff because we can grow a lot of it.
>>>
>>> Dennis
>>>
>>>
>>> -----Original Message-----
>>> From: Vanagon Mailing List [mailto:vanagon@gerry.vanagon.com] On
>>> Behalf Of
>>> Don Hanson
>>> Sent: Sunday, September 01, 2013 9:36 AM
>>> To: vanagon@GERRY.VANAGON.COM
>>> Subject: Re: Bad fuel economy (solution) Ethanol, LVC
>>>
>>> On Sat, Aug 31, 2013 at 11:17 PM, Dennis Haynes
>>> <d23haynes57@hotmail.com>wrote:
>>>
>>>> The ethanol is really not going to kill our vehicles any more than
>>>> unleaded fuel or modern engine oil or even current antifreeze. The
>>>> ethanol bend helps reduce pollution as it is a safer oxygenate then
>>>> MTBE. The oxygenate helps reduce carbon monoxide emissions
>>>> particularly for short engine cycles and cold climate areas. In
>>>> addition ethanol is a cleaner burning fuel than gasoline. There is
>>>> probably also a benefit of the ethanol burning characteristics
>>>> reducing the formation of NOx. Yes there is an economy and performance
>>>> hit. However the EPA is working to have all of use 15% so we just have
>>>> to adapt. Just like all diesel will be 15% bio-diesel soon.
>>>>
>>>> Dennis
>>>>
>>>
>>>      Just curious about ethanol and it's base.   I have 'heard' that
>>> many
>>> other countries use beets or cane to make their ethanol and that those
>>> crops are a lot more effective than subsidized corn, effective at
>>> getting
>>> the vehicles moved for the least cost ..Some have said it actually
>>> takes
>>> more than a gallon of fuel in the supply chain to produce a gallon
>>> of corn
>>> ethanol.at the 'gas' pump.  How about the sugar beet or sugar cane type
>>> ethanol?   Is that the case there, too?  Or is government-subsidized
>>> corn
>>> ethanol actually THE best way to make this stuff?
>>
>