Ethanol gas vs milage

US Energy Independence is the only good reason for using Ethanol. It is one of several good directions we must move in. Thankfully we Prius owners will suffer a lot less $ loss than most auto owners as we hopefully become less dependent on foreign oil.
Many of us remember the service station rationing lines during the early 70's and smiling OPEC ministers parading into frequent meetings to adjust the price upward. World demand may be doing that to us now as well.

 

How is it really energy independence when we have to use so much fossil fuel to produce it?

 

It doesn't support energy independence when we have to use an equivalent amount of petroleum to make the ethanol. If we could do it like they do in Brazil it might be a different story, but not the way we do it with corn.

Tom

 

Oil drawn from foreign wells, shipped in tankers across the ocean, pumped to oil run refineries, delivered in diesel trucks and pumped from electric pumps to our cars also has a hidden cost.
In the gasoline energy to ethanol energy equation there might be an upfront loss but if the energy loss is covered by energy we control then that's a price of freedom.
I'm no expert but my primary concern is that of relying on foreign resources, especially oil.
I'm thinking in terms of controlling our own destiny.The excess (or even wasted) energy we might need to produce ethanol should be absorbed by our own resources. I guess even farm tractors, delivery trucks, etc could be converted to use alternative energy. Coal and natural gas are resources the US has a lot of and could be more effectively used to supplement our own moderate supply of oil. I fear atomic energy due to the disposal issues but will temporarily leave that on the table if needed to make us secure. We can even import some oil just not so much that a sheik in the middle east could harmfully cut us off or jerk us around. Shucks we might even avoid getting sucked into a war while protecting our supply.
It's my understanding that Brazil is self sufficient with ethanol as it's primary auto fuel. Converting our energy supply to make the US self sufficient is the only way we can predictably maintain our way of life. We need to use a lot less oil to produce auto energy and eventually have production energy coming from an initial product that WE control. I don't think ethanol is a cheaper alternative but its growing availability along with technologies like wind,natural gas,hydrogen, electric, and solar will reduce the need to import sooo much foreign oil which would help save us from a cut off or reduced supply down the road.We're better off as a nation exploring and developing all the alternatives now before we don't have a choice.
My concern is that to continue our dependence on foreign oil energy will sooner or later put us in the same boat we road in 38 years ago.
That is the guaranteed formula for disaster our nation is currently courting. I'm wide open to any course I've neglected...as long as the US controls the US's destiny.:rockon:
I'm also too long winded.

 

Thank you for adding the production distinction.
I'm not defending poor production methods..just the end product of ethanol to serve our national need.

 

This podcast (mp3) has very interesting interview regarding corn ethanol. Listen here : http://www.podtrac.com/pts/redirect.../thewattpodcast/tWW59P2-2006-05-28_56kbps.mp3

It's a bit long winded (50 min) and it took me a little while to get used to the guys accent, but take the time to listen and I think you'll find it quite interesting.

 

We have to keep in mind the two distinct uses for ethanol: a fuel (E85), and a fuel additive (E10). As a fuel additive, good; as a fuel in the US, bad.

- As an oxygenating additive it increases octane and is very effective in reducing emission of partially-burned hydrocarbons. The previous used chemical MBTE easily pollutes groundwater when gasoline is spilled, and while not especially toxic has a very bad taste.

- As a fuel it attracts water which can damage systems and engines. Of course they can be designed to withstand that, but most cars on the road now can't. Worse, when made from corn it offers little or no net energy benefit and amounts to a big fat subsidy to US agribusiness. It is infeasible to grow enough sugar plants to meet more than a fraction of the US' fuel needs with ethanol.

 

Thank you.
Yes, it is a bit long and I wanted to get my own questions in while listening
I now see that in the political and economic realities of our day choices become very complex and unfortunately there are no easy (or necessarily right) answers...only opportunities to "choose our own poison."
For our (USA) short term there may be some answers that are very expensive to our environment and pocketbooks. I believe our leaders must become wise and proactive ASAP !
:focus:

 

My question is when we travel in Canada during the summer our gas milage is 54-56MPG (displayed) but in the US it drops down to 51 (at best). Nearly all the gas we buy in the US has the 10% Ethanol sticker on the pump and our home state mandates it. I'm assuming the good mileage in Canada is with ethanol free fuel.

In the winter our (displayed) mileage drops to 45, nearly a 10mpg difference from Canada summer gas.

 

Fleet Farm in Green Bay Wi. sells pure unleaded gas.

 

That means we are in a heap of trouble.

 

I'm a numbers freak and record mileage, per gallon price, total cost and report mpg at every fill up. For the first 3 years I had my Prius, I put only non-ethanol gas in it and was averaging about 50.1 mph. In mid 2007 the gas stations converted to E10. Since I've gone to E10 I'm averaging 43.6mph. When I was vacationing in an area with E15, I averaged 39.7. I pay 3 times for use of Ethanol, increased gas price, a gasoline tax, and the lower mph for using it. I have driven a 2010 Prius as rentals on a number of occasions and the days of 50mph are gone forever!

One note, the displayed mph average is +10%/-5% accurate. It tends to overstate the mpg in city driving and understate it when the majority of drive is 55+ mph.

 

Q: what is "milage"???

I checked my online dictionary and got this reply:

Milage, it turns out, isn't in the free Merriam-Webster Online Dictionary, where you just searched.

 

Try including an "e" in the spelling

From Websters Online :

 

That's real interesting geode2. A lot of people make claims of drastically reduced mileage with E10 but few have the accurate data that you do to back it up.

As I'm sure you've already read the decrease in energy content with E10 should only be about 3%. Yet your drop in mileage is about 13% which seems very strange.

But you're not the only one to make that type of claim and you do seem to have data to back it up. So I wonder if there's something tricky going on with the blending of E10 in some regions. I mean what if they're using the fact that the ethanol increases the octane rating to allow them to use cheaper or inferior base gasoline to mix with it. Hey I don't know if this is even possible, I'm just throwing it out there as pure speculation because I just cant otherwise understand those figures like 13% drop that people often seem to report.

Here in Australia I've never noticed this effect. Sometimes (actually mostly) I use regular (without ethanol) and sometimes I use E10, but I never see more than about 2% to 3% drop in mileage as a result. Is it possible that I'm getting better quality E10 out here than you are there geode?

 

50.4 MPG average from 33,139 miles of driving using nothing but E10 with my 2010.

47.7 MPG average from 118,185 miles of driving using nothing but E10 with my 2004.

No complaints here... except everytime there's a smog alert. Sure wish all cars were cleaner. At least ethanol helps with that type of emission.
.

 

Tom

 

I wonder what I would get for mileage without ethanol. I still average 48-53mpg with it.

 

Welcome,
Good to see someone else from Green Bay, and a Paper Converting guy to boot.