Downside of ethanol

As spring is here, we will soon see public service announcements on when to mow the grass and when to fill our vehicle gas tanks to reduce the pollutant ozone in our atmosphere.

In The Star I read that ethanol-blended gasoline is being mandated by the state of Missouri (4/1, Local, “KC awaits Blunt’s waiver of ethanol mandate”). According to the article, ethanol creates more smog and dirtier, less healthy air.

So with ethanol, will it really matter when we mow our lawns or fill our gas tanks if the government decrees we use dirtier gasoline? It’s “through the looking glass, down the rabbit hole, and take a seat at the Mad Hatter’s tea party.”

I am sure our expert environmental government legislators will come up with more great ideas. Perhaps they will outlaw incandescent light bulbs and replace them with a more expensive product that can only be disposed of at a hazardous waste site. Nah, that would never happen.

David P. Yurkovich
Overland Park

The driving and taxpaying public has been duped. Somehow our elected legislators have determined that alcohol in gasoline is a good thing, a green thing.

Alas, this is not so, Chicken Little. The mandated alcohol-in-gasoline regulation has only driven the cost of corn and wheat products significantly higher while giving us a reduced-energy product that costs more to make than it returns.

If it were not for the government subsidization of ethanol, this would never have happened. This is a failed policy that’s good for some farmers and Archer Daniels Midland, perhaps, but it’s a rip-off for drivers and taxpayers.

Ethanol has only two-thirds the energy of gasoline. It is distributed by truck, further increasing the cost of driving. One again, the poor citizen taxpayer is the victim of what’s known as the law of unintended consequences.

Worse yet, the pumps don’t have to tell you if they have ethanol or not.

This fiasco is reminiscent of the days of prohibition of alcohol, in reverse. How can we correct this dreadful mistake?

Bob Patterson
Lee’s Summit

Comments

[lamoine]

Talk about hoof and mouth disease, you are talking to someone who has over 20 years experience in energy I would suggest you get a copy of Dr. Robert Zubrin's book, "Energy Victory", Dr. Zubrin is an aerospace engineer by trade and designed NASA's mars program. I suggest you read his book and look into his back ground and get some common sense ideas about our energy problem in the US. You might also try reading "The end of Oil" by Paul Roberts, on the history of energy in the world. Then you may have the back ground necessary to look at all energies with an open mind.

[NoMoreMrNiceGuy]

lamoine, you are inccorect. Ethanol is an oxidizer and it reduces mpg, burns cleaner yes but costs substantially more to produce. Corn ethanol affects the price of corn on the open market (supply and demand).
Incidentally, it appears you are not aware of who capitalizes the most from a gallon of gas at the pump, the US government. They retain more profit than anyone. FACT.
Apparently you did not watch the hearings.
Oil companies have a right to make a profit, I hardly think 8-11 cents per gallon profit is ludicrous. Maybe a reduction in the consumption txa would relieve some of the rpice at the pump?
BTW - at the hearings, the Democrats were nmore concerned with profit control and confiscation to redirect those funds to advertising adn special interests programs, not reduce the price at the pump. A sign telling me to conserve for "the chidlren's future" is not going to reflect less $$$ at the pump. I highly suggest you educate yourself in regards to the enegry sector before inserting your foot in mouth.

[lamoine]

If ethanol is so bad for the air, why do, Denver, Chicago, Phoenix, Salt Lake City, Minneapolis and St Paul have cleaner air than before they started using ethanol 5 years ago. No more smog alert days, wouldn't that be nice in every city.

[jack]

Last stuudy I saw suggested the payback on ethanol is about 30 years. That is, the time it takes to get back to zero on greenhouse gases, including everything (construction of plants, etc, not just growing) is about 30 years. That is because the benefit is small.

Switchgass is supposed to be better. Early incadescant bulbs were so inefficient and expensive that many hung onto their natural gas lighting systems until forced to abandon them.

Sure gald the light bulb wasn't abandoned because the first try wasn't all that good. Maybe we should treat new energy sources the same way. Hopefully we'll go from not very good and expensive to cheap and efficient over time. Just like the light bulb.

[Stifled Freedom]

"It is distributed by truck, further increasing the cost of driving."

So is gasoline.

Ethanol can be derived from a number of sources. From corn it is not very efficient. From other cellulose sources it is efficient. See this article which states switchgrass delivers 540% of the energy required to grow it. Corn delivers only 25%.

http://www.sciam.com/article.cfm?id=grass-makes-better-ethanol-than-corn

[Stifled Freedom]

sorry about my many typo errors....I am in a hurry today.

[Stifled Freedom]

We have been importing food for decades. Most beef comes from Brazil now. When we got totally dependent upon imported food, we will be completely and totally vulnerable to gouging.

I saw a TV documentary last night that stated the exact opposite about the cleanliness of ethanol additives to gasoline. The show was about the MTBE disaster as a gasoline additive. in the early 90s, EPA said gas in urban areas needed an oxygenated additive to burn cleaner and mandated it gasoloine in urban areas in the summertime.

The two chemical choices for additives where ethanol and MTBE. Refineries choose MTBE over ethanol because they would manufacture MTBE themselves from isobutylene which is a byproduct of refining. They did not have to purchase ethanol from outside sources.

MTBE turned out to be a disaster becuase it is a suspectec carcinogen and it later leaked from many underground tanks at gas stations and contaminated ground water supplies. MTBE is highly mobile in soil and dissolves easily in water making it very tough to remove down to ppd levels in drinking water.

Ethanol is commonly consumed in your alcoholic beaverages.

Nevertheless, the show clearly implied that ethanol would make for cleaner burning gasoline.

[Casady]

Here's an interesting analysis of the current situation that may be of interest.

http://www.businessweek.com/lifestyle/content/apr2008/bw2008041_945564.htm

[lamoine]

Once again the "oil" word is out there. If the oil companies were not getting subsidized in the Iraq, we would be paying more than double for our gas right now and a study just realeased last week said, if it were not for ethanol in our fuel right now, gas would be 48 cents higher.

As for importing food, we have always imported produce and some food items, but the net exports still remains above the average for the last five years. There is only 11 cents worth of wheat in a loaf of bread and only 15 cents worth of corn in that box of cereal you had this morning. Even if the prices of corn and wheat double those foods should not go up in price very much.

Brazil has become energy independent in 10 years, would that not be something we should try for here? How many more lives do we need to lose in Iraq before we've had enough.

[Rogue]

isn't there currently a government subsidy of 50 cents a gallon on ehanol? Isn't corn costing $4.00 plus a bushel, and aren't we for the first time importing "food".

Lets see now, we grow our fuel, and import our food....Hmmmmmm, I think I like it better the other way around.

[Don S]

The forced inclusion of ethanol is yet another handout to a select few, particularly gubernatorial relatives, at the expense of an overwhelming majority of citizens and businesses. It will do nothing but drive the price of everything up and our air quality down. Thanks, Matt.

[lamoine]

Where does this guy get his info. Every study that has ever been done, and turned over for "peer" review, about ethanol has shown it lowers green house gas emissions and produces more energy than it takes to make it. That is a fact, not miss information that has been spread around by the "OIL" companies who do not want to lose one gallon of sales.