When it comes to bio fuels like ethanol, does anyone wonder what will happen when we have a drought?

Question

I think it's stupid to think that corn will save us. Not only do we have to worry about drought and disease to kill the crops, but the vehicles will get 20% less fuel economy with this fuel. It's a bad idea. Write your congressman at congress.org and tell them to think for once. Fuel cells are the best choice.

Answer 1

I think burning anything is a bad idea. Why not use electric? They have much less moving parts to break, and they themselves don't pollute the environment. If we were to use solar energy plants to get the electricity to power the cars then there would be virtually no pollution...

Answer 2

Jeremy,

Great point!  However this is why scientists are trying to reduce the cost of producing cellulostic ethanol.  

Lots of people got it right here.  Corn ethanol is a bad idea, costs to much, too much energy, too much land, etc. etc.  However everyone needs to remember corn ethanol is how we make Jim Beam, Jack Daniels and most Bourbon Whiskey.  Since they have been making corn mash whiskey for many many years it was the first solution they looked at.

Ethanol from prarie grass will require

1 - no irrigation

2 - no pesticides

3 - no fertilizer

4 - it regrows itself every year (perennial)

We're almost there!  Then ethanol prices should come down, (corn bushels are at record highs) to less than 50% of a cost of a gallon of gasoline and it will make sense to fill up with E85 (if you can accept a 25% loss of range out of a tank of fuel.)

Fuel cells will be the eventual solution in 20-30 years or more.  The problem right now is hydrogen occurs nowhere in nature without an oxygen or carbon atom attached.  The energy required to break these bonds will make hydrogen a solution far into the future.  Maybe not in your lifetime.  Definitely not in your congressmans lifetime!

Thanks for the question!  I hope that answered it.

Answer 3

It takes about 900 gal of water to grow 1 acre of corn. This will then be made into about 25 to 30 gals of ethanol.

What! 1acre to grow only 30gals so I would need 12 to 15 acres to make the fuel for my car alone each year!

Answer 4

You are 100% correct, Ethanol is just corruption and a very fast way to make few billion dollars for some private enterprise and big wheels. visit : www.santanaeffect.com and you will see the answer to many situations.

Answer 5

there are other sources for ethanol and not only corn that needs water.theoretically everything organic can be used to produce hydrogen but ethanol is the most effective.however, we should consider what will happen if 20% of our soil which is used to produce food is used to produce energy based plants

Answer 6

come on,dude.

their r people being slaughtered all over the middle east  for oil, and your musing about what will happen to your friggin' corn!?

wake up, dude. oil isn't going anywhere. no matter how much you love your ethanol. seen gas prices lately? seen a bunch of pissed off people holding these pirates accountable?

as long as people r lining up at the pump, instead of lining up in the streets, the oil companies will continue to laugh at you and your corn. in case you have forgotten, oil brings in trillions of dollars to the global players. u think they r going somewhere?

Answer 7

the agricultural security issues of bio-fuels have been little disussed, but they are the same as food security; and intensive mono-crop agriculture is very vunerable to climate pertubations and disease vectors.

but it is clear that bio-fuels require us to make a choice between driving gas-guzzlers and affordable food. already in Mexico the cost of maize has increased, causing hardship to poorer people, directly because of bio-fuel.

Fuel cells are only an intermediate energy store. ie the hydrogen requires energy to make and transport. and they are not yet suitable for mass vehicle production and there is no significant manufacturing or distribution system

Large scale nano-LI batteries are available, they can be charged in 10 minutes; refuel from a socket at home or work directly from grid or home renewable energy source. see www.phoenixmotors.com

Answer 8

I hope that when you say fuel cells, you mean solar power. We might as well use the sunlight we have while we have it! And if we do have a drought, it will probably be because of the sun and not enough rain.

I've also been told that if every household switched one regular lightbulb to an environmentally safe fluorescent bulb that we'd save a significant amount of energy and reduce the number of power outages caused in the summer from air conditioning use, that and keeping our thermostats set no lower than 76 or 78 degrees in the summer. If you think your place is still hot, make or buy some ice and make some lemonade or iced tea, and enjoy a popsicle in the summer! And reduce, reuse, and recycle! Be resourceful! You would be surprised at the things you can do with something you'd normally throw away! Make a compost pile in your backyard out of food scraps and lawn trimmings, but don't put anything in there with sugar, fat, or grease on it, you'll have a bad bug problem! I mean things like vegetable peels, banana peels, orange/citrus rinds, etc.

Answer 9

That still shouldn't adversely affect ethanol production too much.  Normally there is always an overproduction of corn to the point where corn is stored outside in piles in many places.

Also there are millions of acres of land that farmers are paid to leave dormant that could be brought into production to help produce more ethanol if needed.  And if ethanol production failed in the US due to a drought, ethanol could be imported from Brazil to help account for any deficiency.

And actually they aren't 20% less efficient.  They are only 10% less efficient and the lower price accounts for that.  Also the raise in corn prices helps many US farmers instead of these big oil industries and it helps many of them to keep from being way in the poverty level.  There are many farmer families that only make $10,000-$12,000 per year.  And when new farm equipment runs about the cost of a new house (about $150,000 or more).  That doesnt' make it easy for a family who makes that little to keep farming.

Secondly, research is being funded to be able to make ethanol out of corn stalks and different types of tall grasses.  That would greatly increase the amount of ethanol that could be produced.  And since the plants use as much CO2 as the fuel from them would give off, it really shouldn't hurt the environment at all.  Basically the fuel can be regrown whereas oil cannot.

Third, there are already millions of cars on the roads in the US that can run on E85.  And a good distribution network is finally getting established across the US.  So it and bio-diesel are probably our two most eco-friendly solutions until hydrogen technology can be made affordable and a distribution network for hydrogen can be established.

Most all of the automakers have been investion a lot of money into hydrogen research.  And the government has been funding a lot of money to hydrogen research.  But taking a new technology from concept to consumer reality not only takes a lot of money but a lot of time.  There are very few companies that know how to make the components for the hydrogen technology and the process needs to be greatly refined so that the technology can be become much cheaper and mass produced.  Most Americans can't afford a hydrogen car that costs a cool million or two.

Hydrogen is great to aspire to for the future, but until we reach that point to where it is feasible biofuels such as ethanol and technologies such as hybrids and efficient diesel engines are our best choices.

Like they said Rome wasn't built in a day.  Hydrogen cars are still at least another 10-20 years away.  Till then we need to use the best that's available and still continue to fund research towards hydrogen.