Commenting on comments

Jim G., commenting about my last post, said that there is some disagreement among experts as to the ratio of energy return from ethanol. Some say you get less out than you put in, some say you get more out. I admit that I have never done a quantitative study of it myself so I'll can only put forth my opinion on the subject.

First, I notice that the detractors always bring up the point that the tractors that harvest the corn run on gasoline and that fertilizer is made from petroleum products. Shouldn't they be doing their calculations by including machinery that runs on Ethanol or E85 or a similar fuel? Isn't the idea to get away from the oil based economy? Also, I'm sure we can find other sources for raw materials to make fertilizer that are not based on petroleum. One of the reasons they started making it that way was the cheap availability of oil. Since that's not true anymore, we should be moving to something else. What about all those horrible lakes of pig excrement and chicken shit that are accumulating outside of factory farms and despoiling the countryside? Can't that be processed into fertilizer?

Second, this sequence of events over the last several years seems more than coincidental to me - Gas prices soar upward. Everyone starts saying "Well, Why can't we use Ethanol for our cars?". Congressmen start passing laws to subsidize Ethanol plants and then corn prices rise. And then the false choice between food or fuel is splashed all over the papers and we are told "Oh no, we can't use ethanol because it takes away food from the hungry. Besides it's not an efficient conversion process. And it's not really ready yet. nope, Can't be done."

And then the oil prices drop again, conveniently, making it harder for ethanol to compete on the market.

"But what about Brazil?" you may ask. "They do it there. They run almost all of their cars on Ethanol."

"That's different" they say. "They use sugarcane instead of corn. It just wouldn't work here unless we use switchgrass, but that technology is 10 or 20 years away."

"Ohhh", says a mollified John Q. Public, before going back into a television/computer/game induced trance.

And so, the tyranny of oil is maintained and those pesky new ideas like using ethanol, or electric cars, or any other technology that would get us off of petrol are quashed again for another 10 or 20 years. [Also, the illusion of advancement is maintained by continuing 'research' into the problem, while very little is done.]

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{I wrote this late at night and it might not be as coherent of an argument as I'd like it to be, more like my pet peeves about the naysayers. But hey, your getting this for free so don't complain. :-P }

Strategic Independence from Oil by Using Ethanol

The following comments and notes were compiled by me over the course of the last few years.
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"... (the) United States market, which consumes nine million barrels of gasoline each day - or roughly 138 billion gallons each year."
- NYT -7/14/2009

Eurekalert - 1/26/2007 "In the United States, ethanol production began in the late 1980s with a handful of plants producing about 170 million gallons. More than 25 years later, the industry has 107 plants that produced more than 5 billion gallons last year."

me- The industry's production capacity will reach 11.4 billion gallons per year once existing construction projects are completed.

NY Times 1/5/07 - The Earth Policy Institute says that 79 ethanol plants are under construction, which would more than double ethanol production capacity to 11 billion gallons by 2008. In addition to the 116 ethanol plants in production, and the 79 under construction, at least 200 more ethanol plants, with a capacity of 3 billion gallons a year, are in the planning stages. (11 + 3 =14 billion gallons)

me- The nation now uses about 140 billion gallons of gasoline per year, and if all of it contained 10 percent ethanol, refiners would need to make 14 billion gallons of ethanol per annum. (79 + 116 + 200 = 395 plants producing approximately 14 billion gallons of ethanol per year. )
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Senate passes Pro-Renewables Energy Bill (AP) 6/22/07 -
"...The legislation provides a bonanza to farmers and the ethanol industry. It requires ethanol production to grow to at least 36 billion gallons a year by 2022, a sevenfold increase of the amount of ethanol processed last year."
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In 2007, Congress ordered huge increases in ethanol use, requiring refiners to blend 20 billion gallons with gasoline by 2015 and a further expansion to 36 billion gallons a year by 2022.
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Goals - 14 billion gallons in 2012 to 36 billion gallons by 2022

38 billion gallons by 2024
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Possible Plan -

2010 - 400 plants producing 14 billion gallons of Ethanol/Year.
All gasoline sold must have 10% ethanol.

2016 - 800 plants producing 28 billion gallons of Ethanol/Year
Alco-line (tm) available in 100%, 95%, 85%, 75%, 50%, 15%. 10%
Car companies will have the goal of converting cars to run efficiently on these grades of Alcoline (tm) (Alcolean, Alcoleen)

2022 - 1,200 plants to produce 36 Billion gallons of Ethanol/Year

2030 - 1600 plants producing 56 billion gallons of Ethanol/Year

2040 - 2,445 plants producing 75 billion gallons of Ethanol/Year

redux - The nation now uses about 140 billion gallons of gasoline per year (2007),,, and if all of it contained 10 percent ethanol, refiners would need to make 14 billion gallons of ethanol per annum.

IF ,,, The United States can keep it's gasoline consumption
@ 140 billion gallons / Year,

THEN, by 2040, HALF of the U.S. Fluid Fuels for transportation will be ethanol or have ethanol as a blending agent. If a Propane/Butane/ & biodiesel program for all Trucks over 5 tons. is also put into action it could give the U.S. Strategic Independence from foriegn oil.

I ended my last post rather abruptly because i got a phone call from a distraught friend. I was going to expound about the book "The High Frontier". That post was getting a little to long though.

I'm still undecided about which direction my reading should go and it seems i have less time for it every year. That's why I can't decide whether to spend that time reading frivolous stuff or serious stuff. Maybe the way I do it now, bouncing back in forth is best.

So I'm going to finish the books I have now, write short reviews for the edification of my audience of 2, :-D , and just leave it up in the air.

more on books

I finally finished that lightweight science fiction book I was reading. It was called "The Viper of Portello". It was ok but I just couldn't seem to get engrossed in it. The main character is the bastard son of a woman who had cheated on her rich husband and then raised her son as part of the family. He has artistic talents but because of his strict upbringing goes into the military and becomes a commando who later acquires the nickname 'Culebra' (a fact the author never seems to tire of telling his readers about, until it loses all power to grip your attention). During the opening chapter his unit goes on a raid, is betrayed and ambushed. The voice he hears before he is knocked unconscious leads to the trail of the betrayers who are revealed much to early in the book to shock. All in all, it is a rather formulaic book and neither the main scenes nor the parts that are supposed to flesh out the characters are captivating. Perhaps it is more interesting to those who like Military Sci-Fi, but even considering that I would have to say, Heinlein did it better.

I would give it 2 out of 5 stars.

I'm still haven't finished the 9/11 commission report. It's a long and very dry account of what led up to that day, what happened that day, and what the US should do in the future. I've had it on my nightstand for about a year now. I'm debating whether to to finish it or not because I have a whole list of related books on terrorism, radical Islamic fundamentalism, and the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan that i was thinking of reading. I've read a couple already and have taken out of the library Benazir Bhutto's "Reconciliation: Islam, Democracy and the West". I've started to read it and will tell you about it in my next post. I was shocked, saddened and dismayed when those bloody savages in Pakistan killed her. I really thought she might bring a new and better government to Pakistan, but those Islamo-fascist murderers just couldn't stand the idea of an intelligent woman having power, could they? ...... So Sad.

The other book I'm reading is "Inside Al- Qaeda: Global Network of Terror." It's as dry as the 9/11 report so far, but maybe once I hack my way past the first chapter it will be better. The odd part about the book is all the typographical errors. I might critique that in my next post also.

I've already red these 3 books,

~"Fiasco:The American Military Adventure in Iraq" by Thomas Ricks
(Penguin Press, NY; 2006)
{an excellent account of the blunders of the Bush administration during the occupation of Iraq}

~"Jawbreaker" by Gary Berntsen and Ralph Pezullo
(Crown Publishers, NY; 2005)
{an account of the war against the Taliban and al-Qaeda in Afghanistan and how the Bushies let Usama bin-Laden escape}

~ "The Looming Tower: Al-Qaeda and the Road to 9/11"
by Lawrence Wright (Alfred A. Knopf, NY, 2006)
{EXCELLENT book. Insight into the origins of the Islamist/terrorist philosophy}

,, hence my dilemma in continuing my reading about this topic. You know how it is, once you've invested time in doing something you don't want to give up on the project. For me, it is usually series of books on a particular subject with some sci-fi thrown in for entertainment. That and watching late night Anime i've recorded from Adult Swim. :-D

After many months of reading a small section at a time, I finally finished reading a lengthy document that was on the web about how the Saturn Rockets and the Apollo program came into being. Not the political aspects, but all the engineering, computer and logistics problems that Werner Von Braun and so many, many others had to solve in order for those elegant giants to work. Landing men on the Moon was definitely one of the great accomplishments of the human species.
And while NASA is currently working on getting us back to the moon and exploring further out, and western civilization seeks to solve the problems of global warming and carbon free energy production, medieval minded barbarians with modern weapons are setting off bombs and killing civilians - for the greater glory of god of course. But I digress.....

After reading that old NASA document* on the Saturn rockets and looking at my Space related reading list, I'm considering concentrating on reading books about the history and future of space travel. I was very inspired in the early 80's by the book "The High Frontier" by Gerard K. O'Neil.

(I was going to write more but I'm involved in a phone call now... I'll finish this later.

* http://history.nasa.gov/SP-4206/contents.htm