The Strange Energy Budget of Ethanol Production

joeflies writes "The San Francisco Chronicle published an article regarding research on how much fuel is required to make Ethanol. The results indicate that it make take 6 times more energy than the end product delivers."

Comments

The real future is not in corn

[1967mustangman]

Ethanol has long been a problem. The real insteresting prospect is the company up in Canada that is creating ethanol from the woddy portions of plants with a genetically modified bacteria see this slash dot story http://science.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=05/01/0 7/1846247&tid=14

Re:comparisons?

[kherr]

Minnesota Department of Agriculture has a comparison of energy costs to produce different types of fuel. Treat this as a starting point for information.

People seem to forget that we don't pump oil out of the ground and into our gas tanks, it requires some serious refining. I've also heard that ethanol processing essentially removes the sugars from the corn, leaving a high-protein slurry that can be used as animal feed. Since it's high in protein and low in carbohydrates it's a more efficient feed and causes lower emissions from the cows. Heh.