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The New Ethanol Blend May Damage Your Vehicle
Hugh Pickens writes writes "About 80 percent of the gasoline consumed in the U.S. is blended with ethanol, primarily with a 10 percent mix of ethanol, generally derived from corn. Now Kate Sheppard writes that the Environmental Protection Agency has approved a new policy that will allow states to raise the blend to up to 15 percent ethanol (also known as E15), approved for use for cars and light trucks from the model year 2001 and later. A few weeks ago, AAA issued a statement saying that the EPA's new policy creates the 'strong likelihood of consumer confusion and the potential for voided warranties and vehicle damage.' AAA surveyed vehicle manufacturers, and found that only about 12 million of the 240 million vehicles on the roads today are built to use E15 gasoline. The EPA will require that gas pumps with E15 bear a warning sign noting the blend and that it is not recommended for cars older than the 2001 model year. But what happens if you accidentally use it? 'Nobody really knows what negative effects [E15 is] going to have on the vehicle,' says Brian Lyons, Toyota's safety and quality communications manager. 'We think that there needs to be a lot more study conducted to make sure there are no longer term effects on the vehicle. So far everything we've seen says there will be.' The concern is that repeated, long-term exposure could cause the higher-alcohol-content fuel to degrade engine parts like valves and cylinder heads — which could potentially cost thousands of dollars to replace. Gas station owners don't like it very much either, because they'd likely have to upgrade their equipment to use it. Nor are environmental groups big fans of the EPA's decision, arguing that increasing the use of ethanol can drive up food prices, and isn't the best means of reducing our reliance on foreign fuels. The ethanol lobby is the only group that really seems to like the new rule. 'We've force fed a fuel into every American's car that benefits a few thousand corn farmers and ethanol refiners at the expense of virtually every other American,' says Scott Faber."
My 2010 Honda's manual very specifically says not to use ethanol blends higher than 10%. I'll trust Honda's word over those of the corn lobby.
Oh, no! You have walked into the slavering fangs of a lurking grue!
That's true for every gasoline engine that isn't specifically designed for alcohol. Alcohol makes rubber gaskets dry out and crack, it also does a pretty good job at taking the lubricating oil off of everything. Its a wonder that old motors last hours let alone years on the 10% stuff.
Dear aunt, let's set so double the killer delete select all
This research:
Ethanol Production Using Corn, Switchgrass, and Wood; Biodiesel Production Using Soybean and Sunflower David Pimentel and Tad W. Patzek Natural Resources Research, Vol. 14, No. 1, March 2005 doi:10.1007/s11053-005-4679-8
Which was cited by the article you cited.
Here is another discussion:
http://www.theoildrum.com/story/2006/8/25/221617/881
The latter is more interesting because not only does it point out the economic issues, but also that there are other issues such as water consumption, soil erosion, political costs etc. associated with using ethanol for fuel.
The Oil Drum is a very worthy site because it presents a useful hard economic view of alternative energies. I think it's probably overly pessimistic, however it's probably a lot closer to the truth than a lot of the advocacy positions that appear in the media.
Yep - this is right up there with the MTBE debacle in CA about 10 years ago.
The Cal EPA (yes California has it's own set of idiot Environmental Regulators) decided that we needed Oxygenation in our fuel mix. The Refiners had this great additive that they had NO market for called MTBE that they claimed would do the job. A report was done describing the effect of use of the additive. CalEPA literally removed dozens of pages of negative results from the report documenting that the additive would corrode the neoprene used in Gas Hoses in most vehicles! Did I mention that MTBE is a major carcinogen!
So the state merrily adopts the stuff!
Well, sure enough, CHP starts to have a huge number of car fires in their patrol vehicles as proof that the original report (the suppressed part) was correct! The bureaucrats can't sweep that CHP fleet numbers under the rug.
Then the stuff starts showing up in drinking water all over the place!
The bureaucrats are running around in circles (think circular firing squads) pointing fingers at each other. Turns out that once MTBE enters the Ecosystem, it doesn't leave. The bureaucrats (without any scientific basis) start banning motorboats on reservoirs arguing that they must be all leaking the stuff. Nope - rain! The stuff is in the air, and the rain is bringing it down into the entire water shed.
Finally tally - 20K drinking wells are polluted with the stuff.
Next - it turns out that MTBE doesn't really do the original job it was claimed to!
Well - the public is incensed! How could this all happen! This is about the time the rest of the original report shows up documenting the fact that MTBE destroys gas engines. Everything from lawn mowers to cars had problems with the stuff. A new form of gas hosing was invented to contain this mess.
The public outrage grows and eventually the governor decrees that the stuff will not be allowed into CA gas.
Final insult. The biggest manufacturer of the stuff sues CA for 1 billion dollars because of voided contract with them - and wins!
Excuse me - I've seen this movie before and know how it ends.
Have you compiled your kernel today??
Speaking as someone that lives in a socialist country, bills get passed that favor the politicians, not the corporations or the people.
I actually farm, so I feel the need to step in here and correct you a little bit. The richest soils I know are only 5% organic matter. And while I share your concerns over ethanol production in general, you don't appear to know a whole lot about soil science in general. Continuous cropping of any kind does deplete the soil. But it doesn't deplete it in terms of organic matter (though it can affect that). It depletes the soil of macro and micro nutrients (minerals). And you are wrong about corn being produced by top soil. Crops can grow in soils without any organic matter at all (I know because I've done it), but without organic matter you have to provide 100% of the nutrients the plant needs. N, P, K, S, Cu, Bo, and a host of others. That's part of the core problem with corn ethanol in general: corn is produced by feeding the plants the vast majority of their required nutrients through synthetic fertilizers, which come from fossil fuels (natural gas is the main one).
High organic matter soils are rich because they have a greater capacity to produce the fundamental nutrients by breaking down plant matter. But no matter how you cut it, if you aren't fertilizing in some way (synthetic or manure) you're just mining your soil of nutrients and eventually you'll run out.
Crop rotation has little to do with organic matter or soil richness. Crop rotation is almost all about disease and weed management. Corn farmers do rotate for this reason. Usually it's corn, soybeans, wheat, repeat, which is not enough. There is a small benefit to the soil of doing rotation, particularly when you grow legumes, which fix their own nitrogen and replenish the soil's nutrient levels.
I'm also in a position to comment on your thoughts on food production. The real problem with corn ethanol and food production is that it's driving up costs of all food commodities (wheat, beef, dairy) and inputs at a dramatic rate on a global level. This makes basic food more expensive all across the world. It's now cheaper in Africa to import grain than to grow it themselves, because of the input costs which are priced on a global market (yay for globalization). Not only is this an inflationary cycle, it also directly is affecting starvation in third-world countries who are now dependent on imports and handouts. So while starvation has nothing to do with the amount of food in the world, it's our practices that are directly contributing to it. Hence the criticisms of corn production replacing food production are indeed warranted.