Ethanol

What about electric cars? Charge the batteries by wind/solar power at home and have some system where you pay a bit of money to switch your battery for a fully charged one when you run out on long journeys at petrol stations or something. I dunno.

 

ethanol is fucking stupid.
we are burning food in our cars!! doesnt that seem a little fucked up?

 

I personally find the fact that we have cars more strange than burning food to run em.

 

yes! if we are still driving cars 50 years from now, humanity will likely become extinct in a couple of hundred, if it hasn't already in less then that 50.

methane from farts and compost and so one is just fine for heating and cooking with, but the use of combustion in any form for anything else is collectively suicidal for the human species, and possibly the planet's entire web of life.

the automobile is a big part of the ass we need to get our heads out of if we want to have a future. and of course if most people don't really care if they bring about the end of life as we know it or not, well it's not like we can't or won't, it's just that we don't have to and some of us would rather not see it all end in such totally unneccessary futility.

i'm not talking about giving up comfort zone here, and throwing it all out with the bath water won't help all that much, not as long as there's this many of us. well it will help in a sense, but it won't help humans at all.

but it's trying to impress each other that's driving all this stupidity that's destined to kill us off eventually if we don't wake up about it.

ok, so maybe you COULD run cars on flywheels or big mainsprings like there used to be in pocket watches. somebody actually suggested doing that before the gasoline engine was invented.

but the trouble with cars, or at least cars as we know them, besides, i mean the use of combustion to propell them, is all that real estate consumed by paved streets and roads, and what that does to the micro-climate, not to mention the habitats of other life forms.

and it's all so blinkin unneccessary. there ARE other ways! even to have mechanical transportation if that's what people want.

and i do have a certain fondness for it myself.

only time will tell of course, about things like consensi, and what turns out to be practical politicaly and culturaly. i'm realistic enough to understand everything isn't going to turn out like my ecotopian fantasies.

but cars, propelled by burning anything, in any form, and the generating of electricity by doing so, just arn't in a long term future if there is to be one.

=^^=
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Why is it "strange" for people to travel in cars? Isn't there some cheetah or some animal, that can run at up to 70 mph? Humans can run at maybe 8 mph, in short little bursts. But we are intelligent and designed to use machines to make our lives easier. And of course, machines require abundant and cheap energy, to reduce poverty throughout the world.

Think about it, for just a few seconds. Without cars and trucks, don't you suppose you would have quite a lot less stuff in your home? People would be a lot poorer, if all they had, they had to carry all the way from the store or factory. Wait a minute. What factories? Factories couldn't sell enough stuff, to be economically feasible.

But we are so stuck on gasoline, because electric cars can only go around 50 to 100 miles on a charge, and flywheels and springs couldn't do more than a few miles on a winding. Likewise with running cars on "compressed air." It would be nice if people with all those wacked ideas, actually considered the physics. A tank of gasoline will take a car some 300 or 400 miles or more. That's rather hard to beat, and that's the obstacle to be considered. You have to do better than that, to sell the "car of the future."

Well that's why I advocate flying cars, like on The Jetsons cartoon, or like they have in a few video games or movies. But we are still missing a few key technological inventions, say like "anti-gravity emittors" to eliminate the bulky and problematic wings, that can ice up in bad weather, and are prone to problems like wind-sheer.

The environment will burn fuel, whether we want it to or not. It produces more than it can use. Either we have wildfires, or maybe with more "controlled burns" in cars and furnaces and harvesting of lumber, maybe we can reduce the wildness of nature, to be more human-friendly.

 

Ethanol pollutes alot. Since all of the corn farmers are pressured to produce alot of corn, they rely on fertilizers (esp. cow poop), pesticides, etc. and it pollutes our waters, and in order to turn it it to ethanol, it produces alot of pollution, too. Since most of the corn in the US is grown in the midwest, the pollutants eventually travels down to rivers into bigger rivers such as the mississippi and down into the gulf of mexico. there are huge dead zones in the gulf, and an increase especially from the increase in corn farming. And also, more forests are being cut down to grow the crops, and corn drains nutrients out of the soil so fast, so eventually nothing could be grown in those areas. I got all this info from an article in the St. Louis post-dispatch.

I think people should depend less on their cars. I mean, with all the obese people in America, walking every now and then could help them, too. It seems like a more logical approach than waiting for some 'miracle science' to fix everything.

 

Animals "pollute." Plants "pollute." (oxygen, overgrowth, "chemical warfare" against other plants, which is amoral, not immoral, because plants have no soul and do not care.) But it's all biodegradable. Forests are full of rot and fungus. (mushrooms, lichens, rotting leaves, etc.)

But we have to do something, since the greedy oil companies are colluding to price-gouge us on gasoline. So of course let farmers produce ethanol to power their own equipment, and sell if they can. But ethanol yields lower gas milage than gasoline, so I am not so keen on burning it in cars, as I once was, before I heard that. But there are other formulations, or so I heard on TV, so there may be some potential yet?

Without cars and trucks, our modern and more comfortable way of life, just wouldn't work. And the world now has way too many people in it, to back to whatever Dark Ages of the past. "There is no going back," I heard somewhere. And of course people just have to have their precious darling babies. I wouldn't dare argue against the endless compelling reasons why people have so many children as they do. More and more people would be glad to live--but of course. God commanded people to be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth.

But we aren't all obese, and at least some of us, need to get to work on time. If I am already running late, and don't have enough time for everything, where am I going to find the "over an hour" to walk to work? Is it even safe to walk so far? Walk even in inclement weather?

Pollution is caused by incomplete technologies. The answer then, isn't to get rid of the machines that help enhance our lives, but to make them better, reduce the cost by using better automation and machines to produce them, and complete the technologies.

Now yeah, I think one could walk to their mailbox. What's up with people having to start up their cars, just to drive a few feet? And rather than paying the greedy oil corporation monopoly's game and driving to the gym, boycott them by eliminating uncessary trips, and go for a walk.

There should be even more cars, for all those people in India and China getting cars, but people could consider driving a bit less. Read good books. Why must people always be "doing something?" Why not sit down with a good book or video game, and relax?

 

Cars are just one more technology created to simplify our lives.

Thus, I do think its time to let the gasoline powered automobile go. It is simply another technology, one that has disastrous effects on our planet, and its time we stop using it.

I would GLADLY trade the convience and simplicity of day-to-day American life for the FUTURE OF OUR PLANET anyday. This planet is all we've got. This is it. If I have to give up the comfort of an easier life, in exchange of the future of this planet and mankind as a whole, I would do so without giving it a second thought.

So yes, you may be inconvienced by the current climate crisis. Try to rememeber that it is for a purpose greater than most can even imagine.

I mean, hey, we did this to the planet. This is OUR fault. Thus it is our responsibility to curb global warming in any way we can- even if it means giving up the automobile. Dont get me wrong, I know the gas-powered automobile isnt going anywhere anytime soon. Big Oil has way too much influence over our country, and people are too relient on their ways for the automobile to dissapear overnight.

What I think we are going to see is an increase in ethanol use, thus polluting more, driving up the price of foods etc. Ethanol is basically putting chewing gum in the hole in the boat. It is a solution, yes, but it is temporary, and sooner or later we will be forced to confront the issue again, and SOLVE it, not just brush it aside.

If you are going in it with the mind-set that we are too set in our ways to make any serious change- then we won't. People have to shed this mindset that we cannot change what has been in effect for so long. That is exactly why it has taken us so damn long, to make such MINISCULE progress in curbing the disastrous effects of global warming. It starts with an attitude, so we need to make it a positive one.

Will discontinued use of pollution-rich habits force us to alter our ways of life? Of course. We can and will adapt, we are human beings after all. The question is are you ready to give up comfort and convience for the sake of the planet?

I sure hope so.

 

I'd question why since the seventies when farmers received their first aid checks for the development of ethanol, was it's free distribution controlled until now? What's different?

What exactly has the little working man actually done to the planet? But now we will have to pay to fix a problem caused by industry, both the military suppliers and the globalists. They are marketing to our fears and they have found a receptive market. They will not lose money, but we will pay higher fuel costs, and higher food costs. They come out the winners once again, while we send our young people overseas to procure resources to feed their industries.

End war, and you will limit pollution in the environment more than buying a hybrid car. But their ads and Gore's film don't mention that option.

 

hmmmm

 

It's interesting how most of the "renewable" energy alternatives don't seem so viable when you examine them closely. I planned to make biodiesel for my jetta (it's not new, and I'm not yuppie scum ), then I discovered I'd have to handle toxic chemicals, so now I just fill up with the stuff when I can find it. The problem with fuel cells is the environmental impact of the chemicals used in them, and how do you dispose of them responsibly? Those low wattage bulbs are great (I've replaced all the bulbs in my house with them), too bad they contain mercury.

The bottom line, as someone has suggested, is we need to curtail our consumption of energy, period, the first step being to focus on efficiency and life style changes.

It would be helpful if our politicians weren't in bed with the big oil companies, whose primary focus is to maximize profits and our dependency on oil till the oil's gone, rather than developing more fuel efficient forms of transportation.

 

Some of us have already cut our consumption to the bone. When will our governments cut their's by cutting out wars and feeding the hugest energy consumer out there, the Military Industrial Complex?

 

I think I'll take a different tack here. Rather than "macro" issues (is ethanol the best energy choice for the US/the "first world"/everyone?), I'd like to look at the "micro" issue (is fueling my car with ethanol a good idea FOR ME?)

From what I see, I can purchase black strap molasses as a start for my ethanol, such that the end ethanol product is under $2.00/USG (note that ethanol is roughly 30% less energy-dense than gasoline, but still economically viable). Or, I could see about purchasing waste carbs from my nearby university, but I'd need to be totally legit (BATFE permit for the still) to be so "visible."

Since the molasses is (essentially) a "waste" product from the production of sugar, it wouldn't have the same externalities as using a first-level food product such as corn. Also, as ethanol is water-soluable, ground-water pollution is minimized compared to petroleum. Plus, for those who still care, buying ethanol is more likely to be domestically made and lower the trade defecit (as well as decrease the need for more "oil wars.")

I mean, I'm gonna do it anyway, because the engineering challenge interests me, but can I have something roughly resembling a good conscience about it?

From what I understand, ONE professor has claimed that ethanol production is a net energy loss. Everyone else has claimed (modest) energy gain, and his research has been discredited, mostly because he neglected to include the value of the waste products (CO2, depleted corn sold as feed) as well as consider the externalities (such as fewer wars) associated with ethanol use.

Fuel cells are a STORE of energy, not a SOURCE. Something's gotta charge the fuel cell, and where I live, it'd probably be coal. The neat thing about fuel cells is that they make electric cars feasible (assuming the cost comes down) because they allow realistic range without unduly heavy cars from Pb/acid or Ni/mh batteries.

Also, I'd prefer not to brew the stuff in my studio apt, but rather get some "synergy" out of the waste CO2 by brewing somewhere that someone might get benefit from it for his "house plants." How might I discreetly arrange this?