Background The use of ethanol as an automobile fuel in the United States dates as far back as 1908, to the Ford Model T. Henry Ford was a supporter of home-grown renewable fuels, and his Model T could be modified to run on either gasoline or pure alcohol.3 Ethanol was used to fuel cars well into the 1920s and 1930s as several efforts were made to sustain a U.S. ethanol program. Standard Oil marketed a 25-percent ethanol by volume gasoline in the 1920s in the Baltimore area.
Ford and others continued to promote the use of ethanol, and by 1938 an alcohol plant in Atchison, Kansas, was producing 18 million gallons of ethanol a year, supplying more than 2,000 service stations in the Midwest.4 By the 1940s, however, efforts to sustain the U.S. ethanol program had failed. After World War II, there was little interest in the use of agricultural crops to produce liquid fuels. Fuels from petroleum and natural gas became available in large quantities at low cost, eliminating the economic incentives for production of liquid fuels from crops. Federal officials quickly lost interest in alcohol fuel production, and many of the wartime distilleries were dismantled. Others were converted to beverage alcohol plants.5 [Page 2] -----snip----- The two most common methods to increase the oxygen level of gasoline are blending with MTBE and blending with ethanol. Because ethanol has a higher oxygen content than MTBE, only about half the volume is required to produce the same oxygen level in gasoline. This allows ethanol, typically more expensive than MTBE, to compete favorably with MTBE for the wintertime oxygenate market. Unfortunately, ethanolās high volatility, measured by Reid vapor pressure (Rvp), limits its use in hot weather, where evaporative emissions can contribute to ozone formation. Nevertheless, ethanolās expanded role as a clean-air additive has allowed it to penetrate markets outside the Midwest (Figure 2). [Page 2] -----snip----- Pure Energy is also developing a new fuel called OxyDiesel, composed of 80 percent diesel fuel, 15 percent ethanol, and 5 percent blending agent to raise cetane levels.11 The company has developed an additive system to prevent water absorption for a stable ethanol-diesel mixture that can be shipped through a pipeline.12 Currently, fuels blended with ethanol cannot be shipped in multifuel pipelines, because the moisture in pipelines and storage tanks is absorbed by the ethanol, causing it to separate from gasoline. Rather, the petroleum-based gasoline components have to be shipped separately and then blended with ethanol at a terminal as the product is loaded into trucks. [Page 3] -----snip----- [Available from] Outlook for Biomass Ethanol Production and Demand by Joseph DiPardo (Completed Apr/2000) US US Energy Information Administration - DOE http://www.eia.doe.gov/oiaf/analysispaper/pdf/biomass.pdf PDF ------------------------ Yahoo! Groups Sponsor ---------------------~--> Buy Stock for $4 and no minimums. FREE Money 2002. http://us.click.yahoo.com/orkH0C/n97DAA/Ey.GAA/FGYolB/TM ---------------------------------------------------------------------~-> Biofuel at Journey to Forever: http://journeytoforever.org/biofuel.html Biofuels list archives: http://archive.nnytech.net/ Please do NOT send "unsubscribe" messages to the list address. To unsubscribe, send an email to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/
