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There is a good article in Rolling Stone about ethanol. They examine the whole ethanol policy and agribusiness connections with our politicians. I think it is a good read.

The great danger of confronting peak oil and global warming isn't that we will sit on our collective asses and do nothing while civilization collapses, but that we will plunge after "solutions" that will make our problems even worse. Like believing we can replace gasoline with ethanol, the much-hyped biofuel that we make from corn. Ethanol, of course, is nothing new. American refiners will produce nearly 6 billion gallons of corn ethanol this year, mostly for use as a gasoline additive to make engines burn cleaner. But in June, the Senate all but announced that America's future is going to be powered by [tag-tec]biofuels[/tag-tec], mandating the production of 36 billion gallons of ethanol by 2022. According to ethanol boosters, this is the beginning of a much larger revolution that could entirely replace our 21-million-barrel-a-day oil addiction. Midwest farmers will get rich, the air will be cleaner, the planet will be cooler, and, best of all, we can tell those greedy sheiks to fuck off. As the king of ethanol hype, Sen. Chuck Grassley of Iowa, put it recently, "Everything about ethanol is good, good, good."

My feeling is that [tag-ice]ethanol[/tag-ice] is great for a small impact alternative fuel or blended fuel but we sure cannot go the way of turning our corn crops into ethanol and think we are going to save the country from the evil foreign oil.

Rolling Stone's bottom line take:

In the end, the ethanol boom is another manifestation of America's blind faith that technology will solve all our problems.

Energy Tags: ethanol, energy resources

6 Steps To make e85 Ethanol

Step One: . . . The Conversion Process

We have to break down carbohydrate sugars, such as the starch from corn. Create it into 'Mash'. Grind or crush the feedstock (corn, soybeans, wheat, etc…). Then dilute and add an enzyme (alpha amylase) to turn the mixture into a liquid. Once liquified a second enzyme is added(glucoamylase) to convert the starch into sugar. (If the source is mainly sugar, i.e…rotten fruit, molasses, etc…, the conversion step can be skipped.

Step Two: . . . Fermentation

Add yeast and make it into a beer (wine) type solution.

Step Three: . . . Distillation

The beer (wine) type solution needs to be run through a still to extract the alcohol from the solution.

Step Four: . . . Filtration

The ethanol now needs to be filtered to get rid of excess organic volatiles.

Step Five: . . . Dehydration

The ethanol needs to be 'dried'. After the distillation process there will be a certain amount of water in the ethanol you have just created - this can be dried running the ethanol through Zeolite a readily available product for drying ethanol.

Step Six: . . . Ethanol Into e85

Now simply convert the pure ethanol into e85 by adding 15% unleaded gasoline to your ethanol. e85 is nothing more than 85% ethanol mixed with 15% gasoline.

Frederick Musser

Frederick Musser is the owner of e85 Tips. A site dedicated to informing the world about e85 and its benefits.

For more information on e85 please visit e85Tips.com

This article takes a look at the different ways people view a news event based on the impact of their culture. Using ethanol and corn as a basis for awareness, the article provokes our thoughts as to why cultures clash.

More: continued here

What does growing corn and other crops have anything to do with natural gas? It takes about 33,000 cubic feet of natural gas to produce one ton of nitrogen fertilizer. About 96 percent of the corn planted in the United States depends on fertilizers. Some 90 percent of the cost of manufacturing nitrogen fertilizer depends upon the price of natural gas.

More: continued here

The recent State of the Union address by Pres. Bush has sparked much debate about the production and use of ethanol in the US to help in the effort to reduce our foreign oil importation. It would seem thought that many analysts think there is no way we can produce the amounts of biofuel that the President calls for in his speech.

Specifically, the President’s call to increase the supply of alternative fuels to 35 billion gallons by 2017, has drawn the most reaction. 'We heard a huge number from the President, and the first reaction is no way is that possible,' at least under current circumstances, said Jacob Golbitz of HighQuest Partners in a recent UPI report. He added that even in a best-case scenario the U.S. would only be able to produce 16 billion gallons of biofuel per year by 2015, assuming that most of the biofuel would be corn-based ethanol. A recent Bloomberg report said Exxon Mobil Corp. considers ethanol "irrelevant" as a solution to an addiction that forces the U.S. to import two-thirds of its oil. No "viable, meaningful business proposition" exists for Exxon in ethanol, according to Stuart McGill, Exxon’s senior vice president.

There is strong indication that the bloom is off on ethanol plant production and that even for plants that are on the board and ready to be built there will not be profitability in them and thus the market will suffer. Last year the feeling was that anyone could make money producing ethanol but no so now.

The supply and price of corn may play a prominent role in the future of U.S. ethanol production. U.S. Undersecretary of Agriculture Thomas Dorr said at a clean fuels finance conference in London reported by Bloomberg, "There's clearly a terrific demand on corn right now. There is no question that the next couple of years are going to be painful."

What do you think about ethanol? We want to hear from you. Drop a comment on this blog and share your opinion.

Source: Ethanol