I think it's perceived as being "green" because it comes from growing the corn. It's seen as "a natural resource that we can grow, replenish, and it won't run out". Noone sees past that point such as the converting and manufacturing (and after all that, the combustion) of the fuel that is made. Not to mention the price of actual corn for the food and feed consumers has increased 2-3x it's price before ethanol started being mass produced (as the farmers are crying there is a shortage in corn land to produce enough for both the consumer and ethanol)... and the government is still subsidising these corn farmers! So pig and cow farmers that rely on feeding their livestock corn-based meal are having to pay more for it, which then raises the price for portk, beef and milk in the supermarket. All around, it's affected everyone, and has done little to nothing to benefit anyone!

As twuelfing said: Ethanol is a perpetuation of oil dependence. The best way to reduce oil dependence is to reduce oil consumption. As far as I know, only 4 or 5 cars truly exist that get >50 MPG. Maybe a handful more that can be converted or adjusted to get somewhere around 50 MPG as well. But the rest of the cars get less than 30 MPG, and most of them actually get less than 16 MPG. That's pretty sad, but a true reality! I'm not a treehugger, and I am biased in the fact that the main reason I bought my HCH was to save ME some money in the long run. If I do it by only having to fillup 25-30 times a year (~18,000 miles using 300 gallons of gas) instead of 70-75 (~18,000 miles using 1100 gallons of gas), then I'm doing my part to reduce oil consumption!

 

Thank you, well put.

 

JasonTX,

I believe I read in my manual that we can use E15 gas. But, I'm not sure they even sell it in WNY.

 

E15 is the cutoff before you void your warranty. I think it's more of an engineering tolerance against standard E10 gas that might have just a little more ethanol than expected. I think if you were to be able to get E15 you'll be at the very edge where your fuel line may start to corrode/seals starts to be eaten away. I don't see why we can't just mandate flex fuel vehicles, the cost from all the press reports is only around $500 extra. Then maybe we'll see more E85 pumps and everyone will get to have a choice when E85 or E10 is more economical.

I know there are many issues with ethanol from subsidies, to whether you get less energy out of it than making it, etc. From my point of view I can deal with the imperfections. Money goes to big agri instead of big oil but at least more of the money stays in country. Ethanol will then tie fuel efficiency to food on the table. A very good way to get a point across that there is a cost to bad FE other than what you pay at the pump. This will put conservatives in a real bind as should they hew true to "err on the side of life" then they would get on the raising fuel economy bandwagon as that would mean less poor people will starve.

 

The only problem I have with corn based fuel is that there are so many other things that yield a munch better return... one in particular stands head and shoulders above the rest.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Biodiesel

Find the chart at the bottom and then look for the one that doesn't belong with the others. Then tell me that corn is the way to go.

 

I could be wrong but I thought this discussion was about if E85 could be used in the HCH-II.

If my HCH-II had a diesel engine I'd be all over converting it to biodiesel. I'm not here to argue which is the best way to go. My point and others is that why not give us the option to use E85 since we're already using gasoline.

 

I assume you want to use E85 because somehow you are under the illusion that it's greener and better than buying from big oil? The link show how untrue that is, yes the link has values in diesel but a lot of the samples could be used to create ethanol as well. With a greater yield than corn. Buying E85 only helps create another problem, imo. No better then what we have with big oil.

 

He doesn't drive a diesel car so biodiesel is a moot discussion. This isn't about is ethanol green or not, its about having more choices with a gasoline car. You've already stated E85 creates a problem no better than big oil so if both options being equally evil why not give us a choice to use the cheaper option given the differences in prices?

 

Almost anything is better than using foreign oil. There are a lot of questions about using corn, as it is one of the lowest-yielding options for ethanol. I like soybeans much more. Since algae has such a great yield, why aren't we hearing more about it? (I've heard some, but not much.)
At least someone should be producing algae-ethanol - it's got to be a great money-maker, right?

 

You're being narrow minded. Not everyone drives a hybrid because they are treehuggers. If you read my other posts. I clearly stated I'm not driving a hybrid to save the environment. I drive it so save money. Less emmissions is just a side bonus for me. I drive 55 miles one way to work. Getting 23 miles a gallon with my Subaru WRX wasn't very good on the wallet. Getting 40-50mpg and now I have someone to carpoll with is saving tons of $$. If I had the option of using E85 which we should since it doesn't add much to the cost of production would just make sense.

Do you even know what the cost of E85 is per gallon in Iowa? If E85 is $1 cheaper per gallon. I'll gladly take the lower mpg and still save money. That is my point. Not all of us are here to stroke our e-peens on how many miles we can get per gallon.