Optimal Ethanol Blend-Level Investigation

[Jakey]

Here's an interesting report on the effects of different ethanol blends:
http://www.ethanol.org/news/index.php?newsid=25
http://www.ethanol.org/pdf/contentmg...inal_12507.pdf

Thoughts?

[MustGoFaster]

Intresting. Isn't MN going to E20 soon (a few years) anyways?

[merkzu]

Thats pretty interesting.. The optimal blend was different for each car, I wonder if the factory timing table is closer to MBT on the optimal blend than it is on gasoline?

[Pushit2.0]

"The three non-flex-fuel vehicles tested operated on levels as high as E65 before any engine fault codes were displayed."

At that point the ecu could not add any more fuel and threw a lean code I would guess. I am up for E30 if thats what gets me more MPG.

~John

[merkzu]

Also the only car that was consistently above the "calculated mpg" was the flex-fuel impala that would have a fuel composition sensor that would allow the ecu to alter the timing for the blend.

[JET]

Very interesting! Too bad we don't have a good way to make mass quantities of ethanol yet. Corn produced ethanol is not the answer. We'll have to see what happens with cellulistic ethanol production in the next year. There are supposed to be 2 plants up and running right about now. I haven't checked on it recently though.

[Goat Blower]

Along the lines of this subject. They had an ethanol bike on American Chopper last night. Some of their comments were hilarious. The engine builder said he thought it used 2.5 times the amount of ethanol than fuel.

[Pushit2.0]

I watched some of that also, the chopper looked cool.

~John

[Jakey]

No comments from the anti-ethanol folks?

[JET]

Couple of good articles on cellulosic ethanol:

http://www.doe.gov/news/4827.htm

http://www.technologyreview.com/Biztech/19714/

[Jakey]

Originally Posted by JET

Couple of good articles on cellulosic ethanol:

http://www.doe.gov/news/4827.htm

http://www.technologyreview.com/Biztech/19714/

One of my roommates from last year is now working as one of the project leads on this:

Broin Companies of Sioux Falls, South Dakota, up to $80 million.
The plant is in Emmetsburg (Palo Alto County), Iowa, and after expansion, it will produce 125 million gallons of ethanol per year, of which roughly 25percent will be cellulosic ethanol. For feedstock in the production of cellulosic ethanol, the plant expects to use 842 tons per day of corn fiber, cobs, and stalks.
Broin Companies participants include: E. I. du Pont de Nemours and Company; Novozymes North America, Inc.; and DOE’s National Renewable Energy Laboratory.

My other former roommate had this at his M.S. project and is now at John Deere continuing work on biomass harvesting:
http://www.farm-news.com/news/articl...articleID=5664
http://www.iowafarmertoday.com/artic...02bioecon2.txt

The future of ethanol is going to be interesting. There is currently an oversupply so prices have tanked, and as a result, some plants have closed (or new ones ceased construction) and others are merging:
http://www.farm-news.com/News/articl...articleID=5680