E85 Ethanol; Balanced Basics
Ethanol is probably the most well known alternative fuel in the world today, especially in corn growing states like Iowa, Illinois and Indiana. Ethanol is really nothing more than grain alcohol because it is made most often with corn. Using ethanol as an alternative fuel is a great way to help the environment and our farmers too. After all, the United States is an agricultural machine!
The main ethanal fuel product available nowadays for you car is E85. E85 is made from 85 percent ethanol and 15 percent alcohol. There are many cars that can run on E85 fuel and many of you drive these cars and probably don’t even know it. If your vehicle is labeled as a “Flex-Fuel” vehicle, then chances are you can run it on E85.
Running your car on E85 is good for the consumer because it costs less! With the recent volatility of the oil industry and prices rising and falling like waves on the ocean, E85 has remained consistently cheaper and simple to produce. In addition, (and I don’t care what you hear from critics) E85 will not effect your gas mileage in any way. You car doesn’t know what it’s burning! It only responds to the weight or your lead foot, and not to the ‘drank in the tank.’
Environmentally speaking, E85 is much cleaner burning compared to its petroleum counterpart and is made from a renewable resource! These are two good selling points in the eyes of environmental watch dogs.
Are you catching the balance here folks? You can actually do something good for the environment without sacrificing quality or paying more to do it! That’s balanced green living!
Brazil, which is by far the largest producer in the world, makes ethanol from sugar cane. Projects are now underway in California to convert some of the state’s agricultural waste, like rice straw that is now burned in fields, into ethanol. Ethanol as an alternative fuel has really come a long way over the years and has turned out to be an extremely viable product for both consumers and activists alike. This is why we consider it to be one of the most well-balanced green initiatives to date.
Corn ethanol as an alternative fuel is made today by converting the starch in corn to sugars and then into alcohol in a process of fermenting. A company in Canada, Iogen, has invented a process for converting agricultural waste such as corn stalks, husks, etc. (corn “stover”) and other cellulose rich plant waste like straw into ethanol by using enzymes.
Using ethanol as an alternative fuel is only a part of the alternative fuel trend. There are many other alternative fuels being developed in the “green” movement and we will talk about each of them and report on their viability as we see it. The reality is that ethanol provides the most promise to date in use as an alternative fuel.
E85 is the perfect green product in that it is cheaper, performs well and offers less impact on the environment, now that’s balanced green living!
