Hybrid Car Forums

HybridDriver · #1 (**permalink**) Sun, Jun 21st, 2009, 01:49 pm

It recently occured to me, that most people's complaint about ethanol is, it requires fossil fuels to produce it.

What if it didn't?

FORGET about turning cellulose directly into ethanol. I've read up on that, and it's pretty difficult to do.
Use the cellulose to FIRE the ethanol plant, and make the electricity.

Cellulose is the woody, stalks, stems, roots, even leaves of plants.
Starch is the energy store house of the plant, the sugar, the grain, the "fruit" of the plant.

We can now cleanly, and cheaply, burn bales of straw to make syngas or heat directly, and that heat can run distillation of sugar ( starch ) based ethanol, as well as make steam and run a steam turbine to electrify the ethanol plant. I've seen a plan on paper to build a fossil free ethanol plant, one that is totally off the grid.

I've visited a 30 million gallon plant, that is 60% off the grid. They are burning corn bran, the non-fermentable shell of the corn kernal, and making steam for the plant with it. Next step is to go 100% off the grid.

Now what say you to that?

HybridDriver · #2 (**permalink**) Sun, Jun 21st, 2009, 01:53 pm

Now, before you nay-sayers get a go here... A Canadian study found that only 15% of the corn stover ( stalks ) need to be tilled back into the soil for fertilizer. So 85% could be baled and used as a fuel source. There is a surplus of stover ( straw ) yet to be utilized.

bwilson4web · #3 (**permalink**) Sun, Jun 21st, 2009, 07:43 pm

This is good news. I just wish we could get a heavier alcohol with energy density closer to gasoline. But even the lower energy density, having it produced in the USA is perfect.

Bob Wilson

FastMover · #4 (**permalink**) Mon, Jun 29th, 2009, 12:41 pm

bwilson4web said:

This is good news. I just wish we could get a heavier alcohol with energy density closer to gasoline. But even the lower energy density, having it produced in the USA is perfect.

Bob Wilson

Agreed. I am not a chemist, but it seems to me that the Ethanol and Biomass fuel people could bang heads and come up with an Ethanol version of Syngas that would have a higher energy content and a higher evaporation point than high percentage Ethanol blends, yet still be produced in sufficient volumes. Such a product would permit us to carry more to improve range, or to have smaller, lighter fuel tanks, and it would cut down on evaporative handling losses.

RFB