Dept. of Energy Rejects Corn Fuel Future

eldavojohn writes "The United States' Department of Energy is stating that corn based fuel is not the future. From the article, "I'm not going to predict what the price of corn is going to do, but I will tell you the future of biofuels is not based on corn," U.S. Deputy Energy Secretary Clay Sell said in an interview. Output of U.S. ethanol, which is mostly made from corn, is expected to jump in 2007 from 5.6 billion gallons per year to 8 billion gpy, as nearly 80 bio-refineries sprout up. In related news, Fidel Castro is blasting the production of corn fuel as a blatant waste of food that would otherwise feed 3 billion people who will die of hunger."

corn and switch grass are NOT the way to go

They (like sugar cane) all grow in a 2d space. In addition, a log of energy goes into growing corn and sugar. In addition, these crops are basically batched. You may plant and then lose it all in the end.

Instead, ethanol and bio-deasil will come from algae or other microbes. The simple fact is that it allows for a continual stream of fuel as well as feeds on our waste. Finally, the amount of fuel that it uses is a fraction of regular crops.

Have to laugh at what castro is saying. There is plenty of food for the world. The issue is one of distribution. Correct that, and we could cut back on crops.

Re:corn and switch grass are NOT the way to go

The European Union continues to subsidize thousands of farmers, allowing them to produce huge amounts of surplus food every year that costs EU taxpayers a fortune. There is no political will to curb this waste as (especially in France) the farmers have too much political clout). So, there is no need to consider planting new crops specifically for fuel. The resources already exist, though greater efficiency may come from changing the crops EU farmers currently grow to ones more suitable for biofuels. Growing crops in the EU for biofuel, therefore, could solve two problems contemporaniously: EU waste converted into much needed fuel. Alternativly we could all scrap our cars and take the bus!

Re:corn and switch grass are NOT the way to go

exactly, in the US and the EU the govt pays farmers to not grow food to allow their land to recover and pays farmers to enter land management where they grow what makes their land produce best and not necessarily what's selling on the market. Many people don't know large parts of the US have been in drought conditions for 5 years... in my own county the corn only grows at half what it used to due to lack of rain. But we don't go hungry because there's extra grown in spite of what the market may bear.. it's that important that people don't STARVE.

That said, now that farmers might actually have a CASH crop and end the govt subsidies, people don't want to pay fair prices for food... funny how "free market" raiders don't like when another industry can lock up some profits at their expense. It does seem "wasteful" to use the food crop for fuel, but poverty and hunger are not due to lack of food like Casto and others would like to think... we ship more than enough food to the starving nations to feed them, their leaders sell it or burn it instead of helping the people... the GOVTS simply don't care about other people. We grow lots of crops to not use expressly for food that corn can be used for both food and fuel is a good thing! Like how soy can be used for all sorts of things.

Frankly, we need to get more "eco-friendly" all life comes from the Sun... even coal and oil were once vast herds of dinosaurs and lush forests before being buried by massive amounts of earth being flipped over... last I checked we're not making anymore dinosaurs for oil anymore. If we can get slightly less power from a plant without waiting the thousands of years to make oil we should go for it.

Re:corn and switch grass are NOT the way to go

Algae essentially grow in 2d too. They only grow in the plane that the sun shines. Once you have an algae soup, only the top few cm get any light. Sunlight only goes a few metres into clear water before its useful properties are reduced.

Sugar is a good way to go. Sugar is very fast growing which is why ethanol in Brazil is pretty cheap: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/artic le/2005/06/17/AR2005061701440.html [washingtonpost.com]. There flexi-fuel cars can run on gas (which is at least 25% ethanol) or E100 (100% ethanol).

A massive usage for corn is in fattening cattle. This is a hugely wasteful way to feed people compared to a more direct approach such as eating the corn or soy or whatever, Processing into beef is very wasteful. This would also drive up beef prices which would make McDonalds unhappy with DoE

There is no reason why there should not be a multi-input strategy. Corn can grow where sugar cannot. Algae can grow where corn and sugar can't. It is silly to really argue for one over the other. Rather make a multi-input ethanol industry.

Re:corn and switch grass are NOT the way to go

Furthermore, we already use too much corn (not the best choice of words, but I'll explain what I mean). Besides the corn we eat in its regular form, corn syrup and other corn derivatives are used in a large portion of our diets in the US. Also, corn is used as the vast majority of feed (estimated at 92% in 2003 [cornell.edu]) for livestock. Corn is a major part of our entire food infrastructure. We are already in serious danger if a corn famine ever arose, but the effects would compound if we base our fuel on corn as well. Diversification is important for any country, especially with an economy as large as the US. Of course, this might never happen, but we all know it's possible (Ireland). By the way, I live in Illinois in a small town of 4000 people surrounded by corn fields. I'm not saying this because I hate corn, but dependence on a single crop is a thin line to walk.

Re:corn and switch grass are NOT the way to go

Much of this restructuring has to happen in the poorer countries, and they are unwilling to restructure.

Take a look at North Korea, where the government makes the (mis)allocation of resources to military expenditures rather than food supplies. Take a look at Sudan, where the government has no interest in the health of its citizens, or Somalia, where there is no functioning national government.

By and large, the countries which have opened themselves to Western-style Keynesian socialist markets are developing themselves out of food security issues (China, India, and other developing 3rd world states). The other places, where nationwide starvation remains a chronic issue are either the result of natural catastrophe (Bangladesh), or broken governments (North Korea).

I would like to know

How come aren't there any diesel hybrids available? They should provide even more mpg than a prius.

While I'm thinking about it, why aren't the car engines run like the train engines, with the diesel motor running at a more or less constant rate refueling the batteries that run the electric motors that actually turn the wheels - the diesel engine could be much smaller than normal because it won't have to peak to provide power - just a nice steady constant - wouldn't even have to be a normal 4 stroke engine - it could be a stirling engine that is highly efficient but has problems speeding up - though Ford managed to get it's 0-60 speed down to 17 seconds while experimenting with alternate engines during the 70s oil crisis - making it's marriage to this application ideal.

Any thoughts on this? I admit I don't have much knowledge in this area and probably missed something very basic that is wrong with the idea.

Re:I would like to know

Because the diesel/electric motors in trains aren't done for efficiency reasons, they're done because of space constraints.

First, trains don't have batteries. It's just:
engine->genset->electric motor.

Diesel engines (especially large ones) work within a very narrow power band. For on highway trucks it's around 1000 - 2000 RPM. This is great when pulling a heavy load, but it means that you're gearing has to be set up accordingly. This is why 18-wheelers have 13 speed gear boxes.

With the amount of torque that trains need to get up to speed the gear box would need to be as long, if not longer, than the train itself. You'd need a 10000:1 (made up number) gear ratio to get the train moving, but that ratio would only be good for 1000-2000 RPM, so you'd have to shift to 9999:1, etc.

The genset -> electric motor works great because the electric motor has a near infinite 'gear ratio' and provides peak torque from 0 RPM.

However there are losses, you'll never get better than a drive where the engine is connected directly to the wheels, this is why some automatic transmissions allow you to lock up the torque converter.

Diesel hybrids are coming, but the gains over a traditional diesel engine aren't as great as over a gasoline engine.

Re:I would like to know

You just described the kind of hybrid that the auto makers are selling.

I believe the grandparent poster meant direct, electric-only wheel power, not the "dual-forces on one driveshaft" approach current hybrids use.

Diesel-electric locomotives have no direct mechanical linkage from the hydrocarbon-fueled engine to the wheels on the track. This is exactly the kind of car I am waiting for. I'm a EE, so I like the idea of electricity as the main transport of energy in a car. And the hydrocarbon engine plus generator could be replaced in the future by better technology. So IF someone made an inexpensive, reliable fuel cell, it could take the place of the engine.

Re:I would like to know

I've read about a Mini Cooper design that used a hybrid motor. It was an excellent design, with a gasoline generator powering 4 electrical motors which were located in each wheel hub.

Here's the link: http://www.leftlanenews.com/hybrid-mini-offers-640 -hp-0-60-in-45-seconds.html [leftlanenews.com]

640 hp, 0-60 in 4.5 seconds, 160 hp per wheel-motor, and a 3 prong plug-in-the-wall adapter for charging the batteries up.

Cool, huh?

Re:I would like to know

I've posted this before, but for a very long time I've wanted to take an inline 6-cyl diesel, turbo it, and jam in into a regular RWD vehicle like a Supra. Then I'd replace the transmission with a large alternator, and have motors all the wheels, or if I can't make the fronts work, just the rears. I'd have to write some custom software to keep the engine running at an efficient speed for the alternator and electrical load, instead of trying to meet perceived fuel flow for mass air, throttle position and exhaust richness. Alternators can achieve 94% efficiency, with some hitting 98% (but that's in a lab, I'm sure it's not that good in reality), and turbo diesels are the most efficient HC engines that I'm aware of at that scale. I wonder if anyone has ever tried this.

three billion?

http://www.starvation.net/ [starvation.net]

Even if you buy their generous estimate of 35K deaths/day, that's over 200 years to reach 3 billion deaths.

Sugar Cane fuel is the current answer

Sugar cane ethanol is the viable alternative, if you are going to use biomass based fuel. Brazil is doing it since the seventies, it already works on most cars that use gas with little to no modification (Fiat, GM and other auto companies already produces them in quantities there) and it is almost a closed cycle, using barely to no fossil fuel on its production. This [senate.gov] (warning, PDF) is a good summary on the benefits of sugar cane ethanol, of course we can wait for hydrogen or whatever is the technology of the future, just like we are waiting since the seventies, but if you want something that already works, sugar cane ethanol is the way to go.

Do you know that the only reason that makes U.S. not to get more ethanol from Brazil is protectionism via subsides and import quotas? Fidel got it right on this one, in order to protect the few (and rich) local corn farmers (not to mention the oil barons), U.S. impedes cheap sugar and ethanol to reach the U.S., artificially increasing the demand of corn for ethanol production, driving corn prices up and, this way, making things harder for poor people on U.S. itself and, indirectly, on Mexico too (thanks Nafta). Check this article [cnn.com] and see, it is past the point of speculation and conspiracy theories.

Law of unintended consequences in action here. It could be different. Unfortunately, I'm not a citizen of U.S., so, I'm not part of the democratic process there. But a lot of you are, and only you could make the difference. You can wait for the Tesla electric car [wikipedia.org] all your lives (maybe it will fly too, if you wait time enough) while complaining about dependence on fossil fuels and financing wars on it, or you can make the difference now and take a stand on it.

wonderful

Great. At least someone realizes that corn isn't the answer. The answer is hemp [wikipedia.org], which among other industrial uses [wikipedia.org] is great for biofuel [wikipedia.org]production [hempcar.org].

Before you say it, no, we don't need to think of the children. Industrial hemp contains less than 0.3% THC, as opposed to the 20%-30% that is found in unfertilized female plants that are grown for drug use. But God forbid anyone grow hemp: we all know what evils marijuana can cause [imdb.com].

Correct

Ethanol is not the way forward, the BBC has an interesting article [bbc.co.uk] on this, some excerpts:

The grain required to fill the petrol tank of a Range Rover with ethanol is sufficient to feed one person per year. Assuming the petrol tank is refilled every two weeks, the amount of grain required would feed a hungry African village for a year

Much of the fuel that Europeans use will be imported from Brazil, where the Amazon is being burned to plant more sugar and soybeans, and Southeast Asia, where oil palm plantations are destroying the rainforest habitat of orangutans and many other species.

Using ethanol rather than petrol reduces total emissions of carbon dioxide by only about 13% because of the pollution caused by the production process, and because ethanol gets only about 70% of the mileage of petrol

Food prices are already increasing. With just 10% of the world's sugar harvest being converted to ethanol, the price of sugar has doubled; the price of palm oil has increased 15% over the past year, with a further 25% gain expected next year.

So it seems the right decisions are being made here. I'm quite suprised as I thought lobby groups were already springing up around so-called 'green fuels', I've seen some suspicious adverts for ethanol fuels on Canadian TV recently.

Subsidies stink

The corn based ethanol craze is founded in subsidies, not practicality. I grew up on a farm in southeastern Minnesota and came to loathe subsidies, PIC setaside acres, furloughs, etc. All kinds of ways to make money to do nothing that didn't benefit the family farm (which ours was) but ultimately lined the pockets of corporate farmers with lobby interests.

When I went to college (in Morris, Minnesota) there was an ethanol plant in town and I researched ethanol production just to provide some context to the awful smell (think rotting sileage) that hit my apartment complex when the wind was right. Even back in 1990 there was little justification to use ethanol because of the high energy use for production, the increased end-unit costs because of the need to blend at the POS (because ethanol absorbs water it needs to be mixed into the blend near the end delivery point) and the other implications for vehicles (reduced power/volume, injection issues, etc). The investment that the government has made has been misplaced. It purely subsidizes this waste instead of promoting the development of more efficient production/end product. The plant in Morris is still producing the exact same product in the exact same way, the only difference is now (16 years later) they are making money hand over fist.

Finally, corn requires a tremendous amount of water to grow. When we grew corn we didn't irrigate but big corporate farms cannot resist. The Oglalla aquifer is draining, which is a big deal. Irrigation for crops of all sorts are the primary culprit but the impact is larger -- most of the 'breadbasket' of the US is dependent in many ways on the viability of the Oglalla aquifer.

I am stunned and pleased that the DOE has stepped up and stated what should be the obvious. I hope that people following the stories realize that subsidies without measurable and definable goals have no place in our "free trade" economy (tongue in cheek there).

I'm more amazed

That three billion people die a year from hunger. HOLY CRAP!

Welcome to Presidential politics

It's called "Iowa". Eliminate the Iowa caucuses as the "first in the nation" that every Presidential candidate must suck up to (and convince his party to suck up to) and you'll never hear about corn-based ethanol ever again.

Re:Cuba a potential major sugar producer

But ethanol is such a poor fuel compared to biodiesel I am amazed it gets the attention it does.

There's no technical reason for it. It is pure politics and the media exploiting(mocking) the anger with the petroleum companies. And it's putting more rainforests at risk. I don't what it does to the soil. I'm sure it will make Monsanto rich. As long as we continue using our present day jalopies, biodiesel is the one true fuel for rapid oxidation. And for the best bang for the buck(best yield per acre), algae [wikipedia.org] is the way to go(about half way down the page). Heck you can grow the stuff in(on) the ocean. No need to use up valuable real estate, but in case you want to anyway, "More recent studies using a species of algae with up to 50% oil content have concluded that only 28,000 km or 0.3% of the land area of the US could be utilized to produce enough biodiesel to replace all transportation fuel the country currently utilizes. Furthermore, otherwise unused desert land (which receives high solar radiation) could be most effective for growing the algae, and the algae could utilize farm waste and excess CO2 from factories to help speed the growth of the algae."

Re:zombie castro said what?

Bullshit! Read the fucking editorial [www.cuba.cu], it is in spanish, if you can't read get someone to translate it to you. I quote here:

"(...) independientemente de la excelente tecnología brasileña para producir alcohol, en Cuba el empleo de tal tecnología para la producción directa de alcohol a partir del jugo de caña no constituye más que un sueño o un desvarío de los que se ilusionan con esa idea. En nuestro país, las tierras dedicadas a la producción directa de alcohol pueden ser mucho más útiles en la producción de alimentos para el pueblo y en la protección del medio ambiente."

Translates (roughly) as:

Independently of the excellent Brazilian ethanol production technology, in Cuba the use of such technology to direct production of ethanol from the sugar cane is nothing but a dream or a fantasy from the ones who have illusions with this idea. In our country, the soil dedicated to the direct production of ethanol can be much more useful in the food production for the people and for the protection of the environment.

So, stop spreading lies and RTF Editorial.

Re:zombie castro said what?

Im not sure I undstand your kneejerk outrage.

Half of all cuba's exports earnings are from sugar. Cuba used to supply 35% of the world's sugar, but now only 10% [usda.gov] (though that's still a lot for a little island). The decline is primarily due to the price of sugar dropping 58%. Therefore if sugar was used for ethanol, it's price would increase like corn's price is doing now, and Cuba's sugar exports would approach previous highs.

Which is all to say, there's not really anything wrong with that. Sugar is better at making ethanol than corn by a longshot, and there's nothing wrong with a little national self interest, even from zombie communists :P

Re:zombie castro said what?

"Unless I'm missing something in translated translation, I looks to me that he is saying their soil is better for food and they won't be doing it."
No, he is saying, although their soil is appropriated for sugar cane (and I add, dutch, spanish and portuguese fought for it in the past exactly because of it), he believes the soil better use is for food, because people is more important that everything else. That's the point of the whole article.

Nothing about the GP's stating he wanted sugar cane used so his crops would be worth more.

GP implied that Fidel's interest on shifting the ethanol production from corn to sugar cane is benefitial to Cuba. Fidel's point is that everything ethanol is bad if land that could be used to produce food is used to produce fuel.

In case your wondering, taking the majority of the competitions product off the market makes your prices go up. It is the free market thing."

Yes. Except that there is no Free Market in Cuba. And that, even if there was, there is this little thing called U.S. mandated worldwide embargo on any Cuban export, so they couldn't benefit from it. Don't they teach those things there on history/geography classes?

Re:zombie castro said what?

There's no such thing as U.S. mandated worldwide embargo. I am from Brazil and had a girlfriend workin for a company which has some factories in Cuba (Souza Cruz Tobacco). You can find Cuban products (not so many of them) in almost every city on Europe (including U.K.), South America and Asia. Also, major european Hotel companies have business in the island. Fidel Castro also receives a lot of oil for free from his ally Hugo Chavez. The embargo applies only to American companies, and it's perfectly just, as american citizens and companies that were expropriated by Fidel's revolution never received compensation for the theft. Don't they teach those things there on history/geography classes?

Re:No, half the world is not starving.

Not everywhere is like the land of the plenty were the supermarkets are stocked with food.

Yeah, well it would be if everybody would stop shooting at each other for a second.

Re:No, half the world is not starving.

I don't think jobs are the problem, but the supply of food.

Actually, famine nowadays is rarely a function of food supply alone. per Wiki [wikipedia.org]:

Modern famines have often occurred in nations that, as a whole, were not initially suffering a shortage of food. The largest famine ever (proportional to the affected population) was the Irish Potato Famine, which began in 1845 and occurred as food was being shipped from Ireland to England because the English could afford to pay higher prices. The largest famine ever (in absolute terms) was the Chinese famine of 1959-60 that occurred as a result of the Great Leap Forward. In a similar manner, the 1973 famine in Ethiopia was concentrated in the Wollo region, although food was being shipped out of Wollo to the capital city of Addis Ababa where it could command higher prices. In contrast, at the same time that the citizens of the dictatorships of Ethiopia and Sudan had massive famines in the late-1970s and early-1980s, the democracies of Botswana and Zimbabwe avoided them, despite having worse drops in national food production.

According to Nobel-peace prize winning economist Amartya Sen [wikipedia.org] quoted here [jhu.edu], there is without exception a political component involved that allows the food shortage to progress beyond food insecurity:

I have discussed elsewhere the remarkable fact that, in the terrible history of famines in the world, no substantial famine has ever occurred in any independent and democratic country with a relatively free press. We cannot find exceptions to this rule, no matter where we look: the recent famines of Ethiopia, Somalia, or other dictatorial regimes; famines in the Soviet Union in the 1930s; China's 1958-61 famine with the failure of the Great Leap Forward; or earlier still, the famines in Ireland or India under alien rule. China, although it was in many ways doing much better economically than India, still managed (unlike India) to have a famine, indeed the largest recorded famine in world history: Nearly 30 million people died in the famine of 1958-61, while faulty governmental policies remained uncorrected for three full years.