The Ethanol question Should we or shouldn’t we? If you had problems starting your lawn mower, motorcycle or car this
year, it might have been the fuel you were using. Was it Ethanol? Touted as the new environmentally-friendly alternative to straight
gasoline, some people are concerned about how efficient it is when it comes to maintenance, performance, and even the economy. According to Motorcycle Cruising Magazine (
www.motorcyclecruising.
com), there are pros and cons to using this alcohol-based fuel. This is an excerpt of what they said in their “Shop Talk” section:
THE PROS o Alcohol creates fewer environmental problems than other fuels. o Alcohol reduces tail pipe emissions. o Alcohol-based fuels are renewable, reduce our dependence on foreign oil imports, and create jobs. o There is a cost advantage to using alcohol, either as a standalone fuel or as a “filler” to stretch stocks of gasoline.
THE CONS o “Alcohol/gasoline blends actually create emission problems, are damaging to vehicle fuel systems, are as environmentally unfriendly in their own way as MTBE [methyl tertiary-butyl ether, initially used to increase the octane of gasoline but is a suspected carcinogen] or lead, and are a giant economic scam perpetrated on the [Canadian and]American people” by organizations and corporations with their own agendas. o “Alcohol is both hygroscopic, meaning it absorbs water, and to some degree, a solvent, so its use in a fuel system that’s not designed to handle
it can be problematic” and possibly causes more corrosion. Some say they’ve experienced “engines that suffered from mechanical damage traced to poor quality gasohol.”
THE MAGAZINE GOES ON TO ASK: “Does adding ethanol to gas
reduce emissions? That’s a sticky one. The opposing argument is that since alcohol-infused gasoline creates less power than the equivalent amount of straight gas, you have to burn more of it to achieve the same power output, hence more fuel is burned per mile ridden, which doesn’t do much for either the environment or your mileage. The situation is exacerbated by alcohol’s affinity for water; simply put, as the water content of the fuel increases, the less power that fuel is capable of producing, so on the face of it the answer would seem to be a ‘kind of, sort of, under perfect circumstances, maybe’.” It says there’s still more to consider: “While it’s true that alcohol burns cleaner than gasoline, it’s only by
about16%, so once you figure in the amount of hydrocarbons that are created by the tractors, trucks and everything else used in the process of planting, refining and transporting the alcohol, there doesn’t seem to be much of a savings.”
IT PROPOSES YET ANOTHER ARGUMENT: “Every acre used to grow a crop slated for alcohol is one less that can be used to grow food, which increases the costs of groceries, and that furthermore there are huge subsidies involved, as well as embargos in place to prevent foreign growers/ refiners from competing in the U.S. These factors make the venture profitable to the American ethanol producers, but detrimental to everyone else.”
129 Walgreen Road, R.R. 3, Carp, Ontario 613-836-2120
www.westcarletonauto.ca www.bounder.ca BOUNDER MAGAZINE 27
Page 1 |
Page 2 |
Page 3 |
Page 4 |
Page 5 |
Page 6 |
Page 7 |
Page 8 |
Page 9 |
Page 10 |
Page 11 |
Page 12 |
Page 13 |
Page 14 |
Page 15 |
Page 16 |
Page 17 |
Page 18 |
Page 19 |
Page 20 |
Page 21 |
Page 22 |
Page 23 |
Page 24 |
Page 25 |
Page 26 |
Page 27 |
Page 28 |
Page 29 |
Page 30 |
Page 31 |
Page 32 |
Page 33 |
Page 34 |
Page 35 |
Page 36 |
Page 37 |
Page 38 |
Page 39 |
Page 40 |
Page 41 |
Page 42 |
Page 43 |
Page 44 |
Page 45 |
Page 46 |
Page 47 |
Page 48 |
Page 49 |
Page 50 |
Page 51 |
Page 52 |
Page 53 |
Page 54 |
Page 55 |
Page 56 |
Page 57 |
Page 58 |
Page 59 |
Page 60 |
Page 61 |
Page 62 |
Page 63 |
Page 64