- Posted on Wednesday, April 19th, 2006 at 9:30 am
Kansas Governor Leads on Flexible Fuel
By Ken Cole
GM Vice President, Government Relations
The Governors’ Ethanol Coalition (GEC), chaired by Kansas Gov. Kathleen Sebelius, is expanding a program with GM that will deliver ‘07 promotional design E85-capable flex-fuel vehicles to recipients in select GEC- member states. This is a great way to connect the innovations at GM to the Governors and other policy makers to encourage wider availability of E85 pumps. The program expands on one launched last year involving the GEC, the Renewable Fuels Association and GM. GM has also partnered with Shell Oil Products US, Chevron Technology Ventures, Kroger, Pacific Ethanol, VeraSun Energy and Abengoa Bioenergy to increase the number of E85 refueling stations in states like California, Illinois, Texas and Minnesota.
With partnerships like this – already 1.5 million flex-fuel vehicles are on the road and plans to add 400,000 more cars and trucks representing nine of GM’s most popular models are coming soon — GM has established itself as a leader in this effort. Phillip Lampert, executive director of the National Ethanol Vehicle Coalition, said of these types of initiatives, “I applaud GM’s commitment to E85 and its significant presence in the flexible-fuel marketplace.” GM is committed to offering alternative fuel vehicles outside of the US too – 78% of vehicles sold by GM in Brazil have Flexpower – allowing the cars and trucks to run on 100% ethanol.
Visit the National Ethanol Vehicle Coalition web site to find out if your car or truck is E85 friendly.
15 Comments
Paul
It doesn’t really matter if my car is E85 ready considering there are no public E85 stations in Pennsylvania.
However, a hybrid can save me money and save the environment where I live right now. So maybe, just maybe, GM should figure out how to make real hybrid that runs on E85.
That is, before Toyota beats you to it.
Again.
Edward Hayes
GM’s flex fuel vehicles were one of the biggest components to Brazil’s success with their ethanol infrastructure. The ethanol only cars flunked the test but GM’s prowess allowed Brazil’s success no question. I am hopeful GM can do the same thing here in America.
The best I have heard so far is the station where people can choose E10, E20, E30 or E85 or pure petroleum. It would give motorcyclists less headaches. It would also allow some to fill up on E30 who do not have E85 capable vehicles.
With Bill Gates, large retailers and investor dollars behind it ethanol is taking big leaps overnite.
Edward Hayes
Oh by the way here is the ethanol site I found with the most, and most up to date news on ethanol; daily.
ethanol-news.newslib.com
Philip S. Zivnuska
GM’s advertisements and recent promotion of E85 Flex fuel vehicles led me to consider a flex fuel vehicle for a second car. This was based on my belief that the rising gasoline prices would make ethanol cheaper than gas and more than offset any power loss. A recent radio interview with Michael Pollan, author of Omnivore’s Dilemma, has persuaded me not to.
Mr. Pollan’s key insight comes from his work as an agricultural journalist. Specifically, he stated that in the US, the production of corn is so heavily dependent on petroleum (gasoline, diesel, and natural gas for fertilizer) that it takes between 0.9 and 1.0 gallons of petroleum to produce each gallon of ethanol. That’s right, it is essentially a wash.
Once I realized this, it became clear why ethanol and the corn it is derived from require government subsidies and why it will never be practical without them. Incidentally, Brazil uses sugar cane and other countries may use other plants to make ethanol viable in other situations.
US ethanol production from corn does nothing for the environment, the farmer or the consumer.
CaptainDan
Paul, There WILL be E85 stations in Pennsylvania, in your area, long before a hybrid saves you any money. Hybrids are expensive, and only start to save you money 5 to 10 years down the line IF EVER.
In fact I’ve heard the Honda Accord Hybrid, which costs $8000 more than a non-hybrid Accord, gets WORSE gas mileage than the non-hybrid Accord! That’s not going to save anybody any money, and it won’t save the environment. Toyota was indeed smarter than Honda in that their Prius has no non-hybrid version to compare it to.
But you are certainly correct. There is a huge shortage of E85 stations available nationwide. But they will only build more if the public has the vehicles that can use E85. And that is happening. There are already 5,000,000 E85 capable vehicles on the road, and more are being built every day. The E85 availability is expanding, but it takes time, both to ramp up production of ethanol and to install more E85 pump locations, but it is happening.
And selecting E85 capability on a new GM vehicle is a no-cost option.
Saab Yurk
“GM should figure out how to make real hybrid that runs on E85.” (Paul)
Good idea. They’ve already shown one in Trollhattan that will run on anything from E100 to pure gasoline–even electric only.
http://www.autoblog.com/2006/03/31/saab-debuts-worlds-first-dino-free-hybrid/
Saab Yurk
Philip,
I think your numbers are a bit high, but don’t forget, the technology is improving by leaps and bounds. Check out the most recent study at Berkeley which was not funded by any special interest groups:
http://rael.berkeley.edu/EBAMM/
Also, even if your numbers are correct, don’t overlook the fact that it takes at least 1.1 MJ of petroleum energy to produce 1 MJ of gasoline. So, even if you use petroleum to produce ethanol, it’s roughly 1 gallon of petroleum for a gallon of ethanol burned versus 2.1 gallons of petroleum per gallon of gasoline burned. That’s still a great reduction in petroleum consumption.
bill
Some things on Brazil, you would think they removed oil from their economic system but that is not the case. They power only 20% of their vehicles with sugar based ethanol. (And yes, you get more ethanol from sugar than you do from corn, by a factor of 8.) The other 80 % is still oil, but it is oil produced by wells in Brazil.
Thus Brazil is not an importer of oil. Brazil uses 10% of the oil used by the US. (2 Million per day) So Brazil has enough ethanol to substitute for 400,000 bbl per day.
The US consumption is 20,000,000 bbl per day. This would require a lot more ethanol. —–> ONE Barrel = 42 gallons
Since 50% of our oil is imported, we would need to substitute 10,000,000 bbl ( 420,000,000 gallons ) of oil with ethanol.
And a LOT of land to grow the raw base plant material in. Corn or Sugar Cane
Simply put, there is not enough land in the entire US to grow the amount of corn or even sugar cane to provide the ethanol. You could farm from San Francisco to North Carolina and still not grow enough.
Period.
E85=Freedom
Thats GREAT NEWS!!!Ethanol is viable.The Department of Energy has studyed it and published there HONEST findings.Just go to there web site.DOE ethanol.You should give out bupper stickers to customers wether its threw sale of a car or a oil change!!
Saab Yurk
Trying again since my first comment didn’t make it…
Someone above incorrectly stated that ethanol is a wash as far as saving gasoline because “it takes between 0.9 and 1.0 gallons of petroleum to produce each gallon of ethanol”.
Without arguing the stated numbers, it was overlooked that it takes 1.1 MJ (megajoule) of petroleum energy to produce 1 MJ of gasoline energy, roughly 2.1 gallons of petroleum get consumed for each gallon of gasoline consumed (including the consumed gasoline). With ethanol, that would be reduced to the stated 0.9 to 1.0 gallons of petroleum, a significant and worthwhile reduction in petroleum consumption even if corn is the ethanol source.
And, the technology holds great promise with the Cellulosic forms of production.
Source: A recent Berkeley study published in Science on January 27, 2006 which was not funded by any special interest group. The study and supporting information can be found at: http://rael.berkeley.edu/EBAMM/
fred dzlsabe
If ethanol is viable then biodiesel is twice as viable. As the only NA driver of a GM 4cyl diesel I cant believe this product/technology is not an option in virtually every model/line. 35-44mpg and great performance are powerful inducements. And ethanol can be used to make bioD a more value-added, higher BTU fuel.
mario
I love the Solstice. As a matter of fact, I started reading and tracking every article a year and a half ago. Bob Lutz, you promised a sporty car that medium income buyers can purchase. I thought with tax and destination fees I was expecting to pay $23.500.00-$24,000.00 MAX. Everywhere I go, I see $26 - $29K not including the 5-$6,000.00 mark up. I ask you Mr. Lutz, are you aware of dealerships asking for 32-33K for what should have been a $20,000.00 MSRP? I know to some, $12,000.00 is not much but to me- this is out of reach. Once again- only the ‘rich’ are afforded the luxuary of driving a sports car. Mr.Lutz, would you care to comment?
jason
My first comment did not post for some reason so I will try again.
I am a GM employee that is loosing my job so buying one of these E85 compatible vehicles is not really an option at the moment. I personally would love to have one though. I like that most of the vehicles with a V8 are E85. Now we need to see some of the smaller more fuel efficient cars get it. How about a E85 Cobalt or Colorado or Canyon. The S10 was E85, why isn’t the Colorado or Canyon?
I would even consider running my older vehicles on E85 if I had an idea on how to convert them. and had places to get it as well. The only station in my state is for private use only. What good does that do. They need to get another deal with Meijer to get E85 at all of their gas stations and not just the ones in MI. If they show that it works they could get more places to start selling it like Giant Eagle in PA and Tops in NY.
Jason Coryell
1. It is great to see GM getting the news about E85 out to the public.
2. Now we need to advertise the industry-leading fuel economy of our large SUV’s/Trucks SPECIFICALLY and their E85 capability. The public doesn’t want to hear big, rugged, and powerful anymore. They want Efficiency with Functionality.
3. We need GM to also lead in converting old vehicles to E85-capable vehicles, hopefully with just a simple additive similar to what can be used for classic vehicles before gasoline went “unleaded”. The goal…bring that E85 price lower with new and old vehicles!
Tom Ward
I was wondering if it is possible to make a non E85 vehicle become “flexible”. I got rid of my Jeep Grand Cherokee due to gas prices and bought the new Dodge Caliber, I couldn’t be more disapointed with the overall quality of the vehicle. But if I can make it more fule efficent I may be able to live with it.
Also, what is the truth about the MPG between E85 and gasoline? I have heard conflicitng stories.
One more, will GM ever make a E100 vehicle?
Thanks!
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