- Posted on Friday, August 24th, 2007 at 3:55 pm
E85 “Mythbusting”
By Mary Beth Stanek
Director, Environment Energy and Safety Policy
There has been a lot of fervor in the press lately over E85, with plenty of rhetoric meant to discourage consumer confidence in this renewable fuel. So, please allow me to do a little “mythbusting” on the subject of E85.
Fact: If all of the E-85 capable vehicles on the road today — including those that GM, Ford, and Chrysler have already committed to produce over the next 10 years — were to run on E-85, we could displace 22 billion gallons of gasoline annually.
And if all manufacturers made the same commitment, we could increase the savings to 37 billion gallons of gasoline annually. That’s more than quadruple the savings that a 4 percent per year CAFE increase would achieve … and, very importantly, enough to actually reduce America’s oil consumption by more than 10 percent versus today’s levels, and CO2 emissions, as well.
Here are a few of myths out there on E85, and truth provided by experts.
Food vs. Fuel — Using corn for ethanol takes away from those supplies that could be used for human food or animal feed, and increases overall food prices.
Not true. Each year there is an average 1 billion bushel corn surplus. This will be true for 2007. In response to greater demand, farmers planted the largest corn crop since 1944 and corn prices already are coming down in response. Additionally, ethanol production yields co-products including distillers grain, a high-protein animal feed. The relatively small increases in food prices in 2007 have been attributed to increased energy costs (oil cost). (source: USDA and National Corn Grower’s Association (NCGA))
The increased use of corn to produce ethanol in the U.S. has caused increased prices of tortillas in Mexico. — White corn in Mexico is protected with a tariff against U.S. corn. The tortilla crisis was a result of speculation, not real world corn prices. (Source: USDA and NCGA)
Milk prices are rising due to increased corn price — Milk prices are set by a formula under regional Milk Marketing Orders, the main component of which is supply and demand of dry milk powder, whey powder and cheddar cheese. The regional MMO sets the price bottlers must pay farmers for milk. The prices are high now, thanks to a supply shortfall driven by global trends, including dairy policies in Europe, a long-term drought in Australia, growing demand for milk powder in Asia and the rapid growth of cheese consumption in the United States. Those trends have raised the base price of milk paid to California dairy farmers.
(Source: Renewable Fuels Association (RFA), USDA, USGAO)
Net Energy – It takes more energy to make a gallon of ethanol than that gallon delivers. — False. Current research prepared by Argonne National Laboratory (a U.S. Department of Energy Laboratory), indicates a 34% gain in the overall energy input/output equation for the corn-to-ethanol process. That is, if 100 BTUs of energy is used to plant corn, harvest the crop, transport it, etc., 138 BTUs of energy is available in the fuel ethanol. Corn has a positive energy return and future cellulosic biomass will be even better.
It is worth noting that in fact, gasoline has a negative net energy of .87, meaning it takes 13 percent more energy to produce than it delivers. (Source: ANL)
Not enough land — There is not enough farmland to support the amount of corn needed to produce significant amounts of ethanol. We’d have to clear cut forests to get more land. — There are more than 300 million acres of active cropland in the U.S. In 2007, approximately 90 million acres of corn was planted. Only about 5 percent of corn is for human consumption. The rest is for feed, fuel and export. Also, corn yields double every generation through technology, so our farmers are getting better at growing more on less land. (Source: USDA). In the future, marginal lands will be used as biomass becomes the preferred feedstock and a smaller percentage of land will be needed
Never enough ethanol – We could not create enough ethanol in the U.S. to significantly offset the use of fossil fuels. Studies, including two by the DOE and USDA, have proven we can produce 60-90 billion gallons, on an energy equivalent basis, and potentially offset fossil fuel use by 30% or more by 2030.
Water Waste – Significant growth in the production of ethanol will stress available water supplies in local/regional municipalities. — This is an issue, but a manageable one. Ethanol production is water intensive, but technology is improving. It used to take 5 gallons of water to make a gallon of E85 ethanol. Today, it takes about two to three gallons. Ethanol facilities recycle some of water in the process. Gasoline also uses water in production. Technology improvements and better recycling techniques will improve the process. Proper permitting will help prevent issues from arising in local areas. (Source: Clean Fuels Development Coalition and Institute for Agriculture and Trade Policy)
Carcinogens – Use of E85 ethanol will lead to increased smog and health effects. — This assertion has no basis in fact. There was a study published by Stanford University that indicated that E85 was no better or worse than gas. The media misinterpreted the study. The actual study inputs have been questioned by a number of key people, including the Natural Resource Defense Council who have asked for a blue ribbon review.
The potential of bio-fuels like E-85 to significantly displace petroleum is within our grasp today. GM already has more than 2 million E85-equipped vehicles on the road … but they are not being fully utilized because of constraints on supply and distribution.
What are your thoughts on E85? How can we better promote E85 and help consumers understand the positive benefits of bio-fuels?
I look forward to hearing from you.
17 Comments
eggsngrits
I pretty much knew that these myths were overstatements or outright myths. I really hoped that someone would address the issue of the MASSIVE cost of developing and supporting the infrastructure required to distribute E85 to end users throughout the US.
Gary Dikkers
Ms Stanke,
That’s quite a list of mythbusting you did there. Of course, they look a lot like the lists of talking points that one can find on websites belonging to the American Coalition for Ethanol, the Ethanol Production and Information Council, the Renewable Fuels Association, and the National Corn Growers Association — all lobbying associations who have a vested interest in promoting ethanol and putting it in the best light possible. A skeptic might legitemately wonder whether those associations really present both sides of the issue.
What are my thoughts? First, please read my comments to your coworker Donna McLallen at:
The Ethanol Debate
Ethanol: My Final Words
In particular, read my explanation to Ms McLallen of why one of GM’s flex-fuel vehicles actually consumes more TOTAL energy burning E85 than when it burns gasoline.
To keep this entry from becoming too long, I will split my comments to you, and over the next couple of days, I plan to submit three separate comments addressing the following issues:
Regards,
Gary Dikkers
Gary Dikkers
Ms Stanke,
I don’t share your confidence that ethanol will displace any fossil fuels in our national menu of fuel use. In fact, I have direct experience that says it won’t.
One of my cars is a 1999 GMC Sonoma light pickup truck. Since I got my first driver’s license, I’ve always kept track of miles driven, fuel used, and computed my fuel mileage.
About four years ago I started to notice that whenever I put E10 in my Sonoma my mileage dropped. So I started doing tests — deliberately running the fuel tank to near empty, then filling up with either E10 or straight gasoline, and comparing results.
My Experience Using E10
Time after time, I have arrived at consistently similar results: When I burn E10, I get about 29 mpg at steady highway speeds, and when I burn straight gasoline, I get about 32 mpg.
That three miles per gallon doesn’t sound like much of difference does it? But let’s try a little thought experiment and imagine a theoretical trip of 320 miles.
But 90% of that 11 gallons of E10 would be gasoline. And what is 90% of 11? A: 9.9 gallons.
That means whether I burn gasoline or E10, I would burn almost exactly the same amount of gasoline on that theoretical trip.
Conclusion
When I use E10 in my Sonoma, I save virtually no gasoline, but I do have to buy 11 gallons of fuel. I now buy E10 only when I need fuel and have no other choice.
Is my truck an anomaly?
I admit my experiments are not scientific. Perhaps my truck is an anomaly, or there is something about the way I drive that causes the difference.
USDOT Statistics
That’s why I found it gratifying when I found a dataset that validates my experience.
Three years ago I discovered that the US Department of Transportation (USDOT), Federal Highway Administration (FHWA) keeps statistics of the amount of fuel burned and miles driven in each of the 50 states.
I live in Wisconsin and happened to know that Minnesota has had mandated ethanol in all their gasoline for the last ten years, while Wisconsin doesn’t. Two very similar states with one known difference — in Minnesota all motor fuels except diesel must be blended to at least E10.
So why not compare the average fuel mileage of the two states? I did, and what was the result?
Results
In 2004 (the latest year for which data is available) Minnesota drivers drove 56.570 billion miles using 2.744 billion gallons of fuel. Their average fuel mileage was 20.62 mpg.
In that same year, Wisconsin drivers drove 60.399 billion miles using 2.592 billion gallons of fuel for an average of 23.30 mpg.
Minnesota drivers actually drove less than their cheesehead neighbors, but used more fuel to do it.
Something caused Minnesota drivers to get almost 12% worse fuel mileage than their neighbors to the east. What could have that been?
Both states have almost identical topography, climate, demographics, and about the same mix of urban/rural driving. (In fact, Wisconsin has a slightly higher ratio of urban to rural miles driven.) The two states are about as close to being twins as any two states could be. (Not counting the Vikings/Packers difference of course.) Yet fuel economy in Minnesota is worse, and their drivers buy and burn more fuel than their neighbors.
The only obvious difference that jumps out is that Minnesota has mandated its drivers burn a blend of ethanol and gasoline — a fuel with a known lower energy density than gasoline.
The facts are pretty clear: The results of this huge sample size – the entire State of Minnesota – validated my individual experience.
Unfortunately, that is a piece of information you will never find on a website belonging to one of the ethanol lobbying organization.
Best regards,
Gary Dikkers
Corky Estrada
“Only about 5 percent of corn is for human consumption. The rest is for feed, fuel and export.”
Right, most domestic corn now goes for animal feed or is exported. But why do we feed corn to livestock such as cattle, hogs, and poultry? (Answer: So we can eat their meat, eat their eggs, or drink their milk.)
And why do others import our corn? (Answer: So they can feed their livestock.) And why do they feed their livestock? (Answer: So they can eat their meat, eat their eggs, or drink their milk.)
Sorry, I’m not buying it. Even the corn we don’t eat directly and feed to livestock, is still a critical part of the human food chain.
Not far from where I live an ethanol plant started running out of corn last spring because the local dairy farmers (who had been selling the extra corn they raise to the ethanol plant) started hoarding what they had remaining in order to feed their own cows.
The ethanol plant had to either import corn from out of state, or scale back. They decided to scale back because of the extra cost transporting that corn would have added.
Please don’t try to tell us there is no connection between corn-based ethanol and the world’s food supply.
Bradley Looferman
Myth: Never enough ethanol – We could not create enough ethanol in the U.S. to significantly offset the use of fossil fuels. You say, “Studies have proven we can potentially offset fossil fuel use by 30% or more by 2030.”
On the contrary, that is a far from a settled question. A recent study by two scientists at the University of Minnesota found that if we converted the ENTIRE U.S. corn crop to ethanol, it would equal only 12% of our annual fuel consumption.
That’s the ENTIRE corn crop displacing ONLY 12% — and their study didn’t take into account the fossil fuels that would have to be consumed growing that corn and turning it into ethanol.
There is no question that if we used all our corn for ethanol, that step would have dramatic unintended consequences that would cause a seismic shock to ripple through our economy and society.
Don’t be so cavalier in your dismissal of the claim there won’t/can’t be enough ethanol to make a difference.
True, there is hope for cellulosic ethanol, but there is also hope for fusion energy reactors that will someday be able to produce energy, “To cheap to meter.”
Unfortunately, there is an eerie parallel between cellulosic ethanol and fusion power — both hold great promise, but both have always been years in the future.
Brad Looferman
Gary Dikkers
Is corn-based ethanol renewable?
Ms Stanek,
Please all me to so some “mythbusting.”
It’s true, America’s corn farmers can grow a new crop of corn each year. But does that necessarily mean that corn-based ethanol is actually a renewable fuel? Someone needs to speak truth to power and explain the answer is, “No.” (Of course it is to the direct benefit of corn farmers and the ethanol industry if we believe ethanol is renewable.)
Let me ask you the following questions and see how you react:
So what’s the answer? Could it be that farmers and ethanol plants don’t use the fuel they make, because that fuel is actually not renewable?
Of course that’s what it means. It is fundamentally incorrect to say that a fuel is “renewable” if its production is dependent on the consumption of irreplaceable, unrenewable fuels.
Renewable, sustainable fuels can’t come from the continued consumption of unrenewable resources.
That’s basic logic, and the fact the ethanol lobby has been able to gloss over that, and that no one in power has called them on that, boggles the mind.
Regards,
Gary Dikkers
Gary Dikkers
What is the energy return on energy invested of ethanol?
Ms Stanek,
The answer is that all the studies about the net energy (EROEI) of corn ethanol are correct — those that say it is greater than one, and those that say it is less than one.
The difference is the perimeter the researchers draw around the process and how many energy inputs they included.
Doctors Pimental and Patzek drew a big fence around the process and included as many energy inputs as they could think of. Shapouri and Wang, who did the Argonne study that the USDA commissioned, kept their perimeter small ignoring some of the inputs P&P included. Whom you choose to believe mostly depends on whether or not you stand to profit from the tax exemptions, protective tariffs, and subsidies the ethanol industry has lobbied Congress for.
Actually, no study is needed
Let me suggest to you that no study is actually needed. You can instead do a simple thought experiment that will lead you to the answer.
The US Patent Office (USPO) test
Ever since the founding of the USPO, they have constantly received patent applications for machines whose inventors say will produce more energy than they consume and run forever. (These machines became known as “perpetual motion machines.”)
The USPO quickly decided they needed a practical way to test all those applications. So they consulted with the scientists of the day who told them that any machine that produced more energy than it consumed would be able to power itself.
Therefore, the USPO developed the following basic test for perpetual motion machines: Upon receiving an application for PPM, they would ask the inventor the following simple question: “If this machine will do as you say, please connect the output to the input and let’s see if it keeps running.”
Those inventors who knew their machines were a fraud would just walk away. Many inventors, who actually believed they had invented a PPM, would connect the output to the input as requested, and watch their machines quickly sputter to a stop.
To this day, no one has submitted a patent application to the USPO for a perpetual motion machine that has been able to pass that simple, basic test: “Please connect the output to the input and let’s see if it keeps running.”
Apply the USPO test to the ethanol industry
The ethanol industry claims they produce more energy than they consume. That leads to my thought experiment: What would happen if someone asked the ethanol industry to take the USPO test and “connect the output to the input?” Would an ethanol production system keep running without any external energy inputs? What do you think?
Several times over the last three years I have asked representatives of the ethanol industry if they would be willing to try the test of connecting the output to the input to see if it keeps running.
Their response has always been, “What would be the point of that? or “What would we gain by that?”
They’re right, they would have nothing to gain from trying to pass the USPO test. It is far easier (and safer) to wave around a paper study the USDA commissioned from the Argonne Lab, than to put everything on the line and try to prove it.
They know that if the test failed, they could never again claim they produced more energy than they consumed. Their industry would be turned on its head and the subsidies, protective tariffs, mandates, and tax exemptions would quickly dry up.
They know they would likely not be able to pass the USPO test.
Why hasn’t Congress ever asked the ethanol industry to pass the USPO test?
It’s unfortunate that Congress and the state legislatures have never asked the ethanol industry to pass the USPO’s basic test for perpetual motion schemes: “Please connect the output to the input and let’s see if it keeps running.”
Passing that simple, basic test should be a condition for qualifying for continued tax exemptions, protective tariffs, subsidies, and mandates.
I suggest we throw the Pimental, Patzek, Wang, and Shapouri and all other ethanol net energy studies out the window, and that Congress instead ask the ethanol industry to pass the ultimate test of whether they produce more energy than they consume:
“Please connect the output to the input and let’s see if it keeps running.”
Unfortunately, we all know the truth — if we had to make ethanol from corn, and we also had to make corn from ethanol, the ethanol industry as we know it could not exist.
Best regards,
Gary Dikkers
noel park
Please refer to my comments on previous posts, “The Ethanol Debate” and “Ethanol: My Final Words” as well.
Please refer to last week’s Los Angeles Times editorial. “Drunk On Ethanol”.
Gary Dikkers was kind enough to provide a link to that editorial, so you can read it for yourself
Please note the letters to the editor in yesterday’s Times Opinion section in response to the above. Maybe somebody as smart as Gary can provide a link to them. As I am not, I will just type one of them in here directly:
“As an engineer who has worked in the energy field for more than 40 years, including ethanol refinery design and engineering,
The Times is to be congratulated for further exposing the ethanol fraud being perpetrated on U.S. taxpayers.”
Daniel Dunn, Northridge (CA)
I would also direct your attention to a report on this issue which ran on the Anderson Cooper 360 program on CNN, either last Thursday or Friday. It basically confirmed many of the things that Gary Dikkers, Mr. Dunn, et al are saying. The last word went to a professor from a midwestern university who said that, if ALL of the corn growing acerage available in the U.S. was devoted to ethanol, it would replace less than 10% of the imported oil.
I am a loyal GM owner/customer. I own 6 Chevrolet cars and trucks for my family and my business. Our business consistently buys over $10,000/month in Chevrolet parts. As such, I started following these blogs because of my sort of forlorn hope that the GM I have supported so loyally would find its way again.
How can the company which built all of the historic cars displayed so lovingly on this blog have become so irrelevant to the American public?
I have to tell you though, that having my intelligence insulted the way it has been by these ethanol spin pieces is severely trying my loyalty. You could not be doing a better marketing job for Toyota and Honda.
Gary Dikkers
Ms Stanek,
That is not a fact. The Argonne National Lab study mistakenly confused process efficiency with energy return on energy invested (EROEI).
It is important to understand the difference between process efficiency and EROEI.
Process efficiency
If you put 100 barrels of crude into an oil refinery, it is true you will get about 80 barrels of fuel (gasoline, diesel, jet fuel, etc.) out. But that 80% is not the return on energy invested — that is the efficiency of the refining process.
The EROEI of gasoline from crude oil
The reason it’s a range and not one number is because EROEI is a function of from where the oil came; how difficult it was to find; whether it gushes out of the ground under its own pressure or has to be pumped; from how deep it has to be pumped; how far it has to be transported from well to refinery; and how difficult it is to crack. (Is it sweet or sour crude?) It should be obvious that gasoline from oil that is easy to find, easy to pump, and easy to refine has a very high EROEI.
Even with those variables, the EROEI of gasoline is still better than corn ethanol by about a factor of five because of all the free energy Mother Nature put into that crude oil over millions of years. (By the way: To answer a question I asked you two days ago, that is the real reason why corn farmers and ethanol plants don’t use their own ethanol as their fuel source. They’ve invested too much energy into growing corn and forming it into ethanol to use it as one of their primary fuels. The only way they can profit is to sell the ethanol they invested so much energy in. They literally can’t afford to burn the ethanol they made.)
In the early days of the oil industry, the EROI of gasoline could even be as high as 100 to 1. But that was in the golden era of the oil business when oil came from shallow easy-to-find pools in the East Texas oilfields and almost always gushed out of the ground under its own pressure.
Certainly the EROEI of oil will decrease as it becomes harder to find; we have to pump it from deeper and deeper depths; and refiners have to use more and more sour crude, but for now, the EROEI of gasoline still outpaces that of ethanol by a considerable margin.
Please don’t fall into the trap of confusing “process efficiency” with “energy return on energy invested.” Too many in the ethanol business have made that mistake trying to make ethanol look better than it is.
If you’d like to learn more about the true story of ethanol, a chemical engineer named Robert Rapier has a section in his energy blog answering frequently asked questions about ethanol. You can find it at Ethanol FAQs
As always,
Gary Dikkers
DC
Ms. Stanek,
It is disusting to see this misinformation being passed off as “Mythbusting”.
FYI: For Your (Mis)Information?
As General Motors’ Director of Environment Energy and Safety Policy, for yourself to post this is disturbing.
Noel Park’s last paragraph is poignant:
“I have to tell you though, that having my intelligence insulted the way it has been by these ethanol spin pieces is severely trying my loyalty. You could not be doing a better marketing job for Toyota and Honda.”
Heed those words.
Thanks,
Devin
Gary Dikkers
Ms Stanek,
The increase in food prices in 2007 has been attributed to increased energy costs, eh?
Where I live (Southern Wisconsin), milk has gone from $1.23 per half-gallon to $1.79 per half-gallon in the last six months, while the price of both gasoline and diesel here is about the same as it was 12 months ago. (Actually, it is a couple of cents per gallon lower now.)
Please explain how no change in the price of fuel here has caused a 45% increase in the retail price of milk?
Here’s a story in the Manchester Guardian that paints a somewhat different picture than you learned from the USDA and NCGA websites:
Read the entire story at: Guardian
Regards,
Gary Dikkers
Gary Dikkers
Ms Stanek,
OK, you’ve heard from us. What’s your reaction? You’ve seemed strangely silent since first posting you “Mythbusting” column.
We look forward to hearing from you.
Regards,
Gary Dikkers
noel park
Thank you bloggers. You are the greatest.
Tim Quirk
Ms Stanek…
?
Nino
By the way, you may want to ask GM corporate counsel to check who owns the trademark to “Mythbusters” and “Mythbusting.”
JOHN TREANOR
THE CLOSEST STATION FOR E85 IS IN MIAMI.50 MILES AWAY. WHEN WILL IT BE READILY AVAILABLE NATIONWIDE FOR MY 2007 AVALANCHE? THANKS YOU SO MUCH. JOHN TREANOR.
Gary Dikkers
Ms Stanek,
We look forward to hearing from you. Your continued silence and failure to counter what we posted in response to your blog entry speaks volumes.
Regards,
Gary Dikkers
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