Beetle Juice
Ethanol, a flammable, colorless chemical compound found in alcoholic beverages and used increasingly as a fuel additive, has garnered much positive press attention lately. The example of Brazil, a country that has weaned itself off of Middle Eastern oil through its own three-decade long sugar-cane based ethanol program, is frequently held up as an example that America should follow. Many, however, remain skeptical that the Brazilian model can or should be applied in the US.
This hasn't stopped major automakers from initiating or increasing research on and commercialization of new ethanol-fuel technology. According to Greenswitch, both GM and VW have begun in earnest:
GM goes ethanol, VW kicks off ethanol research. General Motors is currently trying to promote their FlexFuel vehicles which can either run on gasoline or corn based ethanol E85. They have created a website ("Live green, go yellow") to promote E85. It´s a nifty, flashy site which features the "cornulator" where you can calculate how much gasoline you would save and the "stalk car race" which looks little bit like a pac man for car mechanics. Elsewhere, not nearly as playful but nevertheless interesting: Volkswagen has signed a letter of intent with Shell and the Canadian Iogen corp. to research and start German production sites for cellulose ethanol.
These efforts are what I call demand-side technologies: they are desgined to increase the efficiency or ability of automobiles to use ethanol and thereby stimulate demand for it. They do not, however, address the question of the efficient production of ethanol itself. One of the more promising supply-side technologies that I have seen is under development by a New York-based firm named Xethanol. It plans to produce ethanol from a bio-mass rather than just corn or sugar cane.
Since 2003, Xethanol has operated two Iowa plants that can cheaply distill a gasoline additive called ethanol from bizarre sources such as stale butterscotch candy. When technicians mix the sweets with a special form of yeast, fermentation results, producing ethanol. (Typically producers of ethanol derive the clean-burning, high-octane fuel from corn.) Big oil companies then combine it with unleaded gasoline to reduce the cost of gas and the air pollution it causes. Xethanol isn't just relying on candy for its fuel supply. This year it plans to introduce a process that will make it possible to turn all kinds of things--including cornstalks, grass clippings, and old newspapers--into ethanol.
While the firm has yet to turn an economic profit, it does have resources and capabilites that stand to strategically differentiate it from its US and foreign rivals. It's a secret sauce of sorts:
Xethanol will use a recently discovered form of yeast to ferment various types of garbage into ethanol. It has obtained rights to the process from the U.S. Department of Agriculture, where a scientist discovered that a yeast in the intestines of a type of beetle can convert plant-based waste product into ethanol.
Essentially it's beetle (digestive) juices that they plan to use to convert muck into money, to convert material normally destined for landfills into fuel to fill the tanks of Beetles, Spiders, Jaguars, and Thunderbirds.
Technorati: ethanol | Xethanol | biofuel | Alternative Energy |
Comments
We respectfully disagree with Mr. Martel's comments. You don't have to go to Brazil to find a good model for biofuel use. Minnesota drivers use more biofuels per capita than anywhere else in North America. All of our gasoline is E10, our diesel is B2, and we buy and use more E85 (225 stations and growing) than any other state.
Posted by: American Lung Association of MN | May 25, 2006 1:53 AM
Brazil is precisely the LAST country whose model I would emulate. The more ethanol, as a solution to our current energy crisis, is exposed to rational analysis the worse it looks. The ONLY solution, until technology provides us with a VIABLE alternative to carbon based fuels, is accelerated exploration in the USA with NO restrictions.
Posted by: Charles Martel | May 24, 2006 6:35 PM