I hope people get to their senses and start using more ethanol 
Pretty good explanation of why ethanol is the best fuel:
LeSving wrote:
Pretty good explanation of why ethanol is the best fuel:
Do they cover things like energy density in this video?
Or was that a sarcastic comment, sorry?
arj1 wrote:
Do they cover things like energy density in this video?
Or was that a sarcastic comment, sorry?
The video covers everything from energy density to power and to efficiency. It ends with the newest test results from Ford where they show clearly that using ethanol in a standard engine will in fact increase the MPG (miles per gallon) compared with gasoline, despite the lower energy density.
The reality is that it has been known since the beginning of cars well over 100 years ago that ethanol is the best fuel for a piston engine (non diesel variants). The rest is politics and economy/greed.
So no, it was not a sarcastic comment 
In fact, anyone thinking so has already been mislead by politicians and oil companies.
LeSving wrote:
The reality is that it has been known since the beginning of cars well over 100 years ago that ethanol is the best fuel for a piston engine (non diesel variants). The rest is politics and economy/greed.So no, it was not a sarcastic comment In fact, anyone thinking so has already been mislead by politicians and oil companies.
This is weird… Then how is that possible if the ethanol energy density is substantially lower?!
Although I have to say, even with lower energy density it could still be a good opportunity for greenwashing… It is not as bad as electric plane.
I have another serious questions – why not use turpentine? It has got the same energy density as hydrocarbons and extracting it from the trees does not require any chemicals.
In fact, anyone thinking so has already been mislead by politicians and oil companies.
Have you heard of SAF? it seems BP and Beoing with support of Congress are throwing billions on ethanol SAF from corn as “green” replacement of “fossile” JetA from dinosaures
This is used now to fly paying passengers around, are you saying these are lies? or they say the truth?
arj1 wrote:
This is weird… Then how is that possible if the ethanol energy density is substantially lower?!
This is all explained in the video. In short, ethanol allows higher compression than petrol, which gives better efficiency which offsets the lower energy density.
Whether that reasoning is sound, I have no idea.
But this is obviously never going to happen. Nobody is going to redesign engines.
In brief, ethanol has a higher octane rating and much better evaporation cooling than gasoline, and hence can be used at much higher compression ratios than gasoline. The efficiency gain from the increase in CR compensates for the lower energy density.
For this to work, you need a turbocharged high-compression direct injection engine specifically set up to burn ethanol, so it does now apply in your everyday car, but in a racing context…
The reason E10 gives worse MPG that
- the fuel is blended to give you the same octane rating as the E0 it replaces, so the potential does not even exist
- even if they blended it to a higher octane rating, you are burning it in an engine not set up for it
- even if it were blended to give a higher octane rating, it would not be that much higher because you need E40 to get close to the max octane number
- and of course you would still be burning it in an engine not set up for it
Ibra wrote:
This is used now to fly paying passengers around, are you saying these are lies? or they say the truth?
Mix politics and economics into the equations, and any “truths” evaporate pretty quick (just my cynical experience of how our society works ) The “truth” is still out there though I don’t know much about SAF, but being a JET fuel, I would think it’s just a fancy name for biodiesel, which is a fancy name for plant oil. I don’t see what it has in common with ethanol in this respect since the properties are vastly different. The diesel cycle (or jet, same thing) has the advantage of burning fuel, it doesn’t require combustion or evaporation of fuel into a fuel/air mix. So, diesel and plant oil have the same properties in an engine, it makes little difference. Gasoline and ethanol on the other hand, have very different properties when used as fuel in a piston engine.
Airborne_Again wrote:
This is all explained in the video
Indeed. He also explains this misconception that ethanol somehow is less “potent” As far as power goes, it is a factor 2 more potent. The other thing is that the efficiency can be increased by as much as 30%, and it is a no brainer to do it. The fuel itself does the job.
From an environmental point of view, the energy density is not very relevant. What is relevant is the efficiency in producing the fuel and the efficiency when using it in an engine. That improved efficiency when using it in an engine is today completely untapped. That is the sole reason for decreased mpg also.
If ethanol as a fuel is sustainable in the long run, all things considered, is another matter.
What about turpentine as a fuel? I know some people used it in old car engines as a test, it has worked.
