What you think about Corn as a fuel other than gasoline?

Question

Gas prices are very high. Now since they use corn for and secondary fuel, did you notice Milk as gone up twice as much since a year ago. No matter what they do everything is going sky high.

Answer 1

Biofuels aren't bad, but ethanol is a TERRIBLE biofuel. Even the government says it takes 1 gallon's worth of fossil fuel to make 1.3 gallons worth of ethanol.
http://www.mda.state.mn.us/renewable/renewablefuels/balance.htm

Why? Because alcohol fuels are distilled, and distillation takes an enormous amount of energy because it involves boiling. (latent heat of vaporization). What's worse, you must boil many gallons to get 1 gallon of ethanol. It's extremely inefficient, and they're actually building new coal plants to power the ethanol plants in the midwest. Does that defeat the purpose, or what?

Oil biofuels are much better, squeeze the plant and you get oil. Like 1 gallon worth of fossil fuel yields 3.2 gallons worth of biodiesel. SVO is even more efficient because it skips the biodiesel process. Even better, oil plants often grow where food plants cannot. In fact, oil from algae might actually be able to replace ALL our use of gasoline and diesel.

Of course, that makes the big-industry corn growers into very sad pandas, because corn is the worst possible choice for an oil fuel:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Biodiesel#Yields_of_common_crops
And corn growers have lobbyists. Thus the ethanol craze. A big-government way of pretending to help the environment while actually helping Big Corn and Big Power.

So biodiesel is a very good idea. It isn't being deliberately squashed by the government... but it's not being subsidized anything like corn/ethanol are.

Of course biodiesel requires diesel vehicles, and I know you're going "Ewww" but good news there: First, a major change in the diesel smog laws have triggered development of really excellent new diesel engines. And second, cars are moving toward the "plug-in series hybrid" like the Chevy Volt, in which case gas vs. diesel vs. jet really won't matter. Yes, I said jet. Jets use oil, i.e. biodiesel.

Answer 2

There are probably two reasons why milk has gone up:

1.) Transportation costs have gone up due to the rise in gas prices.

2.) Corn prices have gone up due to the increased demand for corn due to ethanol consumption. Corn is often used to feed cattle especially around the midwest, making the cost to feed the cattle and produce milk go up. Although I really doubt that the dairy producers are seeing much of an increase in the price they receive for their milk. You can mainly thank the stores and milk companies for using those excuses to raise milk prices while still paying the dairy farmer basically the same, maybe a few cents more a gallon.

The dairy farmer probably comes out with the worst raw end of the deal even over the consumer.

I also agree with GPSMAN. In South American they use beets and sugar cane. Corn is used for ease of conversion and cost for right now. The idea is to go to ethanol created from cellulose eventually. That would allow plant stalks to be used for making ethanol. So one day the farmer might not only be selling their corn or soybeans but also the corn and soybean plant stalks baled up for something for producing ethanol.

Actually, ethanol production from corn is not so much of a bad thing. It helps farmers and can help reduce their dependency on government subsidies in order to make enough money to make a living. That means less of your tax money might be needed to help support farmers so they can make ends meat. Also, the rise in corn prices will probably be temporary. There is a lot of land that is held back in reserve and farmers are told and paid by the government to not farm the land. Much of that land can be brought out of reserve and used to farm. Reserved land was created a long time ago in order to keep too much grain from being produced which could drastically lower grain prices and make many farmers go into bankruptcy due to the low grain prices.

So it's not a bad thing at all. It allows the US to produce fuel that would otherwise have to be bought off of other countries.

Answer 3

Ethanol can be made from any sugar or starch. It does not need to be made from corn. Carrots or potatoes, or even grass can be used... as soon as prices fall, other stock will be used for ethanol. Corn is being used right now due to ease of use, and nothing else. The corn used for ethanol is NOT food grade corn.
Ethanol can be made from damaged, dirty, contaminated, rotten, moldy, burnt, bug-infested corn. None of the corn used for fuel came from people's plates. And while ethanol producers use millions of pounds of corn, they also make millions of gallons of fuel. About 6 pounds of corn is used up to make 1 gallon of ethanol. And that one gallon in a small sedan can go 40 miles. 6 pounds of corn for 40 miles? Sounds pretty good to me. There are also modern methods of distillation that DO NOT REQUIRE an outside heat source, so they are very, very energy efficient.

Answer 4

Ethanol from corn is an excellent alternative to gasoline. It is clean, renewable and the money stays here. True, ethanol may make the price of some foods go up but remember 2 things. One---oil makes the price of everything go up. every single good you buy must be shipped or transported to the store. Two---the only thing standing between us and $10/gallon gasoline is ethanol. Without an alternative the Mideast oil sheiks can charge whatever they feel like for a barrel of oil.

Answer 5

Ethanol can be a useful tool in fighting global warming.

But the big gains won't come until we start making it from a weed like saw grass, which grows on poor soil with little water. People are working on that.

Ethanol from corn is an OK thing, but only for the short term. As you point out, the costs involved make its' value as a fuel less.

Answer 6

Fuel from Corn is really just a dumb idea. We will see everything in the food line go up. Things like milk, soda (high fructose corn syrup) and on. Perhaps other plants might make good fuel, but the corn thing just isn't it.

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Answer 7

We are only searching for alterative fuels because we are running out of fossil fuels. Fact is alternatives still produce emissions, we need to be researching something that produces very little to no emissions. We've already had an electric car, but due to several reasons it was dumped. The evoloution of electric cars would be alot further if the project wasnt canned all those years ago

Answer 8

ethanol fuels are a great idea. the concern with them is that you need to use crops to produce them. The main argument right now is that is every car in the US were powered by ethanol then there wouldn't be enough crops for both food and fuel.

Answer 9

It works, but I worry about the effect on food prices and global starvation. Most countries can't feed themselves independently now. Maybe good short term only.

Answer 10

it will...but i would rather support our local farmers for their milk and corn then to put more money into the oil companies share sholders pockets any day...its about time farmers start to reap some of the benefits of there years of hard work working at or below the poverty level....