Ethanol sucks....

Even if it's 10% of overall gasoline per gallon I still lost a bit of mileage from it. Let me explain....

I filled up my car at a gas station selling gasoline w/ 10%+/- ethanol at the same price of normal 100% gasoline, which around here is $3.05. My taurus, gets about 22mpg, and i fill up when the light comes on. Normally, when that happens the odometer read around 220miles. When I fill up I end up getting about 9-10.5 gallons.

Last week I filled up with gasoline containing 10% ethanol +/-. I lost about a lil over 20 miles because light came on at around 180miles and filled up when it was at 200miles. I ended up needing 10.5 gallons to fill it all up.

So basically, I'm spending more money on something not coming from Oil, which costs the same, if not more, than gasoline and gets crappier mileage even at 10%!!!
Wow, no wonder the oil companies are pushing this product than automakers are pushing electric vehicles.

I can't wait until I get my honda civic.

</rant>

 

So you pay roughly £1.55 a gallon, wait till you pay over £5.00 a gallon like us 'poor' 'ole brits, then you will really worry about your fuel consumption

 

Ha. HOnda civic bifuel? Sounds neato! I saw LOTS of them in Calif when i was there last october...and not only in Calif!

Get on and buy one! Dont let those assholes of the OilCompanies get your money that easily!!

 

Meh get a diesel and run it on Veggie oil. Cheap and you don't lose any MPG and improves the uptake. Added benefits of being less harmful to handle and can fill up at any supermarket.

 

You know, I used to think, "Gee, I'm sure glad I don't live in Europe where they have to pay so much..." but really its an entirely different situation.

Where you might have to pay more for gasoline, you have a FAAAR superior public transportation system in general and and greater population density to take advantage of it.

PS: Ethanol does suck...and is the biggest fucking waste of natural resources. We should be developing our solar collection and battery technology. In the meantime, we should be using nuclear power.

 

My cars runs on Ethanol. Not only is cheaper to fill the tank, it makes the engine more efficient. My car had 192HP with Gasoline. With Ethanol, it has 200 HP.

It's being running on alcohol, since the first owner got it (1998). Almost 10 years after, the engine runs great. Never had any engine failure.

Ethanol is not a joke. Ethanol fuel has been avaiable in Brazil for almost 3 decades.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ethanol_fuel_in_Brazil

Some interesting quotes:

" The Brazilian ethanol program provided nearly 700,000 jobs in 2003, and cut 1975–2002 oil imports by a cumulative undiscounted total of US$50 billion. Today, Brazil gets more than 30% of its automobile fuels from sugar cane-based ethanol. "

" The program successfully reduced by 10 million the number of cars running on gasoline in Brazil, thereby reducing the country's dependence on oil imports. "

" Bagasse burning is environmentally friendly compared to other fuels like oil and coal "

" In Brazil, a recent law has been created in order to ban the burning of sugarcane fields, and machines will replace human labor as the means of harvesting cane. This not only solves the problem of pollution from burning fields, but new machines also have a higher productivity than people."

" Some question the viabiliy of biofuels like ethanol as total replacements for gasoline/crude oil. One concern is that sugarcane cultivation will displace other crops, thus causing food shortages. However, these concerns seem to be groundless. Despite having the world's largest sugarcane crop, the 45,000 km² Brazil currently devotes to sugarcane production amount to only about one-half of one percent of its total land area of some 8.5 million km²."

More info here:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ethanol_fuel#Brazil
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Common_ethanol_fuel_mixtures#E100

Hydrogen is better, but Ethanol and Natural Gas are good solutions for now. At least my country won't need to acept OPEP ridiculous prices for petrol.

As for poor nations, why don't the rich countries help them? All this talk about poor countries will be affected is getting dumber. Africa and lots of other poor countries are in terrible situation now. I don't see anyone helping, not even UN ( UN doesn't do nothing these days ).

 

See, that's the thing. However, you guys get it from vast amounts of sugar cane, which can be grown very easily. On top of that, your population is smaller and a very large portion of your land mass is unincorporated (basically nothing but jungles).

In the US its different. Only climate up here the can grow sugarcane is Florida, which doesn't want to shift it towards that purpose. Creating ethanol from Sugar Cane is cheaper because it's been around longer, whereas creating it from corn, which can grow in many of the states in US, is newer, and therefore more expensive.

They are developing technologies that can create ethanol from plant waste, such as stems, bark, cellulose fibers, etc, but it will take years and lots of lobbying for it to be put into good use.

Your government also loves its citizens, whereas the US is sleeping with big Oil. That's another reason we're getting screwed.

It works in Brazil, but it will take an entire different approach for it to work in the US. So for now, we're stuck and for how long, we don't know.

 

Sleeping with/gagging on shaft - it's all the same thing. :110:

I am pro-not using cars at all, but unfortunately that's kind of impossible and at the same time I like being able to go wherever I want, whenever I want, at whatever speed I want (for the most part).

 

Jungles? Apart from the Rainforest (60% is in Brazil), which basicly stays in the whole Amazonas and Acre states and small parts of Pará, Roraima and Rondõnia, we don't have jungles.

Of course it's different. But you can't say it's joke just because it's doesn't "work" in US.

Same here, but thankfully lobbying doesn't happen here. Petrobras is ahead of all these studies. They are not only developing new types of Ethanol and Bio-Diesel, and also Hydrogen and Natural Gas.

Like i said before, it works here, so it can't be a joke. I understand that in US the big oil companies are battling against it, but you guys can't generalize.

 

I'm sorry, please don't take that seriously. I'm mainly ranting because of how much money I'd have to spend now, while they develop this new technology for god knows how long.

 

Yeah, it is less effcient in it's current form. But whatcha' gonna do. It's inevitible that gasoline is just gonna get more expensive, and eventually oil will crash altoghether, sometime in our lifetime.

They should just sell electric cars and be done with it.

 

Petrol in Japan now cost 250 yen per letter when back in January it was only 219 yen per litter. The petrol companies are pointing the finger at the US for our price increase but they're doing sweet FA against it. What makes it shitter is that in Yamaguchi there's a union that stops ALL major petrol companies from lowering their prices. So I now either scout for a no-name petrol station or fill up in the next prefecture where I work. Thank God Japanese cars are quite economic.

In the UK petrol is actually not that expensive once you take away the 80% tax the government add to it.

Yakumo

 

Don't worry mate :thumbsup: But i was worried when i saw everybody with the same opinion.

 

LOL @ your logic!

...When you find a way of obtaining U.K petrol, tax free, give us a shout please. :clap:

 

Typical american. :lol:

 

I don't like using gas just because it's a pretty bad source of energy (expendable, not environmentally friendly, etc).

Yes because being monetarily frugal is an American-only trait. Are you retarded?

 

Okay. I'll sell you anything in my collection you want, for every cent of your money. Oh, you won't do it because you have to spend more money? Shut the fuck up. You're retarded. Not wanting to spend more money is a trait worldwide consumers share, not just American. I'm getting kinda tired of all you guys in the UK here saying shit like "typical American". To me, that is borderline racist. That's like if I said "Typical black people"

 

Well, I'm not that knowledgeable about the history of US public transport; but before the war, weren't there a lot more train lines/streetcars/etc? What happened before cars were as affordable as they are now?

 

The US automakers and oil industry benefited greatly from the war. This lead to the industries wielding a disproportionate amount of influence over public transport systems. They pretty much schemed their way into eliminating more efficient forms of transportation in favor of cars and buses. The short term effects benefited the country by creating a fuel economy. No one was really questioning how sustainable it would be; when thousands of jobs were being created for returning G.I.'s, in the automotive, oil, and highway construction fields.