Current Events > Study states ethanol bigger contributor to climate change than gasoline

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https://www.reuters.com/business/environment/us-corn-based-ethanol-worse-climate-than-gasoline-study-finds-2022-02-14/?utm_source=reddit.com

eb 14 (Reuters) - Corn-based ethanol, which for years has been mixed in huge quantities into gasoline sold at U.S. pumps, is likely a much bigger contributor to global warming than straight gasoline, according to a study published Monday.
The study, published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, contradicts previous research commissioned by the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) showing ethanol and other biofuels to be relatively green.
President Joe Biden's administration is reviewing policies on biofuels as part of a broader effort to decarbonize the U.S. economy by 2050 to fight climate change.
Corn ethanol is not a climate-friendly fuel, said Dr. Tyler Lark, assistant scientist at University of Wisconsin-Madison Center for Sustainability and the Global Environment and lead author of the study.
The research, which was funded in part by the National Wildlife Federation and U.S. Department of Energy, found that ethanol is likely at least 24% more carbon-intensive than gasoline due to emissions resulting from land use changes to grow corn, along with processing and combustion.
Geoff Cooper, president and CEO of the Renewable Fuels Association, the ethanol trade lobby, called the study "completely fictional and erroneous," arguing the authors used "worst-case assumptions [and] cherry-picked data."
Under the U.S. Renewable Fuel Standard (RFS), a law enacted in 2005, the nation's oil refiners are required to mix some 15 billion gallons of corn-based ethanol into the nation's gasoline annually. The policy was intended to reduce emissions, support farmers, and cut U.S. dependence on energy imports.
As a result of the mandate, corn cultivation grew 8.7% and expanded into 6.9 million additional acres of land between 2008 and 2016, the study found. That led to widespread changes in land use, including the tilling of cropland that would otherwise have been retired or enrolled in conservation programs and the planting of existing cropland with more corn, the study found.
Tilling fields releases carbon stored in soil, while other farming activities, like applying nitrogen fertilizers, also produce emissions.
A 2019 study from the USDA, which has been broadly cited by the biofuel industry, found that ethanols carbon intensity was 39% lower than gasoline, in part because of carbon sequestration associated with planting new cropland.
But that research underestimated the emissions impact of land conversion, Lark said.
USDA did not respond to a request for comment.

Not surprising. Ethanol also isn't good for engines-- especially air cooled ones, so don't use that shit in your go cart or lawnmower.

Corn ethanol needs to return to its God-intended purpose anyway, dammit.

https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/a/user_image/3/9/6/AAEhCpAAC7Wk.jpg

This comment...

A friend who is a PhD biologist said its not all the petroleum used to plant, water, harvest and deliver, the energy needed to distill...

It's that corn is a grass that needs a high nitrogen fertilizer, to make the anhydrous ammonia they use the Koch bros have to process several acre feet of natural gas to make a pound of it.

Fertilizer shot up through the roof causing world wide starvation in poor 3rd world area, fomenting the Arab spring, the violence of still reverberating in the middle east.

we need to switch to nitromethane

Need hydrogen engines imo

We were promised nuclear cars in the 50s.

So why not use sugar cane ethanol

So there's this car that runs on water man... it's got a fiber-glass air cooled engine and it's a car that runs on water... a car that runs on water man!!!!

Ban formula 1

LanHikari10 posted...

So there's this car that runs on water man... it's got a fiber-glass air cooled engine and it's a car that runs on water... a car that runs on water man!!!!

Not true. That dude was a con man. It takes so much energy to split the H2O into H & O2 that it isn't feasible.

Build a car that runs on greenhouse gases. Problem solved.

ban farting

LanHikari10 posted...

So there's this car that runs on water man... it's got a fiber-glass air cooled engine and it's a car that runs on water... a car that runs on water man!!!!

My man Steven

Not surprising but there's a huge lobby that'll keep it around forever.

pfh1001 posted...

Ethanol also isn't good for engines

Yeah but an engine tuned to run on e85 can run a ton of boost/timing for big ez power. Pretty much any fast modded street car is gonna be tuned to run on e85 or this stuff

https://solomotorsports.net/product/ignite-racing-fuel-red-114-e90-ethanol-race-fuel-5-gallon-pail/

The Flintstones had the right idea.

Imit8m3 posted...

Not true. That dude was a con man. It takes so much energy to split the H2O into H & O2 that it isn't feasible.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pNgZ6xL_An4

Whoops!