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Re: Mea Culpa Re: [FOT] Reality check: Hybrid hype and HOV

To: "Bill Babcock" <BillB@bnj.com>, <greenman62@hotmail.com>
Subject: Re: Mea Culpa Re: [FOT] Reality check: Hybrid hype and HOV
From: "Tim Murphy" <timmurph@fastbytes.com>
Date: Wed, 14 Jun 2006 20:45:43 -0500
There is a pretty good article in the July 2006 issue of "Car & Driver" by 
Patrick Bedard regarding ethanol.  The latest, updated, study from Berkeley 
cites a range of from 5% to 26% "new" energy in ethanol, depending upon 
which assumptions are used.  That is, the net energy after what is required 
to produce the ethanol.  Even using the most favorable assumptions and the 
26%  figure, ethanol would only reduce America's use of fossil fuel energy 
by 2/10 of 1%!!  Note also that according to the US Dept. of Energy, E85 
(85% ethanol and 15% gasoline) has 43% more HC in the exhaust.
    Detroit is making "flex fuel" vehicles to get the CAFE for their light 
trucks (read SUV's) down below the mandated 22.2 MPG.  The way the goverment 
figures the E85 fuel economy is by using only the gasoline used, 15% of the 
total!!  This is then averaged with the 100% gasoline milage.  Cute!  Only a 
beurocrat could come up with that one.
    Lastly, the Federal government is currently subsidizing ethanol to the 
tune of $0.51 per gallon.  And it takes about 1.5 gallons of ethanol to 
equal the energy in a gallon of gasoline.
    I think it's like the man said, "There ain't no such thing as a free 
lunch."

For a good read on the environmentalist "cult" or more properly "business", 
try Michael Crichton's "State of Fear".  A work of fiction but with a great 
deal of annotated and footnoted hard data that you probably won't read in 
the main stream press.

My nickels worth.
----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Bill Babcock" <BillB@bnj.com>
To: <greenman62@hotmail.com>
Cc: <S.Janzen@comcast.net>; <wensley@adelphia.net>; 
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Sent: Wednesday, June 14, 2006 2:13 PM
Subject: Mea Culpa Re: [FOT] Reality check: Hybrid hype and HOV cutoff in 07


> Actually, regarding the net energy production of Biofuels I appear to  be 
> very wrong. I asked an energy economist friend of mine for recent  numbers 
> and he said I was all wet to begin with. The study I am most  familar with 
> by a guy named Pimental and a Berkley economist named  Paztek (as I 
> recall) have been supplanted by newer data. Of course  most of the new 
> data comes from somewhat suspect sources, but so was  Pimental, and the 
> new data looks fairly convincing. Ethanol may  deliver as much as a 34 
> percent gain on the fuel used to make it.  Biodiesel is about the same 
> currently, but could achieve higher  efficiencies and the byproducts have 
> value and represent energy. As  usual there is a lot of variation in 
> available data, but I just spent  an enjoyable morning reading some of the 
> papers. I forsee a sea of  waving soy all across Kansas (does soy wave?).
>
> Thirty four percent ain't bad, especially since most of the energy 
> expended (about 60 percent) is non-liquid fuel. My friend tells me we  are 
> also the Saudi Arabia of Corn. We don't currently have enough  production 
> to come close to meeting demand, but that will probably  change.
>
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