There are many alternatives to petrol out there now. You have electric, bio-diesel and even hydrogen engines that are being researched. But one of the leading contenders to petrol's crown as king is ethanol fuel. You could argue that it's leading the pack. But should we put all of our eggs in one basket?
You may be familiar with ethanol fuel because it is really nothing more than good ol' corn whiskey. You could actually get drunk off the stuff but it wouldn't be very good for your health to drink. It's made by an elaborate process that involves fermentation, distillation, dehydration and denaturing. All of this is similar to your great-granddad's moonshine making process. That old adage about running a car on moonshine was closer to the truth than anyone thought all those years ago. However, pure ethanol won't run in most engines as it must go through a process to make it compatible with modern car engines.
In fact, ethanol fuel isn't made solely from the fermentation process; it has to be mixed with gasoline to run and then it's a tricky process. Get the wrong mixture of ethanol and you're likely to have a bad day on the highway. But still, it is a viable biofuel that wouldn't require everyone to purchase new vehicles or converters.
But is ethanol cheaper than petrol? To answer; no. In fact, it's slightly more expensive and this creates a problem. Most people are already fed up with the prices being charged at the pumps. If they have to pay more for a biofuel then it seems likely they may not be willing to do so. Unless of course it's cleaner and better for the environment. Ethanol isn't, studies suggest. There is only a minimal differentiation between the green house gases emitted by petrol burning cars and those emitted by ethanol burning ones.
There's also the fuel efficiency problem. Ethanol fuel is about thirty four percent less efficient than petrol. That means you'd be putting more fuel in your car more frequently and paying the same or higher price. Outstanding eh? But there is a major advantage to ethanol. In ethanol engines, the engines that can burn pure ethanol, you get considerably higher torque and acceleration than gas engines would get. Not to mention and overall increase in the power performance of your engine. But most of us don't have ethanol engines and to enjoy this advantage, we would be forced to replace our gasoline engines and that would be expensive.
In the end, it just seems like ethanol isn't the way to go as far as alternative fuel sources are concerned. Ethanol fuel really doesn't increase engine performance or spare us from global warming and thus doesn't do anything that petrol isn't doing for us right now. But the performance of the ethanol engine sounds really interesting.
Tags: Ethanol Fuel Petrol Alternative Bio-diesel
