Originally Posted by
RLS0812
Gasoline has 31,000 calories per gallon
Ethanol has 20,224 calories per gallon
Ethanol is 1.55 times less fuel efficient ... meaning you need to burn 1.55 gallons of ethanol to go the same distance of 1 gallon of gasoline ( there is no magic engine that changes this ).
1 gallon of gas releases 19.6 pounds of C02
1.55 gallons of ethanol releases 19.68 pounds of C02
Edit: I had forgotten to mention - ethanol releases a LOT of C02 during fermentation
It's sustainable so even though it has less BTU's it can be produced much easier, additionally when an engine is designed to run it, there is a performance gain because of the Stoich value, it runs cooler and the intake charge is more dense and oxygen rich, as a result the combustion is cleaner and more complete and produces more power even with less MPG.
Much better choice than gasoline. Gasoline already has ethanol and the plants that are required to produce it would have released CO2 anyway so... yeah water vapor and CO2 is much more acceptable than Carbon Monoxide in high concentration + Carbon Dioxide (gasoline).
There's a reason that many car enthusiasts are running E85 instead of race fuel - it's not just because it's far cheaper, it's better. NASCAR runs Ethanol now as well.
Oh and it's horse poo about ethanol "eating gaskets" on anything made 1995 to present, unless the car makers are all idiots metals and gaskets are all designed to work fine with ethanol, think about it, if 10% ethanol is OK for an engine (in all gasoline in the USA), after 10 tanks, you've run 1 full tank of it. So if it's damaging then all engines would leak/fail pretty quickly, in fact it's gasoline that creates the deposits etc... it's recommended if you have a flex fuel vehicle and you've never run E85, to start with 1/4 tank, then 1/2 tank then full because it will quickly clean all the deposits gasoline leaves behind and clog the injectors if you don't.
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