Ethanol

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Ethanol is a clear alcohol fuel made from renewable sources such as corn, sugar cane, rice, etc. It is also known as pure alcohol, grain alcohol, and drinking alcohol. There are many ways to produce ethanol, but it is mainly extracted from sugar canes in Brazil and extracted from corn in United States. Just Brazil and United States alone produce about 69% of the World's ethanol (EIA -Energy Kids).=====

Most car that are on the roads today runs partially on Ethanol and gasoline. Nearly all gasolilne sold in the world contains some ethanol in it. About 70% of the gasoline sold in United States has about 10% of ethanol mixed. It is called E10, which means it contains 90% gasoline and 10% ethanol). To a car to run on a fuel mixture that contains more than 10% of ethanol it needs to be modified, or be a FlexCar (EIA -Energy Kids).

Flexible Fuel Vehicles:

Cars that can operate with more that 10% of ethanol mixed to the gasoline are called FlexFuel. Flexcar is mainlly built to run using mostly ethanol. It can usually use any micture of thanol and gasoline up to E85, which contains 85% ethanol and 15% gasoline. In 2008, United States alone had about over 459,000 cars and trucks using E85 (Ethanol 101).

As a result of a long and expensive research of ethanol produced from sugar cane, nearlly half of the cars produced in Brazil today can run on E100 (100% Ethanol), gasoline or any mixture of both (Ethanol Biofuel).



Pollution/Efficiency:

Ethanol doesnt just pollute less, but is can also reduce the amount of green house gases from the atmosphere. The image to the right demonstrate the cycle of the ethanol. First the source of ethanol is planted and grown, then it goes to the crop refining which can produce food products from it, then ethanol is extracted from the source by biodisel production, which refill flex-fuel vehicles. The carbon that is released into the atmosphere is absorbed back into the plantation of ethanol. It always complete the cycle and that is why it can be called renewable fuel. According to the U.S Energy Department a vehicle can reduce the grenhouse gases emission by about 6,500 pounds per year. In the U.S, Ethanol is still expensive due to the efficiency compared to gasoline. Studies are being made to find different ways to produce ethanol other than from corn and eventually make ethanol more efficient and affordable (EIA Energy Kids).

Availability:

Ethanol is still not popular around the United States. One of the main reason is because of the cheap imported gasoline. Across the United States, there are about 900 fuelling station that has a Ethanol pump. In Brazil, with the rapid growth of ethanol popularity and by having a lot of support from the government, about 99% of the country's fuelling station has E85 fuel (Environmental Issues).

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//EIA Energy Kids - Biofuels//. Energy Information Administration, n.d. Web. 14 Nov. 2010. []. //Environmental Issues - Where can you buy Ethanol?//. Ed. Larry West. About, n.d. Web. 15 Nov. 2010. [].

//Ethanol 101//. American Coalition for Ethanol, n.d. Web. 16 Nov. 2010. []. //Ethanol Biofuel//. Global Greenhouse Warming, 2 May 2010. Web. 17 Nov. 2010. [].