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The Effect of Natural Gradients on the Net Energy Profits from Corn Ethanol
Posted by David Murphy on January 13, 2009 - 12:09pm in The Oil Drum: Net Energy
Scaling biofuels from the level of the laboratory or pilot-plants to commercial production is the Achilles’ Heel of almost all biofuels. One major problem is that biofuels use feedstocks that are invariably less energy dense than their fossil fuel counterparts. For example, there are approximately 45 MJ per kilogram contained in both the finished product of gasoline and crude oil, while ethanol has an energy density of about 26 MJ per kilogram and corn has only 16 MJ per kilogram. In general, this means that large amounts of corn must be grown and harvested to equal even a small portion of our gasoline consumption on an energy equivalent level, which will undoubtedly expand the land area that is impacted by the production process of corn-based ethanol.
Figure 1. Map of the optimal gradient space for the production of corn-based ethanol within the United States. Colors correspond to EROI numbers listed in the figure caption. The grey areas represent locations without a significant amount of corn-production.
There is a definite hierarchy of corn productivity by state. For example, in 2005, 173 bushels per acre (10859 kg/ha) were harvested in Iowa, while only 113 bushels per acre were harvested in Texas (7093 kg/ha). This is consistent with the general principal of gradient analysis in ecology, which states that individual plant species grow best near the middle of their gradient space; that is near the center of their range in environmental conditions such as temperature and soil moisture (Whittaker 1956, Hall et al. 1992). The climatic conditions in Iowa are clearly at the center of corn’s gradient space. What is understood less is that corn production is also less energy-intensive at or near the center of corn’s gradient space.
Ethanol producers are privy to this information, which is why most of the first corn-ethanol refineries were located in the “corn-belt”, defined here as the four states in the U.S. with the highest corn production: Iowa, Illinois, Minnesota, and Nebraska. The Renewable Fuel Standard that was signed into law as part of the Energy and Independence Security Act of 2007 mandated that 36 billion gallons of ethanol be produced by 2022, which led to the expansion of the ethanol industry and by 2008 over half of the new plants under construction or expansion were in areas located outside the corn-belt.
Using state-specific data for lime, fertilizer (N,P,K) and irrigation and county-specific data for yield (bushels per acre), I have calculated the EROI for corn-based ethanol for each county across the U.S. to see how the natural ecological gradients across the U.S. might impact the EROI of corn-based ethanol production. I used values taken from Farrell et al. (2006) for all other costs, which are not geographically variable in this analysis, including: herbicides, insecticides, seed, transport energy, gasoline, diesel, natural gas, LPG, electricity, farm labor, labor transportation, farm machinery, and inputs packaging.
My results show diminishing returns for EROI as distance from Iowa increases, meaning that the geographic expansion of corn production will produce lower yields at higher costs (Table 1, Figure 1). For example, ethanol production in Iowa and Texas yield enormously different energy balances. In Iowa, the production of a bushel of corn costs 43 MJ, while in Texas it costs 71 MJ (Table 1). Using those energy yields, the gross costs of producing 36 billion gallons of ethanol would be 576 x 109 MJ in Iowa and 952 x 109 MJ in Texas (0.4 liters ethanol/kg corn, 25.4 kg/bushel of corn). The difference in gross energy costs between Iowa and Texas is 376 x 109 MJ, which is the energy equivalent of 8.4 billion liters, or 2.2 billion gallons, of gasoline. In reality, the proportion of corn used for corn-based ethanol production will come from both optimal and marginal land, but some marginal land will be required.
Note* Yield (MJ/Ha) was calculated using 16 MJ/Kg corn-energy conversion ratio. Values for non-spatial costs include: herbicides, insecticides, seed, transport energy, gasoline, diesel, natural gas, LPG, electricity, farm labor, labor transportation, farm machinery, and inputs packaging. We calculated Farm-Gate EROI by dividing yield (MJ/Ha) by the sum of spatial and non-spatial production costs. We calculated Refinery-Gate EROI using values of 15.24 (MJ/L) for refinery costs, 21.46 (MJ/L) as the energy content of a liter of ethanol produced, and 4.13 (MJ/L) as the co-product credit. No Co-products EROI was calculated the same as Refinery-Gate EROI excluding the co-product credit of 4.13 (MJ/L).
More important than the gross costs and gains of ethanol production are the net costs and gains. The gross amount of fuel produced must be adjusted by the EROI of that fuel to estimate the net energy profit that is added to the economy. For example, if the production of 2 MJ of ethanol requires 4MJ of fertilizer inputs, then the process ceases to provide a net energy profit to society, rather a loss of 2 MJ, even though the gross ethanol gain is 2 MJ. If we assume fertilizers are the only input and ethanol is the only output, the EROI of this process would be 0.5. The following equation can be used to calculate the net energy added to the economy using just the gross energy gains for society and the EROI of the fuel production process.
Net Energy Profit = Gross Energy Gains * (1 - (1 /EROI))
By substituting 2 MJ for the “Gross Energy Gains”, and 0.5 for the EROI, the Net Energy Profit calculates to -2, which means that the production of ethanol is a net energy loss, even though it has a gross energy gain of 2MJ, in this example. Using this method the net energy gains will always be lower than the gross energy gains, which complies with the Second Law of Thermodynamics, which implies that no energy conversion process can operate at 100% efficiency. The question then becomes: How much of the 36 billion gallons mandated by the RFS is an net energy profit? The answer depends, in part, on where the ethanol is produced. If the mandate was fulfilled only by ethanol produced in Iowa, which has a refinery-gate EROI of 1.32:1 (Table 1), the net energy profit provided by the ethanol is actually 9 billion gallons. On the other hand if the ethanol were produced in Texas, then the net energy profit is only 4.7 billion gallons.
Clearly, the net gains from this process are less appealing than the gross. The net gains are even lower if co-product credits are removed. Co-products are dry or wet distiller’s grains, which are a very contentious subject in the literature on corn-ethanol. This matter is significant because the energy credits allotted to the use of co-products as a by-product of the corn-based ethanol process account for 19% of the total energy gains of the corn-based ethanol process (co-products are allotted 4.13 MJ/L while ethanol is 21.46 MJ/L). More importantly, when this 19% is removed from the EROI calculation, the EROI of corn-based ethanol for marginal lands (e.g. Texas) is less than 1. Which is to say that the net energy profits from the production of 36 billion gallons of ethanol in Texas, for example, would be -1.08 billion gallons [36 billion gallons * (1- (1/0.97))]. In other words, without the energy contained in the co-products, the production of corn-based ethanol on marginal lands creates net energy losses rather than profits.
Whether or not co-products should be included in the calculation of the EROI is a topic for a different discussion, but the impact of excluding them is profound. The primary message to be gleaned from this post is that “scaling-up” corn-based ethanol or other similar biofuel projects usually have complications, such as lower corn yields on marginal lands, and these complications tend to increase the costs, not the gains, associated with converting feedstocks with low energy densities to final products with higher energy densities.
References:
Farrell AE, Plevin RJ, Turner BT, Jones AD, O’Hare M, Kammen DM. 2006. Ethanol Can Contribute to Energy and Environmental Goals. Science 311: 506-508
Hall CAS, Stanford JA, Hauer FR. 1992. The Distribution and Abundance of Organisms as a Consequence of Energy Balances Along Multiple Environmental Gradients. OIKOS 65: 377-390.
Whittaker RH. 1956. Vegetation of the Great Smoky Mountains. Ecological Monographs 26: 1-80.
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Nice work David. Given this analysis, (which was intuitive but thanks for being the one to actually quantify it), the precariousness of our natural gas future, and the minimum energy return needed to power our current infrastructure, it strikes me as bizarre that we continue to advocate the ethanol mandate. Pursuing energy independence is ironically using more resources than not pursuing it!!
(note: I am in favor of moderate EROI, or even small EROI biofuels used locally provided there aren't large externalities -scaling biofuels nationally or globally is madness)
As I have pointed out many many many times, EROEI is false because of the logic. No other form of energy has to endure this type of analysis. Electricity does not. Imported oil does not. This post is pure anti ethanol propaganda.
EROEI assumes that it possible and relevant to add the various energy contents of different components in the ethanol process. This is logically impossible. Each component has a different price, utility, characteristics such as renewability and as the post points out, availability. Things that are different can not be compared added, subtracted, divided or multiplied. If the are anyway as in this post, the result is silly nonsense.
The same applies to net energy because it is a similarly false concept. Why should we care about net energy when so many forms of energy are almost free such as solar, wind, geo thermal, gravitational, and nuclear which powers our sun and the stars. There can not be an overall shortage of energy in the universe as long as mass and the speed of light exist.
It is the fossil fuel forms of energy that are limited. Why not specify the forms of energy we are talking about? I suspect it is because then the slight of hand fraud of EROEI would be more obvious.
Energy is undefined in EROEI. Energy is an abstraction like fruit, grain or metal. Some energy is free and some is expensive. To lump all forms of energy together is ridiculous. And to single out a specific form to judge on the bases of an undefined abstraction is beyond ridiculous.
It is absurd that we could decide which grain to grow based on bushels of grain returned on bushels of grain invested. Or that we should decide which metal to produce based on tons of metal returned on tons of metal invested. Yet that is what EROEI and this post tries to do again.
Those who persist in this vein will in the end be exposed for the slight of hand fraud that they are perpetrating. They are attaching the invalid EROEI concept to Peak Oil whether they realize it or not.
It will tarnish the valid Peak Oil concept and do damage to our ability to mitigate its effects. It seems few at TOD care.
Fortunately for the country ethanol is now strong enough to withstand this invalid criticism. I am confident that the new administration understands the fraud that is going on with EROEI. I know Vilsack understands that it is false for sure. If Obama gets sucked into the EROEI trap Vilsack should be able to straighten him out.
It's simply criminal to produce fuel from food in a world in which hunger exists. This is the bottom line. Corn ethanol is a BAD idea, and those of heart and mind will continue to oppose it, despite hysterics from misanthropic vested interests that hope to profit from human suffering and environmental degradation.
As I have pointed out many many many times, you are a smart man but utterly clueless on this topic. ALL forms of energy have to 'endure' this type of analysis. Electricity is converted primary energy from wind, coal, natural gas, etc. BEFORE the conversion takes place, EROI is calculated for all those sources and they are all (except domestic natural gas) an order of magnitude higher than corn ethanol.
Its pretty simple. Energy is what we have to spend, not money. If we did a one for one swap corn ethanol for 86 million barrels of oil and kept all other energy sources the same, energy would all become unaffordable except to the very rich, overnight. You still don't get it. Please read my letter to Obama and upcoming piece by David on 'The Minimum EROI for Society'. They should answer your questions, if you have eyes to see them. In the meantime, work out the math on the thought experiment. ZERO OIL and all ethanol. What would happen..?
(*the reason I continue to respond to you is because I find it amazing that an intelligent person cannot see what is one of the simplest things to 'get' about peak oil. I'll keep trying different angles but my guess is that since you are a corn farmer it is ultimately a psychological cognitive dissonance or something that is the issue, not my explanatory ability)
I find it amazing that an intelligent person cannot see what is one of the simplest things to 'get' about peak oil.
"it's hard to get a man to understand something if his livelihood depends upon him not understanding it."
In another thread some months ago, x made one point that made a little sense to me. It was that if you had an abundance of different source of energy (coal, nuclear, solar, wind) but, what you really needed was a particular kind of source like liquid transportation fuels, it might make sense to waste some of the other forms of energy to get the one you really want. My response was that, from my perspective as a native of a tropical island where all non renewable energy sources have to be imported and paid for out of export earnings, the option of wasting one form of energy to produce another does not exist.
There are many weaknesses in x's arguments which I'm sure have been pointed out over the years but just in case this one has not been discussed, there's the question of how we got to this level of dependence on liquid transportation fuels in the first place. It was due to the discovery of a cheap abundant (non renewable) source of a very energy dense type of fuel, petroleum. Just as we have done in the past, the human race latched on to this source and exploited it as much as possible. It has lasted long enough for our civilization to become structurally dependent on it but, it is not going to last forever. In light of that, does it make sense to expend huge amounts of resources on an unsustainable form of energy conversion, when those resources might be better spent trying to reduce our consumption of and dependence on on liquid transportation fuels?
Case in point. It has been pointed out repeatedly that at best, corn based ethanol can only produce a tiny fraction of the current requirement for liquid transportation fuels while, increasing the US average fleet mileage to the level of Europe or Japan would probably save a larger fraction. Increased use of rail for long haul freight is another potential area for huge savings.
I saw a news clip on BBC World News yesterday (Jan 13) that showed a rubber wheeled, articulated bus with a pantograph on top in Ukraine. This is something I never even new existed but, once I saw it, I realized how many solutions might exist for reducing consumption of liquid transportation fuels. This prompted me to do a search which resulted in my browsing of this wikipedia article that says:
The point being that the EROEI in reducing our overall dependence on liquid transportation fuels would probably be greater than
the returns from the energy spent on this whole corn ethanol debacle. Obviously I have no stake in corn farming!
Alan from the islands
Exactly. By the time we are really out of oil, we will also be short on natural gas which is used to create ethanol. It would be much more cost effective to require higher MPG cars.
I have no problem paying farm subsidies. I think we should subsidize organic agriculture with products delivered by electrified rail. And I would be glad to pay taxes to that end.
Ethanol is a dead end technology. It wastes land and resources that could be much better used preparing for low fossil input agriculture.
As a resident of an island, you may be "wasting" a great deal of wind energy by failing to even try to capture it. Unless you are fairly far north like Ketchican or Attu, you're likely throwing away a lot of solar energy also.
"Waste" in this sense is rather academic. Others are less so, but still pertinent.
Vilack understands that he is the Governor of Iowa and that he is in the thrall of the ethanol industry.
Unfortunately, the decision to produce so much corn in this country is primarily a product of corn subidies. Remove those and the industry collapses because most corn farmers would frankly admit that it is all about the subsidy.
But the local CSA growing organic vegetables gets no guarantees, no subsidies, and no help.
Provide a free market for ethanol and the discussions you hate so much about EROEI would largely disappear. In the absence of a free market, however, we are forced to use some methology to provide a comparison between ethanol and gasoline, for example.
At the end of the day, if there are external factors such as renewability that trump a disadvantageous EROEI comparison, then fine. However, it remains the case that there are inputs into the ethanol production process which are clearly not renewable. You chose renewability as a factor that needs to be considered but ignored other issues such as soil fertility, degradation, impacts on the food supply, and the ability of the available land to sustainability produce enough fuel to power our vehicles.
When it comes to comparing an EV vs an ICE, rest assured that EROEI will and has been used to compare to the two modes of propelling a vehicle.
Anyway, I am sure everyone here knew that you would immediately cut and paste your usual rant against EROEI. The energy return on your rant is zero, if not negative. You are just undermining your cause by posting such nonsense.
Personally, I do not come down firmly either pro or con vis a vis ethanol because of the complexities involved. But, rest assured, your posts do nothing to convince me or anyone else that subsidizing ethanol is a good idea.
"Remove those and the industry collapses because most corn farmers would frankly admit that it is all about the subsidy"
Perhaps I am wrong but when corn market prices exceed the government price support floor then there is in effect no subsidy for that commodity(in this case corn).
And therefore they do not request the loans or other aspects of the government support subsidy.
I always sold my corn at spot prices and never desired to make use of my 'basis'.
And if you are not farming your corn 'base' then you do not qualify for a subsidy. When you farm land that has no 'base' for corn then you are 'wildcatting'. You are not going to get subsidies for that crop. Only on your 'base' if you have then and if you put your 'set aside' land in corn then you are defying the government programs. You right to do so but then you might wish when prices drop to the extreme below the support , that you hadn't done this.
The large operators and farmers play the government like a farm. Its called 'farming the soil office'. Yet in these times of high prices many do as they please.
Its a big game. And in times of low prices , yes there are subsidies.
And there are other forms , such as 'cost share' for sowing grassland drainage areas and putting in ponds(that was some time ago) and when you take land out of production you can get money for turning it into pasture.
Right now it seems the soil office ,USDA, is turning a blind eye to 'sod busting' because of ...well because they are. They want a lot of grain to come to market I suppose.
This is how I see that the program works. Others may and can disagree. In fact they most surely will.
Airdale
While I understand EROEI is a hard thing to accuratly gauge, ignoring it or calling it false seems like a bad idea.
While there is a great abundance of energy in the universe, the problem is that this energy is not easily stored or manipulated.
The energy in EROEI is mesured in joules, the universal unit of energy. By using joules you can measure how much energy has to be put in, in the form of fossil fuels, to the amount of energy extracted, in the form of ethenol.
The metaphors that you are using do make it sound absured. What if, though, it took 15 bushels of grain to feed your horse each year. You needed your horse to work your feild that produces an unknown number of bushels of grain each year. If you produce 20 bushels of grain you have enough to feed your horse and 5 bushels left over to feed yourself. If you produce 10 bushels, you don't have enough to feed yourself and your horse. You can not eat yourself and die. You can not feed your horse and he dies, then next year you cannot work your field and you die.
To me, ERoEI seems like the only logical way to look at fuels. While it is very difficult to put numbers on the exact amount of energy input needed to extract an amount of energy, I don't see any alternative.
It seems to me that you don't really understand ERoEI. There is a very good article on wikipedia that I would recommend reading if you haven't. Or, do you have some alternative method for comparing fuel sources?
I see why you were so charitable in your post. You have been here a little over 59 minutes. See how you feel after about 50 repeats of X's post.
We have discussed the EROI of imported Oil, geothermal and many other things found here.
Why not? Cost-benefit analysis, for example, uses money as a common metric by which to compare the relative values of different things. EROI uses energy.
A deeper understanding of the net energy concept would show you that it is usable energy gained at a net energy profit that is of value, not just "energy" per se.
ok enough for now...
If EROEI need not be considered then let us assume you construct a little experimental economy where ethanol is the only form of energy; no oil, gas, coal, wind, or solar panels; just grow corn and make ethanol from it. You must rely on the energy in ethanol to produce everything you need including the energy you need to produce more ethanol, including the infrastructure.
If you use up more than a gallon of ethanol to make a gallon of ethanol, how long would this economy last?
But you say you that this is an unrealistic economy because you can capture energy from wind and solar panels to supplement the input of ethanol to make ethanol, and you can keep ethanol production going. But would not you have more energy left from capturing energy from wind and solar panels if you had not used up some of it to keep the losing ethanol operation going?
If you were running a business based on your understanding of economics and accounting, then I think it would be bankrupt quite quickly. You must be in government, where squander is the operating principle, or in sales where it does not matter if you make a profit, but only that you make the sale.
EROEI matters for everything we do, which is why eventually all fossil fuel extraction will be reduced to the impractical.
Nate Hagens wrote: " it strikes me as bizarre that we continue to advocate the ethanol mandate. Pursuing energy independence is ironically using more resources than not pursuing it!!"
---Its not bizarre. Its typical pork barrel politics. President-elect Obama comes from Illinois and receives large political donations from Archer Daniels Midland, a huge agri-business headquatered in Illinois and a major player in the fuel ethanol business. Obama voted to double the ethanol subsidy in the 110th Congress, and Obama campaigned on a promise to hugely expand ethanol production to make America "energy independent", and he won the Iowa primary in part because of his strong support of ethanol. After winning the election, Obama nominates Gov. Vilsack of Iowa to be his agriculture secretary, another big ethanol supporter, and Obama proposes to spend huge amounts of money from his stimulus program on ethanol.
There is nothing bizarre about it because the proposed expansion of the US ethanol program is not about EROI....Its about Obama using his power to direct federal money to the business interests and special interests that supported him during the election.
You are correct. I just get hopeful when I see the likes of Holdren and Lubchenko in there but they will likely be drowned out by the economists and backers, as you point out.
In the end, we have plenty of energy - still a good deal of (expensive) fossil fuels and an enormous amount of renewable flows -the problem is a human one - and standing in its way is politics.
David Morris of Minnesota and his group "Institute for Local Self-Reliance" promotes ethanol and biomass production in a vision of a "Carbohydrate economy".
http://www.ilsr.org/
http://www.carbohydrateeconomy.org/
David was the first one to convince me at least that ethanol could "reduce oil imports", even if due more to nonliquid fossil fuels, and value of coproducts.
However the gallons per acre number always looked offensive. I concluded the solar collection effiency and energy density of biomass is simply too small to be used seasonally, unless as a SECONDARY "waste product" of another purpose, OR as a use for "surplus" crop that would otherwise be wasted after a good harvest.
Again and again whenever I look at these issues (not deeply delving the EROI calculations), I conclude that seasonal agricultural energy can't possibly replace even the smallest fraction of energy we get from fossil fuels. (I mean my hope changes if I imagine we could use 1/4 as much energy as we do.)
I wish the economics could be set up to acknowledge the EROI. Intuitively you'd think it would. It just seems to me that anything that can become depleted should be taxed in a way to encourage conservation and efficiency. So instead of subsidizing ethanol, we should has a carbon tax on coal, oil, and NG. Then perhaps economics might work to help?
Thanks David. I particularly like you bringing in the distribution ecology of the species.
This would then apply to the crops sugar cane, sugar beet and sweet sorghum. Would be interesting to make similar maps of their most productive growing regions.
I have maps [somewhere] for productivity of soy and corn in the U.S. Very similar.
The biofuels issue is reminiscent of one of the great preventable disasters in history, the starvation of one million Irish during the potato famine of 1850 period. Biofuels are driving up the cost of fertilizer and food and will cause the same deprivation to the world's poorest people as the potato famine.
Failure of the potato crop due to blight was the direct cause. At that time the landholders in Ireland were British, who grew food for export to England. The Irish tenant farmers tended small plots (.4 to 2 hectares or 1 to 5 acres) for growing their own food while working for the landlords to produce meat, grain and butter for export.
During the famine Ireland continued to export food while there was mass starvation.
Quotations about conditions from the article at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Irish_Famine
“Ireland was on the verge of starvation, her population rapidly increasing, three-quarters of her laborers unemployed, housing conditions appalling and the standard of living unbelievably low."
“It would be impossible adequately to describe the privations which they [Irish laborer and his family] habitually and silently endure . . . in many districts their only food is the potato, their only beverage water . . . their cabins are seldom a protection against the weather... a bed or a blanket is a rare luxury . . . and nearly in all their pig and a manure heap constitute their only property.”
Well, I hope it doesn't come to that if it hasn't already...but very interesting incite - I had not come across that comparison before.
There was great concern recently as grain prices skyrocketed due to world food supply dipping to all time lows of around 50 days. That caused fertilizer prices to increase several hundred percent. The price of oil and gas were contributing factors, but the main factor for fertilizer is that supply is not adequate for the additional biofuels.
High fertilizer prices caused farmers in some of the poor countries to reduce application, and it was feared that serious food shortages would develop.
The world wide recession/depression collapsed prices of all agricultural inputs and food prices as well.
For some unexplained reason (perhaps wells drying up, perhaps disintergration of USSR) world grain harvests plateaued a few years ago. I believe there has been a recent upturn, but I don't know if it's kept up with population.
I'll post the link if I can find it.
Thanks for a very nice post!
It would be interesting to see a map showing the increase in corn acres planted between say, 2003 and 2007, by county. I would guess that it was the marginal acres that were disproportionately planted.
Also, I ran across this book published by the Midwest Trade and Agribusiness Research Center analyzing what to do with the huge amount of distillers' grains that are expected. The authors are projecting that distillers grains will sell below their energy content price, because of the large supply. This is the graph they show:
I hope the calculations at least take a haircut for the lower price DDGS provides.
Ummm Gail
This is an EROEI Calculation, Monetary Price has nothing to do with it :-). It does confirm one thing though, Corn ethanol is basically a GTL process with gross unintended consequences.
Neven
I suppose not, but if 10% of it were thrown out, because no buyer could be found, it seems like it would (or should?) be reflected in the calculation. If you are flooding the market with it, and all it can be used for is something that has 1% of its value as an energy product (say, as landfill for a shopping center) would it still be counted in the EROEI calculations?
Somehow, it seems to me there should be some evaluation of whether a co-product has any real value.
We may have to produce some liquid or gaseous fuel with low or perhaps even slightly negative net energy. The energy density of a lead-acid battery is I believe about 0.2 MJ/kg and therefore we won't be seeing battery powered airliners. When there is no crude only the elite will flying in planes powered by very expensive fuel, maybe oilseed based. Liquid fuel will be required as a range extender in PHEVs like the GM Volt which I predict will be a commercial flop. Another unavoidable need for reliable liquid fuel supply is for farm machinery, again a task not suited to batteries. Thus I doubt that a modern mixed economy could function with less than some percentage (say 25%) of current levels of liquid fuel use. That's after electrification and conservation.
Whether the dominant fuel after oil is gone should be ethanol is hard to say. I'm inclined to think methane gas is more versatile. I think petro-fuels should have a floor price the same time as the ethanol tax credit is phased out. When fuel gets a 'real' price the alternatives will become clearer.
I agree that as high EROI fuels are phased out for one reason or another (climate change/depletion/etc.) that society will need liquid fuel replacements - and that these will almost certainly be low eroi fuels. However a better candidate may be tar sands or something else that exists in VAST quantities and is not a food.
I kinda like 'biosynfuel' whereby the carbon is already in the biosphere but it is upgraded by non-bio inputs. Example hydrogenated pyrolysis oil. When it is burned the plants re-absorb the carbon otherwise yields will be unsustainable. In contrast tar sands add net carbon ie take it from underground into the biosphere. However biosynfuels are only now taking baby steps.
Excellent analysis. In a perfect world, politicians and voters would be required to pass quizzes on stuff like this before being allowed to advocate policies like mass biofuel-dedicated monoculture.
I wonder in what way and how fast this gradient space will move North as climate change grips in earnest. As it moves it'll probably get smaller and smaller.
There's not only the energy density of the crop itself before it's made into fuel to compensate for the fossil fuels used to get them to the biorefinery.
Then once you get the cotton-candy like fluff to the refinery, we still don't know how to store biomass for a year (to keep the biorefinery busy after harvest) without it spontaneously combust and setting the 100 acres stacked 25 feet high on fire (which is why the pulp and paper businesses are only in areas that don't freeze where they can keep the wood wet), or trying to keep the biomass wet, which we don't know how to do without it all composting.
Then, when you get finally feed biomass into the maw of the biorefinery process, the more steps you take to make the fuel, the less energy you end up with -- this is why the Energy Biosciences Institute and other cellulosic researchers are trying to make a creature that eats cellulose and poops butanol in one step (butanol can be burned in combustion engines now, unlike ethanol). But this will be hard to pull off for many reasons, just one of which is that because the cellulose of plants differs widely, you'd want to tailor the critter to one plant, yet even corn stover differs quite a bit chemically and physically.
The main problem with energy crops is that just there isn’t enough water to grow them. Energy crops need as much water as corn per unit weight.
Plus the existing grass is already spoken for by 100 million cattle, 7 million sheep, and 4 million horses.
In the life cycle of making corn ethanol, 99% of the water used grows the corn, and only 1% is used in the industrial process. From seed to fuel, this requires 1,500 gallons of water per gallon of ethanol. Cellulosic ethanol requires twice as much industrial water, yet Iowa is already restricting new ethanol factories due to lack of water. Areas that are irrigated will never be able to grow energy crops for biofuels because there isn't enough water to do that.
Anyhow, the problems are so immense I can't address them in a comment. See http://www.energyskeptic.com/Peak_Soil.htm
and better yet, read the references below, since the reason the issue of biofuels just won't die is that all of the ecological destructiveness is still not discussed (especially topsoil depletion), let alone all the factors in EROEI before and after the farm gate which aren't taken into account when calculating the energy returned on energy invested.
Al-Kaisi, Mahdi. July 24, 2000. Soil Erosion: An agricultural production challenge. Integrated Crop
Management. Iowa State University.
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Tell this to the crop managers at Navajo Agricultural Products Industries (NAPI). They have about 100 hectares of hybrid poplars on drip irrigation from impoundment of the San Juan River. The fact that they have no market (an excelsior mill in Dolores Colorado might take them) serves as no deterrent. Growing water greedy poplars in a region that receives mean annual precip of 8.2" is patently stupid. I call these poplars "bananas in Alaska," but, then, "these are the days of miracles & wonders," of bananas in Alaska, of poplars in the desert somewhere.
The most glaring problem is not including Octane in the analysis. BTUS only take you so far. Gasoline has more btus than ethanol, but you can't run a modern ICE on it. You have to add a less btu, higher octane liquid with it (isooctane, ethanol, etc) to make it work.
The fact is: I can do More Work with a gallon of ethanol than you can with a gallon of "gasoline."
The other problem is you're greatly overestimating the amount of fossil fuels needed to produce ethanol. The new Poet (Liberty) facility will use virtually no fossil fuels. It will derive it's process energy from the lignin of the corn cobs, and kernels while at the same time producing ethanol, and corn oil (and, very high quality DDG Meal) from the Kernels, And the Cobs.
In short, you're doing a 1970's analysis on an industry that's starting to use 21st Century Technology.
I can do more work with a horse than a car too. Energy quality depends on what infrastructure already exists. Does your claim of more work include the math on replacing all the metal in the vehicles and pipelines from corrosion from using more concentrated ethanol?
Does this mean that the Poet facility has found a way to increase the energy density of corn cobs? [no]
Otherwise the same general principles apply - far too much land to grow corn cobs will be needed if the facility is to have any impact on our current gasoline consumption.
Land requirement is the key issue and not EROI per se. Even if you had a magic energy crop that grew, harvested, and processed itself without human intervention and therefore had infinite EROI, you would still have to know the yield per hectare before you could decide on its economic value.
[citation needed]
I'll take it further than that; said assertion is not a fact, it is a falsehood. A falsehood you have been repeating after being challenged time and time again to support, yet have never supported; that makes it a knowing falsehood, a lie.
Medium-speed internal-combustion engines running on petroleum (diesel, GDI, HCCI) can hit around 43% thermal efficiency. To get the same output work out of an identical volume of ethanol would require roughly 40% better thermal efficiency: 60% or so. There's your target; now go and produce the proof that you can do it.
(GCC reports that Scania's HD ethanol engine hits 43% thermal efficiency, slightly lower than the 44% achieved by the diesel variant. That's output joules per input joule; the work done per volume of ethanol will be much lower than per volume of diesel.)
It would be interesting to overlay the water requirements on a county/state basis over your EROI graphic.
Ave gallons per bushel of corn - Source USDA
Because there are people concerned that if we have energy shortages how will they pump their water (and then obviously vice versa). A baseline analysis of what non-irrigated corn by county vs indigenous water resources by county would show a truer unsubsidized potential. If you add in other limiting variables you could come up with a matrix.
Actually, if it becomes necessary (it starts eating into my Bud Light inventory - beer takes a whole bunch more water than ethanol) we can make our ethanol refineries basically water-neutral. As it is the newer ones are down to about 2.5 gallons/gal of ethanol.
Also, a lot of your refineries are using grey water, etc.
This is typical misleading Pimentalian exercise in cherrypicking.
Corn is not an energy crop!
(Yawn, what a surprise.)
A huge amount of biomass energy--all the corn stalks and corn corbs, which are fed to cattle, cows and pigs are completely left out of the analysis. In a way, ethanol is the co-product, an by-product of a food system and a net positive energy one at that!
'Yes, corn is food!
But what's the EROEI of food?
If somebody actually asks this, I'll know that insanity reigns here.
We can burn the biomass to produce heat for ethanol distillation.
An acre of corn crop produces 10 tons of additional biomass with a heating value of 5000 Btus per pound; that works out to 354000 MJ/hectare.
For Texas you use a productivity of 7155 kg/hectare so the additional biomass(bagasse?)to be added in is 49.5 MJ/kg of ethanol far more than the refinery input of 19.2 MJ/kg.
The refinery cost is 15.24 MJ/liter of ethanol which works out to 19.2 MJ/kg; 15.4 MJ/l x 3.78 l/g x 1g/3kg=19.2 MJ/kg
For Texas your crop inputs amount to 20017MJ/ha which turns into 2.8 MJ/kg;
20017/7115=2.8 MJ/kg
Your energy of ethanol looks low(wiki gives 24 MJ/l) but using it anyways 21.4 MJ/l x 3.78 l/g x 1g/3kg=27 MJ/kg
So the energy invested is 19.2 MJ/kg of ethanol(refinery) plus 2.8 MJ/kg(farm) and the energy output is 27 MJ/kg with a EROEI of 27/(19.2+2.8)=1.22 for Texas.
Your EROEI calculation seems to be 27/19.2+2.8+5.2(coproduct credit)=.99.
(Why would a coproduct credit be an energy investment?)
What happens if we reduce the refinery energy input by half using corn field biomass'bagasse'? The efficiency of boilers burning biomass is around 70% versus 85% of coal for instance, and we do want to leave some silage for the critters.
EROEI of 27/(9.6 + 2.8)= 2.17(Texas)
It is obvious that the intent of the EROEI folks is to 'taint' biomass as an energy source using incomplete analysis of corn, an agricultural crop which is not a true energy crop such as switchgrass, sugar cane and miscanthus.
In fact biomass is absolutely key to the renewable, low carbon energy future that lies beyond the final depletion of fossil fuels and a fair energy balance will show it to be quite energy positive.
I understand there are some definitional issues, but corn is used to make an energy product, so......
It isn't. In the calculation of the refinery gate EROI the co-product credit is added to the Eout, and for the no-coproduct credit EROI calculation it is simply excluded.
I say nothing in this post about "biomass as an energy source", rather just corn as a feedstock for ethanol - BIG DIFFERENCE.
2.17 EROEI is something you are crowing about from the highest mountaintop?
What is the EROEI of your post?
Wow Ardnassac. Lots of references.
To me it's an easy estimation. On average, the sun provides 345 w/sq meter to all of earth surface. On average, photosynthesis is at best 1% efficient at converting insolation to bio-mass. On average, the energy equivalent (dried and burned) of each sq. meter on earth produces 0.1 w/sq meter of plant matter. The very best fertile growing lands in non-seasonal latitudes may produce up to 10x that amount, or 1.0 w/sq meter.
So, compare covering a cornfield with a solar thermal plant or a crop of corn and burning the corn directly in a furnace. (more efficient than ethanol conversion, which requires further energy inputs)
1) a 15% efficient solar thermal plant at 40% land useage efficieny. 345 w/sq meter x 15% effic. x 40% effic = 20.7 net watts electricity out.
2) an ethanol system. Even granting corn the maximum production (being a seasonal crop, it doesn't do that but anyway) of 1.0 w/sq meter x 95% land efficiency = 0.95 net watts raw grain+cobs+stalks corn out. Then convert to ethanol....
Not a serious proposition. Put batteries in the cars, cover the field with solar reflectors, and save the irrigation water and NPK fertilizers for better uses.
Add to this the fact the the solar plant would work better in a place that corn doesn't grow well in and you get the benefits of the more efficient solar plant as well as still being able to grow food.
"Add to this the fact the the solar plant would work better in a place that corn doesn't grow well in and you get the benefits of the more efficient solar plant as well as still being able to grow food."
Exactly, use of solar directly by mechanical, chemical or thermal conversion is much more efficient than conversion by biological means (that is, trying to suck solar energy through a corn cob with water and topsoil as the medium of exchange) BUT you still don't have a portable liquid fuel.
This gets back to what we all know, but no one likes to say here...peak oil is essentially a liquid fuel and therefore a transportation issue. If you take out the amount of oil that is burned out the tailpipe of vehicles worldwide, you have enough oil (and can much more easily replace any shortfall with renewables in stationary installations) to not have to worry about peak oil for about three centuries. I love automobiles, I admit it, but it is the fossil fuel needed in the cars and trucks of the world that is at the heart of the whole crisis, and it is this desperate need for a portable liquid fuel that causes us to even consider ethanol as a viable option.
RC
What are you exactly, lengould?
A robot who injests electrons for lunch? Thankfully your Energizer batteries keeps you going on cloudy days and during the nightime.
It is strange that farmers in Iowa are less worried about running out of fertilizer than Bob Shaw in the Arizona desert.
I'd rather see fields filled with crops than a desert filled with solar thermal plants.
Nothing brings out the 'weird' more than EROI.
What the EROI nutjobs don't get is that EROI is just an invitation to Jevons Paradox .
Huh? EROI is dimensionless.
Besides, declining net energy and the stealth EROI cliff are just nails in the growth coffin and evidence we need to spend our efforts on the consumption, not production side of energy balance sheet.
Says nothing at all about Jevons paradox or rebound effect.
EROI is about using the most efficient fuels--bang for the buck. Jevons paradox is that increasing efficiency, increases consumption. The reverse of that is that decreasing efficiency(EROI) will reduce consumption hopefully to the point of sustainability.
Instead of seeking to maximize EROI, you need to minimize it.
:)) Sometimes TOD is priceless for its entertainment value!!
Conversion efficiencies and EROI are not the same thing. I suggest reading this post on the why EROI is important.
This is a true WTF moment.
Somebody correct me if I'm wrong, but I don't think Jevon's Paradox addressed scarcity or price.
Is x majorian's alter ego?
Jevon's paradox says if
fuel x efficiency = output, when efficiency increases, fuel use doesn't decline but increases.
Efuel x efficiency = Eoutput + Einvest=
Eoutput x (1+1/EROI),
'overall efficiency'=
efficiency/(1+1/EROI)
If EROI = 1 then 'overall efficiency' is efficiency/2.
If EROI = infinite then 'overall efficiency'=efficiency.
So dropping to an EROEI of 1 from infinity means effectively cutting efficency in half.
So an engine that is 30% efficient under
an EROI of 100 has an 'overall efficiency about 15% at an EROI 1. 30%/(1+1/1)=15%
If a rise in efficiency leads to a rise in output, then a fall of output will follow a fall in efficiency.
Only if supply is not constrained. Supply constraint is one of the themes of TOD... or were you too dense to realize that?
Yup. Definitely too dense.
The relevance of Jevon's paradox in today's wealthier economies is questionable anyway. Jevon's paradox was a statistical observation in a booming economy centuries ago. Causality was never determined, and the paradox was only about supply (generation) side efficiency, not about demand side efficiency. One might just as easily argue that, if the efficiency of steam engines etc. were not improved, fuel use would have been much bigger still. And the case for Jevon's paradox on the demand side (eg heat pump heating replacing electrical heating systems) is very weak at best.
What little research has been conducted in OECD countries strongly suggests that the take back principle, even after several iterations, is a minority percentage of the efficiency gain. This suggests that leapfrogging energy efficiency (through regulation and induced innovation) across all sectors will have a very beneficial effect in reducing demand. Many constraints are not directly market based, such as lack of information, unclear property rights etc which hamper the market to pick the easy fruit, but also suggest that increased efforts to remove these constraints will be cheap even if not completely effective.
It's interesting to look at the global primary energy use per capita. It's been nearly flat for decades. This is primarily because of increased efficiency. People often confuse the vector of increased global population with Jevon's paradox, but there there is no empirical basis for such a position.
I guess doomers like to take all oppertunities to spread their beliefs, even if it comes at the price of not being factual.
You talk out of both sides of your mouth about the growth issue. In previous discussions where I have insisted that we need to end the growth orientation of our economy you have agree with me, and now you say that Jevon's paradox is an irrelevancy raised by extreme doomers. So which is it? Can we dematerialize our economy and grow forever, or do we in fact need to abandon the growth orientation?
My mouth has two sides just like anyone else's. I agree with ending the growth orientation, at least in it's current form.
But you are framing me into a false dichotomy. The relevance of Jevon's paradox is highly questionable in modern economies. In fact it was questionable even when Jevon made the observation in industrial age England. This does not mean I support BAU growth. Nor does calling Jevon's into question imply that I support BAU, or use it as an excuse for BAU. I support leapfrogging of energy efficiency as part of an radical overall resource efficiency improvement. Population is going to level out at less than twice today's levels most likely, so combining more efficient resource management with moderate, politically feasible changes in the growth paradigm, will be part of a prudent strategy. Without a hard move on resource efficiency, the systemic changes required will be much more stringent, which I doubt is feasible. Improved resource efficiency, combined with dematerialization, leaves some room for growth. It is distribution that is the real problem with the current systems. Trickle down is not enough, something will have to be done. What are your thoughts on improving equity?
What form of the growth paradigm are you promoting? It is not clear to me that greater income equity (though greatly desirable) would in and of itself have any effect on the growth orientation of the economy. Rich and poor alike want more growth. The percentage of people who feel that they are "rich enough" is incredibly small. Changing our financial system to a more conservative form which avoids speculative bubbles might speed up the underlying real growth rate rather than slowing it down. The couple of decades between WWII and the oil price shocks of the seventies when international finance was governed by the Bretton Woods agreements was a period of higher real growth rate than the decades which have followed it.
I am a lot less optimistic than you about the ability of efficiency improvements to maintain real growth rates in the face declining resource quality. Per capita income improvements have always been about greater efficiency. You cannot improve per capita living standards by brute force extraction of more resources. Suppose for example that you had a process for producing copper which could be expanded only by a proportional expansion of all factors of production. That is if you wanted to increase copper production by 20% then you would need 20% more labor, 20% more capital, 20% more energy, etc. You could extend the same standard of living to a larger population in this way (assuming that the resource base is large enough), but you cannot possibly improve per capita standards of living in this manner. Such per capita improvements require an efficiency improvement of some type. For example if you discovered a higher quality ore then you could improve the efficiency of capital, labor, etc. Or you could use the same ore and improve your process efficiency though economies of scale or through technology improvements. Or you could improve end use efficiency by finding a way to get more effective use value out of a given quantity of copper.
Naturally such a pursuit of efficiency improvement follows a best first principle; You exploit the cheapest, easiest efficiency improvements first. The idea that there is lots of low hanging fruit in the way of resource efficiency improvements that will allow decades more of economic growth in the face of decreasing resource quality is highly questionable in my view.
Also there is the issue of the absolute scale of the global economy. Even if the global population stabilizes at nine or 10 billion people, that still represents a lot of people who want to catch up to OECD standards of living (you are planning on Asia, Africa, South America, etc catching up to us aren't you?). Are you confident that dematerialization can allow 10 billion people to live at OECD standards and higher (since we are going to be getting richer for decades into the future) without large increases in total resource consumption?
Given the fact that the biosphere is in the midst of a major mass extinction event, it seems to me that the OECD nations should be more concerned with reducing their ecological footprint than with pursing more economic growth. We should be consciously trying to reduce our resource consumption in order to allow the underdeveloped world to rise to meet us on a reasonable common ground. I realize of course that such a course of action is "impractical" in the current political environment. Which is to say that it cannot be "sold" to people steeped in the indoctrination of our current cultural norms. However, cultural norms do change under the pressure of external events. If you had gone to the European aristocracy after the French Revolution and said, "Look fellows. The writing is on the wall. Why don't you just give it up?" you would have been ridiculed and mocked as an "impractical" idiot. However, this "practical" reality did not mean that discussions of representative democracy were a complete waste of time. Something beyond the growth paradigm is needed, not just a modification of the status quo.
In this I do agree with you, that growth without a goal is irrational. Indulging ourselves 'into the next big bubble' is what we have to change, and targets will have to be set based on scientific understanding of real limits. But we also need to look at other criteria, such as what is politically feasible etc.
Improved livelihoods on an absolute scale for most can be achieved by growth but this is very inefficient - on the higher end it will lead to a large group that overuses resources, making resource management unnecissarily difficult.
That's a rather static view of the situation. Dynamic improvements in resource efficiency have to be taken into account, 'fruit that grows back' so to speak - technical and methodological advancements are constantly occuring. When the cheapest, easiest improvements are made, we might ask ourselves why we ever considered the more expensive ones. When I insulated my home over a decade ago, I considered buying CFLs as well but they were too expensive. Now they are one of the cheapest efficiency improvements available. Reality is dynamic, most economists make the mistake of focusing on static models. This doesn't mean everything will work beautifully, but it's something to keep in mind (eg considering variations in learning curves etc.).
Also, consider more out of the box solutions, such as input substitution of scarcer resouces (replace copper with aluminum and advanced polymers in the future) combined with a stronger move towards a dematerialized services based economies as much as possible. I'm more worried about our absolute resource use, and the impact this has, than about growth per se.
OECD countries typically use a bit too much resources, so a bit of conservation to start will help, and advancing the economy through dematerialization and increased resource efficiency and input substitution for the remainder (strongly beyond BAU, through policy instruments) will be a huge improvement. I'm not sure if it will be enough since even then I think it likely that the absolute level of resource use will increase, but the way it is used can be improved drastically in terms of environmental impact. And we'll be well along the way. It appears that I agree with you on many points, but I'm afraid that what you're suggesting will not be acceptable so compromises need to be made.
How are fields full of crops and scrub land full of solar cells mutually exclusive?
Because if you spend all your resources doing fields full of crops, you won't have the resources required to do the scrub land full of "solar cells" (I recommend "mirrors" and steam turbines though).
majorian:
If the farmers in Iowa AREN'T worried about running out of fertilizer, then they're not keeping up to speed on the state of earth's phosphorous resources. They's best start doing so soon....
OR you could be completely wrong in your obsession about phosphates.
World production of oil 30Gb/a
world reserves of oil 1200 Gb or 2.5% per year reduction.
World production of natural gas 3tcm/a
world reservers of natural gas 175 tcm
1.7% per year reduction
world production of phosphate 150 Mt
world proven reserves of phosphate 12400 Mt
1.2% per year reduction.
The reserve base of phosphate is even larger at 36700 Mt.
Actually farmers add FAR TOO MUCH phosphorous to cropland which can cause water pollution. We can even extract phosphate(stuvite) from manure and recycle it.
http://www.abe.iastate.edu/wastemgmt/agricultural-waste-management-labor...
This board is weirdly fixated on the wrong shit IMHO.
:)
Hello Majorian,
As posted many times before: It is the Flowrate, not the size of the reserves, that is critical going forward. There are already way too many places on the planet that cannot afford sufficient I-NPK as it is [not to mention water], and they do not have the required infrastructure in place to fully recycle their O-NPK.
The lack of energy going forward to convert/move resources into I/O-NPK so that it can be applied to the final square foot is going to have dire consequences on the Hubbert Downslope.
Please, Please stop focusing on the size of the reserves in any potential resource or Element. For example: We could all talk endlessly about the unlimited [N]itrogen in the atmosphere as we all starved to death. It is only the FLOWRATE conversion of N that has any relevance to topsoil and food. Same for any other critical resource.
From th numbers you offer it appears that oil, Natural gas AND prosphorous are set to run completely out within a very few generations. From what I'm seeing, it is completely foolish to worry about oil "running out within 40 years (1200 / 30) and then claim there's "nothing to worry about regarding phosphorous because there are 83 yrs proven reserve and may be up to 244 years supply ( 36,700 / 150 ). Three points
1) your oil figure does NOT include Tar Sands with a "reserve base" of at least another 1200 GB given likely future technology (Toe-to-heel in situ, the Shell process) and Shale, ditto. To compare apples-to-apples oil years to phosphorous years, lets use "reserve base" of
OIL 3600 GB / 30 GB / yr = 120 years at present rates.
PHOSPHOROUS 244 years at present rates.
I'm not claiming that oil "reserve base" is likely or desireable, but its probably as likely as your proposed phosphorous "reserve base".
2) we know of MANY substitutes for oil, and NONE for phosphorous.
3) World oil use due to widespread economic / education improvements is not subject to increasing as much as world phosphorous use.
lengould,
You 'prove' that we will run out of oil in 120 years and we will run out of phosphate in 244 years and then conclude that we have a lot of substitutes for oil?
1 + 1 = ...3?
You ignore that we can recover phosphate from manure.
You say we can reduce oil consumption after I post that we can reduce phosphate use which results in water pollution and show how to do it.
One reason I'm not worried about a vast depletion of phosphate is that world population is supposed to level off in 50 or so years and even contract a bit so less food will be needed in the future.
Malthus thought the world would run out of arable land as he had no inkling of the Green Revolution, so now NPK is the fallback position, but this is a mere figleaf.
Go hug your lovely bag of NPK!
Hello EROI Guy,
Thxs for the fascinating keypost. As the US is becoming increasingly reliant upon I-NPK imports [source: USGS websites for sulfur, nitrogen, potash, phosphate, etc, see also the UN FAO Fertilizer Forecast], IMO, it would increase our long term national security to reduce topsoil and aquifer degradation rates by moving to a much higher percentage of full-on O-NPK recycling, crop rotation, more fallow land time periods, and superior minimal water use strategies.
IMO, the money and resources poured into ethanol could have built many miles of SpiderWebRiding. I have no exact idea, but I wouldn't be surprised if the steel in a single ethanol plant is equivalent to 3,000 miles of small and light narrow gauge track. If this steel had originally been directed into track: the topsoil would be moving in the direction of gradual enrichment versus continued depletion plus many postPeak jobs would be created moving O-NPK from towns back to the topsoil.
Another reason to postPeak move in this direction is that the P & K ores will gradually move to weakened concentrations necessitating even more energy inputs to become sufficiently beneficiated into topsoil applicable, finished, custom blend I-NPK products.
Bob Shaw in Phx,Az Are Humans Smarter than Yeast?
This post does point up the necessity implementing a universally accepted standard for energy cost, but one must be very careful when tabulating the inputs.
As for redirecting the steel in an ethanol plant to light rails, though I understand and do not argue with the enrichment versus depletion arguement, any analysis of just what percentage of that redirected steel would actually become light rail if so directed would necessarily have subtract the amount of steel which would have to be used for machinery for preparing track bed, laying and transporting track and on and on and of course then calculate the same numbers for the ethanol plant the steel was actually used in. Very complex stuff. The only practical mechanism we have for actually calculating these costs now is the market's very biased balance sheet. Wish us luck.
Hello Luke H,
Very little machinery is required for SpiderWebRiding: recall that Chicago dug sixty miles of tunnels, starting in a bar in 1899, and laid the track-->all by hand. I have also posted an earlier link where just a couple of guys have installed a half mile of track on some farmland in a few months.
So, in some sense, this track may have been partially fueled by ethanol, ingested by the workers if you will.
Hello Bob,
Being relatively new to TOD I had no idea how light the light rails you were talking about were. Checking back a year and more gave me insight to your SpiderWeb Riding concept. Pretty trippy.
I do remember reading history about the union movement in Chicago. It seems bricklayers were expected to lay somewhere near 3000 bricks a day in Chicago tunnels and were working themselves into very early graves. One thing unions did was reduce the amount of work required from each laborer to a more sustainable rate. Are the Chicago tunnels you are referring to the same ones I speak of?
http://users.ameritech.net/chicagotunnel/tunnel1.html
A little known historical note is the switch over of rail gauge in the Southern States following the Civil War. The gauge was widened a matter of in inch or two by pulling up the spikes on one side and moving the rail over and re-spiking.
It was accomplished in one day!
If you want to use plant-based fuel for your ICE's, remember you have to assign acreage, to grow Castor oil for lubrication.
I think all those TODers [that promote corn ethanol] would be wise to heed the research of the UN FAO [PDF Warning]:
ftp://ftp.fao.org/agl/agll/docs/globalfertdemand.pdf
---------------------
Forecasting Long-term Global Fertilizer Demand [2015,2030]
[from the Abstract]..Soil nutrient drawdown in regions with inadequate fertilizer use indicates soil nutrient depletion which will in the long run exacerbate food shortages and undermine biofuels production plans. Food and fertilizer policy, farmer education, research and technology development, and other actions will be required to counter soil nutrient depletion.
[from the Conclusion]..While the model does not include the soil nutrients from animal manure or the N fixed by legumes, it provides a preliminary global perspective on the relationship of fertilizer demand and soil fertility maintenance.
--------------------
In the long run: IMO, avoidance of a Liebig Minimum by O-NPK recycling to help drive the soil biolife towards a profitable Liebscher Optimum is our best choice for Optimal Overshoot Decline.
Have you hugged your bag of NPK today?
In accordance with proper cartographic rules, might I suggest you project your 'map'... I suggest an Alber's equal area conic projection.
Thanks in advance,
-That damn map guy
Seattle, WA
New strains of corn will increase US ethanol production and efficiency greatly in a few years. Ethanol plants are being planned in many other countries in South America, Africa, and Asia. Palm oil and jatropha are being developed for biofuel.
Fossil fuel was the past, biofuel is the future.
They will still have a much lower energy density than oil, still require water and fertilizers, all things that inhibit any real application of corn-ethanol as substitute for gasoline.
Fossil oil is a great resource. But there is a limited amount, and wells are quickly depleting.
The new strains of corn planned for ethanol in the US actually DO NOT require traditional feed corn fertilizers.
Corn ethanol already is a substitute for gasoline. Production numbers and efficiency keep climbing every year.
Hello Conservationist,
Your quote: "The new strains of corn planned for ethanol in the US actually DO NOT require traditional feed corn fertilizers."
I would like to see a weblink or other citation supporting this assertion. All plants need NPK plus other trace Elements.
http://domesticfuel.com/2007/10/21/heard-about-earless-corn/
Not much about this on the web, you'll have to do your own research if you're really interested.
You certainly are lazy, you link to a blurb story that has a link with more detail from the University of Illinois.
http://www.aces.uiuc.edu/news/stories/news4169.html
True, tropical maize is stated to not require high nitrogen, but in nature there is no "free lunch", so to produce something, something must be converted. I experienced this with many hybrid plants. They produced more, but only if you "pushed" them.
A gleeful call to arms to denude Indonesia and the Amazon (and Congo for that matter)rain forests to grow factory farm monoculture swaths of vegetable oil-bearing plants is certainly the last thing one would expect to see posted from one called 'conversationalist'.
Don't forget Malaysia. And it's not just the Congo, most of Africa can support jatropha.
Development is progress. No one can stop it.
the starving are the most powerless. at least they won't be able to stop your kind of progress.
puzzled,
snyder
Gross
"It ain't what you don't know that gets you into trouble. It's what you know for sure that just ain't so."
All the best with your particular and peculiar view on the world.
Calculating energy return on investment for only the best corn-growing areas is fallacious accounting at best. If you cherry-pick the best areas for ethanol, you must factor in the result that all other uses of corn will become more costly, because you have preferentially used the best land for ethanol rather than other corn products. All those other products would become more expensive because they have to be grown on sub-optimal land. To give a comprehensive accounting, the added cost for those other products would have to be counted in the ethanol budget.
This is why any energy balance calculations for corn ethanol must be based on the average productivity of the crop, not the peak. Better yet, we can dispense with calculated predictions altogether, and look at actual experience with ethanol vs. gasoline. We are now producing enough ethanol that there should be a noticeable effect on gasoline consumption, if ethanol is really a benefit. As ethanol production increases, gasoline use should decrease. Using figures up to 2006 (before the wild swings in financial and energy markets), ethanol production had no effect on gasoline use. The increase in gasoline use parallels the increase in miles driven, with no measurable benefit from ethanol. I have noted this with quantitative data in a previous post.
If ethanol were useful as a fuel source, it should be viable without a government subsidy. And since the distilling process eats up energy, we would get more fuel calories from our corn by burning it in powerplants for electricity, displacing coal and its CO2 emissions. The ash could be returned to the soil, recycling the minerals. The idea seems absurd, but from an energy standpoint burning corn ethanol is even more absurd. Ethanol indeed converts low-quality fuels like coal into high-quality transportation fuel, but the gain is small because high-quality fuels are also used in the corn growing and distilling process. Let's stop trying to fuel our vehicles with moonshine.
Subsidies?
Have you stopped to think how much money is spent protecting middle east oil supplies?
With regards to the increased gasoline production figures. Most ethanol is blended into the gasoline as E10. Finished gasoline contains ethanol. The figures you should be looking at are the decreases in imported oil as ethanol production increases.
Ethanol EROI is positive. Many studies have been done to refute the EROI negative claim. The negative EROI claim first came from Pimentel and Patzek - well paid oil company consultants.
You can find links to independent studies here vvv
http://www.ethanolrfa.org/resource/reports/
If ethanol EROI were positive, it is indeed true that oil imports should decrease. Again using figures up to 2006, before the present economic and energy instability, I see no evidence that producing billions of gallons of corn ethanol has reduced imports. They increase every year, even faster than total oil consumption because domestic production is post-peak.
David Pimentel has calculated that about 9/10 of the calories in field corn come not from sunlight, but from fossil fuels. The figure has never been disputed, but its implications have not been followed through. It's tough to get a positive EROI with this as a starting point. The oil companies don't oppose ethanol because fossil fuel inputs roughly equal outputs, so for them it's a wash.
Of course those who profit from making ethanol will defend it. Our job is to look at actual energy use objectively.
As I posted above, corn ethanol is not an energy crop--a crop grown solely to produce energy. The corn stalk, cobs are fed to animals as is distillers dried grains. The ethanol produced from the fermentation of corn kernals represents less than 20% of the weight of the plant.
This is different than for sugar cane where the whole plant(bagasse) is used to make energy and which has a much higher EROI (~5, IMO).
Your job(if you chose to accept it) is to honestly total all the inputs and outputs of the energy accounts and not to simply parrot David Pimental whose work has not been replicated by objective researchers.
Oil imports have dropped:
http://tonto.eia.doe.gov/dnav/pet/pet_move_imp_dc_NUS-Z00_mbblpd_a.htm
Ethanol helped to reduce those imports:
http://www.biofuelsdigest.com/blog2/2008/10/17/today-in-biofuels-opinion...
Pimentels work (funded by oil companies), has been challenged by Argonne National Laboratory:
http://www.ethanolrfa.org/objects/documents/78/net_energy_balance_2004.pdf
Straw man - imports have dropped because economy is in tank
Nice unbiased source
Pimentel has been writing about ag related issues and sustainability before there WERE the current oil companies. And there are many who question Argonnes numbers too. It's all a question of boundaries. In the end, we will find that those that used the widest boundaries will have been most correct (but no one fully correct)
So the full cost of neither petroleum nor ethanol is paid at the pump. Fix that, and we'll probably be well over $4/gallon again and the problem will fix itself.
True. If the projections of Ford and MIT are correct, use of non-blended ethanol with direct injection could allow engine output per liter to be doubled and engine sizes to be halved. The projections are that reduced weight, bulk and friction would cut fuel consumption by roughly 30%, far more than the few percent of ethanol consumed. This would have a huge EROI even if the ethanol was only at breakeven.
This research is now some 2.5 years old, but isn't being acted on nearly as urgently as it merits.