How Fuel efficient is your car?

[Box Burner]

The same argument from Detroit is used today against improved MPG as it was back in the mid-60s against seat belts - it'll be too costly, the public will stop buying cars, and we'll all go out of business.

If they HAVE to make cars that get 40 MPG, they will. and they'll figure out a way to do it without hurting themselves.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

I don't see anywhere in the constitution where it guarantees that your bussiness will not fail.

[diane o'thirst]

I just got bumped up into the "I Dicked Cheney" range today.

I got the Condensator installed in my vehicle and they promise a minimum mileage upgrade of 20%, which will put me at around 22 mpg with Cristobel.

But wait, there's less...

The same mechanic also installs the new EPA-endorsed flex-fuel pump. I waited all of one and a half heartbeats before I said, "Sign me up!!" and gave them my number. It's going to squeeze me for about $600 but I'll recoup that in a year at the pump. The claim with E-85 is that it increases horsepower and more efficient operation. Between the flex fuel pump and the Condensator I expect to be driving a midsize SUV and get 25 mpg.

The fuel pump works on everything before 2006 and they're working on a pump for later-model vehicles right now. Scratch together $600 however way you can, find out where you can get it installed at

www.intelligentethanolsystems.com

and convert to the Church of Corn!

I can't wait to see the look on Ahmedinejad's face the next time he threatens to close shipping in the Persian Gulf and we just shrug!

[gyre]

Based on their excessive claims, let me express my skepticism about the condensator.

Alcohol should, in fact reduce your power and mileage unless you remap your fuel system.
Alcohol engines are built around the fuel just as diesel engines are.

What was the result of government testing of the condensator?

I hope these work for you.
I would upgrade engine controls and fine tune before taking any exotic approaches myself.
After seeing the results of hose and gasket damage from much lower levels of alcohol, I will never use it in anything as long as I have a choice.

[BAS]

I have more faith in the Diesel engine running on BioDiesel/WVO approach myself. Most of those gadgets look good on paper, but don't pan out in practice, as far as I can tell.

(Course, I still need to get a few other problems taken care of before I can put my money where my mouth is and convert to Diesel-- such as getting decently employed so I can buy a different vehicle....)


B. (Who only just today got around to washing his sleeping bad from BM2006!)

[diane o'thirst]

Well, Gyre, don't take this personally but you're only the third Nay in a Mahlerian chorus of Yeas that I've heard in the past two years I've been researching E-85. The pump's ordered and coming and I'll be closely monitoring my mileage after it's installed. Pudding will be proven within the month, one way or the other. Let's say "meet on the Playa" and we can compare notes.

BAS...sorry, I'm a biodiesel fan too, shopped for a diesel truck. It was a choice between brand-spanking new and beat-to-hell '70s vintage. Couldn't swing the sticker on the former and didn't trust the latter, so diesel went in the out box. Yeah, I know. The payback's over the long haul. That doesn't help when I don't have a prayer at coming up with $30,000 up front. Trust me, if it were otherwise I wouldn't be driving a 4Runner, I'd be in an F250 Supercab or a Titan (which are E-85 native).

However, I'm encouraged because I'm seeing 4Runners all over Eugene. This is a depressed community and a soft economy; when a car is purchased it's gonna be awhile before the torch is passed. I'm expecting to be traveling with Cristobel for at least the next ten years.

[BAS]

Yeah, if I get a Diesel any time soon, it will probably be one in the "beat to hell" category. Hopefully the Saturn wagon will last a while longer. (Used diesels are not all that rare, the trouble is that I want a diesel wagon for an everyday vehicle, and a diesel school bus for fun, and don't currently have the budget for either!)

I hope those devices do work for you! I'm just skeptical. A friend of mine had a flex-fuel vehicle, and it gets a somewhat lower mileage with E-85 (but saves money since the state subsidizes E-85.) I have never heard of the other device, and my "default setting" is not to trust something like that. (Then again, the time before last when I had my car's oil changed, the attendant had told me that one of his earlier customers was a Burner who had some weird device on his car's engine to improve the fuel economy and swore that it worked! It could be that there is something out there which works and I just haven't heard about it yet. I definitely don't know as much as I would like to think I do...)

Good luck! Let us know how it works out.



B.

[gyre]

I just hope you will take advantage of the many changes that are known to improve gas mileage, if you are this serious.
I'm not sure what you have but gearing is usually the most productive area on a large vehicle.
Don't forget aero too.

When you test out anything you can't measure in a coastdown or other test, remember the placebo effect.
A local tv station recently "proved" that those magnetic fuel gizmos work.
This is a fraud that predates gas cars.
It takes a lot of steady highway mileage to set a reliable baseline.

I hope you will measure before the changes in every way, including acceleration.
Jacobs wrote an excellent book on fine tuning a car scientifically.

I am quite annoyed that my 120 hp car gets about the same mileage as my car with five times the power.
There are pretty simple reasons besides the air drag though.
I have a friend who gets 21 mpg in town in a big Jag on regular fuel.
That just shows how much potential is really there.

I hope to mount an air dam on my car before I hit the road.
The first one will be very crude, but probably effective.
A simple coast down test is all it takes to find out.

[diane o'thirst]

I'm not a gearhead, so if I got a beat-to-hell diesel and it broke on me somewhere east of the Cascades or down on the Lost Coast, I'd be sofa king screwed. So the '70s vintage truck, gas or diesel, ain't an option for me.

If money were no object, I'd get the following array:

F250 diesel mothership to haul the horse trailer with. Only used occasionally/seasonally, and run on biodiesel.

Subaru Forester, GMC Acadia or Kia Sorento for a runabout (24- 26mpg), used whenever I'm not hauling anything.

But, even if I had the $50K needed to buy and equip those, I wouldn't have the money to keep them fed, insured and serviced. Soon as I get my inheritance from the Rittenhouse Family Trust, that could very well change, but that's only slightly shorter odds than hitting the PowerBall.

If nothing else...okay, it's a personal sacrifice to get us weaned off the OPEC tit. I believe in that enough to be willing to take the leap and soak the "get that piece of junk out of my ride!" ding, if it comes down to that. Why pay into a regime that goes against this country's founding principles, simply because we need the oil? If it pans out...great, I'll get my $800 back by next summer or it gets prorated over the next 12-16 years, and my fuel travels only as far as the Oregon/Idaho borderline and the Tri-Cities in Washington, instead of UAE via Corpus Christi and Panama.

My dream is to see the whole of the New World from Tierra del Fuego to Nome go petrol-free, within my lifetime or at least well on the way there. Brazil's already there, and I don't particularly care if we're not on the cutting edge, so long as it gets done. Converting everything pre-2006 to E-85 is very much a step in the right direction.

Bill Richardson has a bold plan to have us cut emissions by 1o% by 2020, 80% by 2050. I'll be 88, Gods willing. (Shut the hell up, Carcinoma!)

[diane o'thirst]

I just hope you will take advantage of the many changes that are known to improve gas mileage, if you are this serious.

Thanks for the points. Yeah, I am that serious. Mileage is just one reason I'm making the jump; you're probably reading the other reasons as I'm typing this.

Don't get me wrong, I'm not the type to jump on something just because it's neato or cool. Capricorns don't do the Impulse-Buy Thing. I've been looking at going flex-fuel for a couple years now. I was only waiting because the EPA hadn't approved any of the technologies until recently, as soon as I heard it was available I was on it.

We'll do a test-run with the Condensator this weekend. I'm driving up to Puyallup for a dressage clinic and it's about a 500-mile round trip. This last tankful lasted me 350 miles measured at 80% empty (23-gallon tank). I'll use that as a non-scientific baseline and measure it against this weekend's roadtrip, the trip up to and back from Olympia in a month and a half, and the Playa run a week later. I'm also due for Cristobel's first oil change (with me) in about 1600 some-odd miles, and we'll have that factored in.

Around-town is against the backdrop of my driving habits. I tend to drive conservatively and plan a circular route when I do the errands. Most days I log 30 miles or less.

Anyone wanna do the math or shall I whip out the Fuel Economy Widget?

[Lassen Forge]

I just hope you will take advantage of the many changes that are known to improve gas mileage, if you are this serious.

Thanks for the points. Yeah, I am that serious. Mileage is just one reason I'm making the jump; you're probably reading the other reasons as I'm typing this.

Don't get me wrong, I'm not the type to jump on something just because it's neato or cool. Capricorns don't do the Impulse-Buy Thing. I've been looking at going flex-fuel for a couple years now. I was only waiting because the EPA hadn't approved any of the technologies until recently, as soon as I heard it was available I was on it.

We'll do a test-run with the Condensator this weekend. I'm driving up to Puyallup for a dressage clinic and it's about a 500-mile round trip. This last tankful lasted me 350 miles measured at 80% empty (23-gallon tank). I'll use that as a non-scientific baseline and measure it against this weekend's roadtrip, the trip up to and back from Olympia in a month and a half, and the Playa run a week later. I'm also due for Cristobel's first oil change (with me) in about 1600 some-odd miles, and we'll have that factored in.

Around-town is against the backdrop of my driving habits. I tend to drive conservatively and plan a circular route when I do the errands. Most days I log 30 miles or less.

Anyone wanna do the math or shall I whip out the Fuel Economy Widget?

No math, but we did have some practical experience at work dealing with Ethanol.

We had a fleet of E-85 vehicles (actually alternate fuel) which we ran for a while. These were GM product and designed as alternate (e85/gasoline) rigs, not conversions. They would run on either.

The one major plus was the increase in horsepower. VERY impressive.

The Minuses were horrid economy (which was related to the e-85 - was about 20% worse than when ran on gasoline) which, when looking at the premium cost of e85, made them pretty uneconomical. (Ya want economy, get a prius or a motorcycle!) and way increased maintenance (the fuel is not nice to the internals, the upped HP is hard on the drive train - these cars were in the shop almost twicw as often as the pure gas versions, and for more expensive repairs).

And mind you, I like the idea of alternate fuel.

We just got a new fleet of pure E-85 vehicles. Not dual fuel. Expensive to refuel, and yes, not thrifty on that fuel. And the maintenance problems are starting up again, tho they're not as "zippy" as the last gen of vehicles. Those that drive them like them, but worry about the economy factor. (Most have a few 1 gallon cans in the trunk in case they run out... not safe, but beter than stranded... I guess...)

The washout? Ethanol burns far, far cleaner, but takes more petro and creates more pollution (and greenhouse gasses) to produce between growing the corn or other grain crop and the actual manufacture of the fuel than the equivalent of gasoline. As such, while as a fuel source it does burn wonderfully clean, it ends up creating more pollution, not less.

I wish it weren't so - and I hope someday we come up with a way to grow this much grain (which can't then be used for food or feed) without needing the oil companys in the middle, but they are - and that's why the current admin loves e-85. Not because it's cheaper, but because it uses *more* oil.

Ug.

My solution - develop a capacitor system to store electricity rather than chemical batteries, and Go Solar. It won't work for everything (ergo the desire for oil-free ethanol or equivelant) , but it will work for a lot.

One thing is for certain - we need to quit - 100% - using petroleum oil for fuel. The only problem is that attitude is anti-patriotic, and anti-government, and leads to terrorism and lower profits for familys embedded with oil companies.

Know what burns the most petro, BTW? War operations.

Have a nice day...

bb

[mdmf007]

Ethanol, and Biodiesel are niche fuels, not everyone could switch to them, as they cant be produced in hte quantities needed to meet demand.
Blanket the US in soybeans and corn, and you still wouldnt meet demand.

So I dont see either as a long term solution. If we are going to go electric - do it right and dump billions into battery research and fuel cells.

But if we go with fuel cells, we need to burn coal in georgia and in the TVA system, or kill more salmon on the columbia, or build new nuclear plants to meet demand to crack water into hydrogen. (id prefer the nuc plants cracking water) Burn Hydrogen -

Why hydogen? its universal, Hydrogen when burned creates water and heat as a byproduct. The only major problem is storage in a car. Hydrogen tends to explode and being a small molecule seeps through many materials. (fill aballon with helium and one with hydrogen - the hydrogen balloon is flat in a couple of hours)

thats just my two cents on it. I could go on for hours but that would get boring

later

[Rob the Wop]

My solution - develop a capacitor system to store electricity rather than chemical batteries, and Go Solar. It won't work for everything (ergo the desire for oil-free ethanol or equivelant) , but it will work for a lot.

Why? Lead acid batteries are extremely recyclable. I'm not sure what a large scale capacitive system would buy you- or how reliable it would be.

In Portland and Europe they have a fairly easy system to get around most large transport issue. Electric trains. A combination of smaller electric vehicle and the development of a grid for large electric trains would solve damn near all those issue. Then its just a power production issue.

[Rob the Wop]

My choice out of all of them would be electric. The electric motor is one of the most efficient types of motors that we know of, and we already pretty much perfected how to produce electricity from kenetic sources.

The cool thing with building a large scale electric transportation grid is that, once the system is in place, the source of the fuel is immaterial.

One way of making electricity isn't so swell, figure out another way. The motors and generators themselves are pretty much perfected at this point- just strap a different kenetic source to it. This is most definitely NOT the case for the majority of motor vehicles out there. ALL of the motors would have to be replaced if things change.

Granted, the batteries may have to be switched out. But the rest of the vehicle wouldn't have to be touched.

[can't sit still]

A few thoughts;
Cornell U says that it takes 1 1/4 gals of gas/diesel to produce 1 gal of ethanol. Fidel Castro said that we would starve 3 billion if we switched to ethanol. Already 1 million acres in the US have been switched from wheat to corn. The price of corn has doubled or trippled.
The world grain reserves are at their lowest point in 80 years [ excluding the war years]
I imagine that we'll switch to ethanol just to starve out the east and middle east. We can tell them with a sad, sad smile that we just don't have the food to spare.
There is much talk of saw grass.etc and nano intervention for producing ethanol. Maybe,,,,,,?

I read a very good breakdown on hydrogen. It appears that it is not easy to deliver. You just can't get much in a truck. The weight limit for normal trucks is 80,000 lbs. A truck with the requisite tanks to haul helium only carries 1500 lbs of cargo. The empty weight is 78,500 lbs. Do the math. You need dozens of trucks to haul an equivalent of BTUs to a station. I believe that hydrogen would be quite similar to helium but I don't have any experience with it. Hydrogen must be produced with electricity. Where are the generators going to be operated? What are they going to be fueled by?
Hydrogen is just a storage system. You use energy to make it one place,,,transport it and use it in another place.
No matter how you look at it, personal transportation is going to get very expensive. I have a great love of ZPE energy. It is moving forward,,,,BUT, The only viable thing that we should do now is rebuild our rail and electrify it. I hate to say it, but if we want to be able to afford electricity, nukes are the only thing on the horizon that pencil out.
I tend to be an "anti-francophile,,,but, they are 80%nuke. Everybody else has electric rail.
By using zoning laws and destroying emerging rail years ago, big oil has made sure that there would be no competing infrastructure.
At the base of everything, non-nuke energy comes from "stored sunshine"You just have to pick what variety of sunshine you want to utilise.
Dan

[gyre]

The helium truck near a friend's house is quite large, fifty feet long with lengthwise cylinders.
Hydrogen leaks much more readily though.
Ask the ice team at nasa.

[diane o'thirst]

From the Intelligent Ethanol Systems site:

"Other Misconceptions About Ethanol"

<b>Does it take more energy to manufacture ethanol than ethanol produces?</b>

"Net energy balance is a term used to describe how much energy is needed to produce a product versus how much energy that product provides. Two professors that are long-time critics of ethanol claim that ethanol has a negative energy balance, but this is simply not true and has been debunked again and again by science. Scientific study after study has proven ethanol's energy balance to be positive. The latest USDA figures show that ethanol made from the drymill process provides at least 77% more energy as a fuel than the process it takes to make it. The bottom line is that it takes about 35,000 BTUs (British Thermal Units) of energy to create a gallon of ethanol, and that gallon of ethanol contains at least 77,000 BTUs of energy. The net energy balance of ethanol is simply a non-issue."

<b>Is ethanol using up corn that should be used for human food?</b>
"In the so-called "food vs. fuel" debate, one major misconception is that the majority of the corn grown in the U.S. goes directly for human consumption. This is not the case. Actually, only about 9 percent of U.S. corn is used for human consumption in products like cereals, sweeteners, etc. The main uses for U.S. corn are for livestock feed or for export, with the industrial uses category - including ethanol - making up a smaller percentage.

In 2005, 14 percent of the U.S. corn crop went for ethanol production, and for the '06 crop that figure is expected to rise to 20 percent. By no means is the U.S. ethanol industry using up all the corn, and by no means is the U.S. ethanol industry going to create a food shortage. Certainly there is a world hunger problem, but the ethanol industry and the availability of corn are not to blame for this. Distribution problems and geopolitical instability in impoverished nations often stand in the way of better nutrition for the world's hungry."

As far as I'm concerned...high fructose corn syrup is just so much obesity fuel and shouldn't be in the food stream in the first place. I'd rather see the corn juice in a car's fuel tank.

Furthermore, methanol is another by-product of composting plant material. And fuel crops can become another stream to divert organic waste into. I cite the use of port-a-potty effluent being used to grow inedible garlic that scents propane. Fuel crops grown expressly for production of ethanol and methanol can be fertilized with treated sewage since they won't be used for food consumption. Or would you rather it continue to pour into our rivers, lakes, coastlines and streams?

[BAS]

Ethanol, and Biodiesel are niche fuels, not everyone could switch to them, as they cant be produced in hte quantities needed to meet demand.
Blanket the US in soybeans and corn, and you still wouldnt meet demand.

WRT biodiesel, soybeans might not be the way to go. I am hopeful that the algae experiments will pan out, and that algae farms will be the main source of diesel fuel (with waste veggie oil being used for recycling purposes). As far as I can tell, soybeans are being pushed mostly due to having a good lobby.



B.

[can't sit still]

The fuel-Vs-food thing is just a disagreement now. If we covered the entire US with soy and corn, it wouldn't be a disagreement at all.
The basic question comes down to ROI,, return on investment. How much energy do you put in and how much do you get back.
If you use geo-thermal or nuke to process the tar sands, you might make a go of it. If you use oil,,, no way. The same holds true for oil. When the oil gushed out of the wells in OK and TX, the return was 16---1. The current world average is 3.4 to 1. It's easy to see that the world won't run out of oil. The price won't matter. When we reach the point that we burn one barrel to recover .9 barrels, depletion will be runaway.
A big part of the problem is that portable carbon energy convertors [cars] aren't very effecient. Electric to kinetic convertors are much better. We need to implement more nuke/geo and capture more solar energy. When we capture/produce more energy, then we can think about energy stable personal transportation.
The Cornell study that I cited factored in all the energy to produce the fertiliser, pesticide, tractor manufacture , etc.
When the stupic fuck oil companies take a good look at ROI, they will realise that they should push nuke and conserve the oil for productiuon, not burning.
I don't see enlightnement coming any time soon.
Dan

[diane o'thirst]

Okay, returned from PuyallupWA. I'm not a gearhead or chemist by any means, but I know how to write down numbers and I have a Widget that calculates mileage from said numbers.

So. This weekend's roadtrip required one and a half tankfuls of gas. I fueled up twice but didn't expend them completely. First tank I ran down to four gallons, second was run down to 11 gallons. I wrote down the mileage on the trip odometer and compared them against the number of gallons purchased. I didn't mix grades, they were all 89 octane from Chevron.

I ran the numbers through my MPG Widget and it coughed up the number 20.5 mpg. Before I installed the Condensator I was getting rock-bottom mileage for my vehicle, 14.5 mpg, so this is an appreciable increase in fuel economy.

Note that last week, before I got the Condensator, I was playing taxi to a...let's say "rotund" friend whose bike broke. Also, during the trip up to Washington, I relied on open windows and moonroof for air conditioning and utilized the cruise control whenever I wasn't in heavy urban traffic.

Okay, I'd like to run what appears to be a gas economy anomaly past y'all. I kept track of my mileage whenever I tanked up. The first quarter tank would get me about 130 miles. If you go on that logic, I should be getting 520 miles of range out of every tankful, yes? But we're bottoming out at around 365 miles per tank-up. Is there something about a full tank that improves mileage in a vehicle? That doesn't make sense to me since obviously a full tank weighs more than a half-empty tank. Am I missing something about automotive technology and its (lack of) efficiency?

[gyre]

You are observing the tenuous connection to reality of most fuel gauges.
If you have a gm, they are beyond inaccurate.
Good gauges are available, if you are interested.
Some tanks are shaped strangely too and this makes it worse.
The average gauge tells you when you are full and empty, if you're lucky.
I have had some accurate gauges on italian cars.
I like the low fuel warning available on some gauges.
Adjustable on the better ones.

They say the break point on ac being more efficient than windows is 40-45 mph. This is only general though.
Using a vent and through ventilation could have less drag though.
It isn't the big mileage killer people think it is though.

Pontiac 6000 with ac on-32 mpg freeway. 4 cyl model. 4 door.

[gyre]

You start off full by topping off the tank.
Now you know it's full.
Some slop even then.
When you run the miles on pure highway, you top it off again.
Now you have miles and gallons.
Even then there is some inaccuracy.
Do it enough and you have some idea.

Breaking it down to the mile is more accurate too.
There is a reason labs use special tanks for these things.
The overall averages are what counts.

[Archantael]

Ethanol is a threat and a menace to the environment due to the vast amounts of water consumed to make it. Unless you live on the coasts where a desalination plant is an option, your fuel will likely come at the expense of someone's underground aquifers being depleted.

There's a new type of ethanol plant that got permitted by the state of Georgia...Slashdot ran a story about it just a few hours ago...here's the link to the source: http://www.ecogeek.org/content/view/798/
They don't go into the water consumption specifics of the new process but corn has always been a water hog, anything that diminishes the importance of it would be a welcome advance.

And it was mentioned how the car companies destroyed the rail system....that was a fundamental mistake and maybe those same car companies should be investigated in depth and forced to pony up money for their restoration. I doubt it will happen but one can dream about it!

[diane o'thirst]

Sequential Fuels (our local biofuel station) says that the ethanol they're getting is coming down from Canada, but there are several farms in eastern Oregon that are starting up now and they'll be producing from wheat. Probably not the grain itself, the stalks.

Thanks for the tips, Gyre. Right now my stock fuel gauge does have a "low fuel" warning light that comes on when the tank gets down to 3 gallons. With the recent mods that means about 50 miles, conservative estimate. I'll ask my mechanic to see if he can install a better gauge when he does the flex fuel conversion.

Sorry, Archantael...calling your bluff. You're looking for reasons to keep us on petrol and not implement biofuel.

[can't sit still]

"And it was mentioned how the car companies destroyed the rail system....that was a fundamental mistake and maybe those same car companies should be investigated in depth and forced to pony up money for their restoration. I doubt it will happen but one can dream about it!
"
Ford motor company is valued at 8.7 billion dollars and has 117 billion dollars in outstanding credit/debt. GM is in worse shape. I think Gov is going to flip a coin on who to save. GM will probably go to China and leave Ford here. I don't see "pony up" as a realistic option.

Changing to bio-fuels really isn't an option either. We might do enough to keep the trucks and tractors going but that is about all. Corn is a broadleaf and uses way too much water. There are other crops, but they all need water. Our biggest aquifer is depleting at 1 1/2 ft. a year. Our snowpack is falling off too.
They've found that if they spray a bit of alcohol on corn , it matures in half the time with half the water. It still won't do.
Rather than cover the planet with corn that needs fertiliser and water, it make more sense to cover the same area with solar panels. No tractors, water or fertiliser. Just electric cars.
We can't realisticly continue with personal transportation except at the cost of enviornmental degradation.
Another 10 years on the present course should see the end of personal transportation for the majority of people.

[Apollonaris Zeus]

"Changing to bio-fuels really isn't an option either. We might do enough to keep the trucks and tractors going but that is about all. Corn is a broadleaf and uses way too much water. There are other crops, but they all need water. Our biggest aquifer is depleting at 1 1/2 ft. a year. Our snowpack is falling off too.

Silage ethanol from seaweed!

Seaweed contains 28% more water then corn or most dry land plants and almost every recreational lake in this country spends millions on seaweed harvesting. All of that goes into the dump with little or no return on expenditure with development of silage ethanol everyone one of those lakes can produce fuel. Those lake havesters can run day and night suppling millions of tons of seaweed.

http://www.halfbakery.com/idea/Seaweed_20Power

[diane o'thirst]

Cars = freedom. The ad was spot on in that regard, and for that reason America will always have cars. Too many people have their own lives and agendas to follow and if we all converted to public transit for everyone and everything, civilization wouldn't come to a grinding halt, it would fall flat on its face and spontaneously combust.

Would that the public transportation sector was efficient and widespread enough to get everyone and everything where it needed to be, but that's a reality only if you play NationStates.

Speaking strictly for me, I can't just lead Tagie up the steps of the EMX and tootle up to Olympia with him.

Here's a question for the gallery: Is anyone transporting their camps via train? There was talk a few years back to get a spur off the train line in Gerlach, but nothing ever came of it.

Second thought: If we can implement wave generation along the coastlines (the most population-dense areas in the country...how convenient), and generate our electrical infrastructure via solar, wave, methane and wind generation, then the fuel energy stream can be dedicated strictly to transportation. Coal is so 19th Century.

[Apollonaris Zeus]

"Changing to bio-fuels really isn't an option either. We might do enough to keep the trucks and tractors going but that is about all. Corn is a broadleaf and uses way too much water. There are other crops, but they all need water. Our biggest aquifer is depleting at 1 1/2 ft. a year. Our snowpack is falling off too.

Silage ethanol from seaweed!

Seaweed contains 28% more water then corn or most dry land plants and almost every recreational lake in this country spends millions on seaweed harvesting. All of that goes into the dump with little or no return on expenditure with development of silage ethanol everyone one of those lakes can produce fuel. Those lake havesters can run day and night suppling millions of tons of seaweed.

http://www.halfbakery.com/idea/Seaweed_20Power

and don't forget the amount of ferilizer and other byproducts such as feed!

[can't sit still]

Zues, It sounds good to me!!! The country is going into a severe drought. Something to keep in mind is that 80% of our water is used for meat production. If we shifted out of beef production, there would be far more water available for energy production. There's lots more silage around than corn. Lake silage is good too. The only question is the end cost when made into fuel. I have no idea what the current state-of-the-art is for converting bio-mass to ethanol,,,, or the cost.
There's also the problem of the oil companies. Los Angeles instituted a green-waste collection program. The feds issued a permit for a greenwaste to energy plant in Bakersfield. LA hauled the greenwaste to bakersfield. The plant made electricity.
The gas company came in and told the utility that they would sell them gas at whatever price it took to undercut the price of drying and handling the greenwaste. They converted to gas. There are no more federal permits forthcoming.
The governor of Alaska was instrumental in blocking the permiting of a wind farm on the eastern seaboard. Alaska sells oil.
Greenwaste to energy is a good idea, but it's controlled by money interests. The corn lobby wants ear corn used. Big oil wants oil used.
Dan

[Apollonaris Zeus]

There's also the problem of the oil companies. Los Angeles instituted a green-waste collection program. The feds issued a permit for a greenwaste to energy plant in Bakersfield. LA hauled the greenwaste to bakersfield. The plant made electricity.
The gas company came in and told the utility that they would sell them gas at whatever price it took to undercut the price of drying and handling the greenwaste. They converted to gas. There are no more federal permits forthcoming.
The governor of Alaska was instrumental in blocking the permiting of a wind farm on the eastern seaboard. Alaska sells oil.
Greenwaste to energy is a good idea, but it's controlled by money interests. The corn lobby wants ear corn used. Big oil wants oil used.
Dan

Don't forget OIL=REPUBLICANS and there are going to quite alot less of them in congress after 2008!

I know who handles the waste collection for the US and if they can profit from recycling (and many do) they will push for it- a dead horses head on your bed goes a very long way!

I believe the profit point for ethanol and most biofuels is about $2.50 a gal
and we are well above that point never to come back down.

AIIZ

ps- write your congressman to impeach BUSH now!

[MikeVDS]

Don't forget OIL=REPUBLICANS

I thought the formula was closer to MONEY=POLITICIANS. No?