Green Fuel Dreams

Posted by Mark Radulich on 01.05.2006

Slowly but surely we as a global culture are looking to limit our dependence on fossil fuels.

Slowly but surely we as a global culture are looking to limit our dependence on fossil fuels. As I've written about on a number of occasions now, renewable sources of energy that are clean burning are the way of the future. While the oil industry is loathe to give up their near monopoly on automobile fuel, the fact remains that everyday more and more cities are switching to products like ethanol and biodiesel for their buses and government cars.

One of the programs set for 2006 to promote "green cars" is a plan to give tax credits to consumers who buy hybrid cars. According to CBS news, "The new year will bring more savings for buyers of at least 13 gas-electric vehicles, with those showing the most improvement in fuel efficiency scoring the biggest tax breaks for their new owners.

The breaks will come in the form of tax credits, and they range from $3,150 for buyers of the Toyota Prius to $250 for Chevrolet's Silverado pickup truck, according to an analysis by the American Council for an Energy-Efficient Economy.

The credits give buyers of American hybrids incentives similar to those now enjoyed mostly by Honda and Toyota owners."

This is the sort of promotion most eco-analysts have been clamoring for some time. Nothing motivates a consumer to change his/her buying habits like a sale or a tax credit and the aforementioned plan is just what the doctor ordered. You can expect to see many more hybrid cars on the road this year if more people in the new car market are privy to this tax credit promotion.

However, gas-electric hybrids are not the only choice we have. Many countries such as Brazil are making ethanol their fuel du jour.

Ethanol is, "a clean-burning, renewable fuel…distilled from fermented grain — usually corn — in production plants. Compared to regular unleaded gasoline, ethanol-enriched fuel burns cleaner and produces fewer harmful tailpipe emissions. It also has higher octane, which can help your car develop maximum horsepower."

Ethanol has been compared to biodiesel in that it too helps the American farmer by finding a purpose for their over-production of crops while reducing our dependence on foreign oil.

Getting back to Brazil as compared to the United States, according to The Coloradoan, "Although Brazil and the United States produce about the same amount of ethanol each year - 4 billion gallons - Brazilians rely on sugar cane-based ethanol for 40 percent of their driving fuel.

By comparison, ethanol accounts for less than 5 percent of fuel use in the United States.

Most cars in America can run well on mixtures of 10 percent ethanol and 90 percent gasoline. About 3 million vehicles in the United States have "flex-fuel engines" that allow them to use 85 percent ethanol, a high-octane fuel.

But to replicate Brazil's success, the United States would need an energy policy that pushes higher ethanol use and the increased manufacture of cars with engines that can run on a fuel mixture of 85 percent ethanol. It also would take technological advances that give ethanol producers the option of using crops other than corn to produce ethanol."

It has been said that if the government would only do its part in divorcing us from the oil oligarchy then we'd have a relatively easy go of restructuring our fuel economy to one that is renewable and more ecologically friendly.

That being said, the aforementioned article goes on to say that, "Congress gave a boost to ethanol production in a national energy bill it passed this year. Under the law's renewable-fuels standard, gasoline makers would have to use 7.5 billion gallons of ethanol a year by 2012. That would be nearly double the amount now produced.

Lawmakers are looking at ethanol - especially the kind produced from crops other than corn - as one way to achieve their goal of reducing oil use in the United States by 2.5 million barrels per day by 2016. They also see an environmental benefit to ethanol: It produces fewer greenhouse gases than oil when burned.

Bills introduced in the House and the Senate call for carmakers to produce more flex-fuel cars - those that can run on either gasoline or high ethanol mixtures. The legislation would provide for grants to build more alternative-fuel stations."

This is not going to happen overnight. It took Brazil more than 20 years to be where it is now in ethanol use and production. Not to mention that politically speaking, we cannot up and completely abandon the fossil fuel market.

Many of the Middle Eastern countries such as Saudi Arabia and Kuwait are entirely dependant on the oil trade to keep their economies functional. Although we all wish that tomorrow we could be done with that entire region, causing an economic depression by devaluing the one regional commodity that keeps some semblance of civilization in that area would be akin to creating another million little Osama Bin Ladens. Remember, poverty is one of the many building blocks of terrorism.

The conversion from a worldwide economy driven by fossil fuels to one that is not needs to be slow and methodical. Though I support the dream of more "green cars" and "green power plants," it needs to be in a way that doesn't hurt the good citizens of the Middle East as well.

Parallel planning is the key. A little while back I reported on a story where Saudi Arabia and Brazil had signed a series of trade agreements. While we work toward a more green future free of Saudi crude, they must also work hard to diversify they economy and prepare for an end to their current single resource economy. This follows for all of the little oil monarchies.