Ethanol's sustainability is currently a controversial topic. (Courtesy: Steve Jurvetson)
The world is addicted to oil. Like any addict who knows they should quit but just can’t find a way how to do it, our collective global society is grasping at straws in the dark, hoping that the next technological breakthrough will ultimately save us all from societal and environmental deterioration.
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Whether or not the American public is ready for next generation biofuels, a new study released by Sandia National Laboratories (SNL) and General Motors says that the U.S. could produce 90 billion gallons of ethanol per year by the year 2030 (75 billion gallons of cellulosic); that is 54 billion gallons more than the current federal ethanol mandates aimed for by the year 2022 and roughly 30% of current gasoline usage.
Whereas first generation ethanol concentrated on food crops that required copious amounts of water and fertilizer in order to be grown, second generation ethanol relies primarily on agricultural waste and energy crops, which includes switchgrass, corn stover, wheat straw, and woody plants.
In order for the ethanol industry to be viable, gasoline prices need to be around $2.50 at the pump. Currently the average price of gasoline is under $2; but just last summer, the price of gasoline was high enough to allow the ethanol industry to get its foot in the door. The study points out that in order for ethanol to compete in today’s transportation fuel market, oil prices would need to be between $70-120 bbl.
There have been numerous studies in the past couple of years claiming that ethanol was everything from society’s savior to its antichrist. Since these studies rely primarily on computer models, the results are only as thorough as the considerations that the programmers cover. The key to creating a practical study is to take manageable figures that make sense in today’s marketplace. For example, focusing on crop-based ethanol ONLY in the study and claiming that ALL ethanol will cause food shortages is misleading and unrealistic; yet the media has been running these types of stories nonstop for almost a year now. This report from SNL is the beginning of a change in that trend.
Accounting for the different feedstocks and the multitude of processes (and innovations) to convert biomass to usable transportation fuel, as well as all of the aspects of storage before and after distillation, figuring the logistics of transporting the feedstock to the plants and the ethanol to market, and finally installing pumps at local filling stations involves complicated mathematical formulas. It is no wonder that so many different studies produce so many different results; don’t forget that many academic programs are paid good money to produce reports that are favorable to their many benefactors. These are not lies that are being told, just subtle shades of grey being revealed.
The truth of the matter is that second generation ethanol (cellulosic), is a fuel that can be made from a variety of different sources. Unlike some of the earlier projections that claimed all of the available cropland in America and abroad would be necessary in order to meet the federal biofuel mandates, the reality is that the feedstocks for second generation ethanol vary based upon geography, and some of the plants used for cellulosic ethanol require very little water and virtually no fertilizers at all, some can even be grown on marginal land. An ethanol plant might use agricultural waste in the Midwest, woody plants in the Southeast, and organic waste (yes, trash) anywhere there is a landfill.
The study put out by SNL and GM “found no fundamental barriers to large-scale production of biofuels, assuming the technology matures as projected”; of course, the industry is not in such good shape right now, and without carbon taxes, tax credits, and loan guarantees, second generation ethanol may wither and die before it gets close to the 90 billion gallon per year projections cited in the report.
U.S. Department of Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack wants to see a higher blend of ethanol in today’s fuel. Right now E10 (10% ethanol) is the standard blend. The EPA controls the nation’s biofuel blend standard and is currently being bombarded on this issue. A higher blend rate would obviously create more demand for ethanol, but there are still many groups that are not convinced that ethanol production will not harm the environment or worsen climate change conditions. Environmental groups such as the Clean Air Task Force, Sierra Club, Audubon Society, Friends of the Earth, etc… have lined up to call for the federal biofuel mandates to be phased out altogether, claiming that not only does ethanol destroy the environment, but also that it pollutes the air worse than conventional gasoline (Stanford Study).
Depending upon which feedstock is being used and even which company is operating the distillation process, the greenhouse gas emissions and environmental damage varies. Check out one company’s operations HERE; it all sounds very practical and definitely better than opening up ANWR or the OCS for deep water drilling. As innovations evolve the ethanol industry from first to second generation, these emissions and damage levels lessen to where ethanol becomes a possible solution. This is what many officials in the Obama Administration are currently considering. Steven Chu's primary focus before becoming Energy Secretary was working on biofuels.
Second generation ethanol is not the end of ethanol’s evolutionary train. By 2030, the world will be much closer to commercializing fuel made from algae than they are today. Countless pilot projects are springing up everywhere; closed-loop algae ponds that absorb factory emissions, algae smokestack filters, genetically modified extra-oily algae that releases hydrogen while it grows… this is the next generation of ethanol.
Crop-based ethanol established the infrastructure for cellulosic ethanol and provided a model upon which to build a possible pathway toward energy independence. Cellulosic ethanol may open up the door to algae oil. Perhaps, as innovation sweeps through the ethanol industry and more second generation facilities begin operating on a commercial scale, some of the scare tactics being used in the media by reputable organizations will cease because we will finally have real figures to discuss rationally.
To change out all of our automobiles with electric cars will require copious amounts of energy simply to produce them; electric cars are part of the solution, but so are biofuels. The future of America’s energy matrix is a patchwork. Producing ethanol domestically has the potential to not only aid America in achieving energy independence but also, as the industry evolves, to lower current emission levels. The internal combustion engine is here to stay, and biofuels just might allow our global society to finally, collectively, enter rehab for treatment of its petroleum addiction.
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