The feasibility of the ethanol in gasoline engines in America

Introduction:
Ever wonder why your own gasoline vehicle does not get the expected gas mileage of the
manufacturers’ suggestion since the government mandatory implementation of ethanol in the
gasoline?

Here is a direct reply from EPA in response to my inquiry on 08/29/2009:

The ratings are generated using 100% gasoline, which is mandated by the current
Federal Regulations. The ratings are intended to be used as a guide to compare the
different cars with one another, and may not accurately reflect the mileage you get in
the vehicle. According to a report by two National Laboratories, the estimated fuel
economy decline is 3.68% for E10, 5.34% for E15, and 7.71% for E20
http://feerc.ornl.gov/publications/Int_blends_Rpt1_Updated.pdf . I do not know if E20
will be covered by your warranty. That is a question that only a manufacturer/dealer
could answer.

Currently, the gasoline mixture dispensed from the gas stations must contain up to 10% ethanol
in volume as a result of the Energy Independence and Security Act of 2007. In many countries
throughout the globe, ethanol blend in the gasoline are currently being implemented in hope to
reduce CO2 emission and to reduce cruel oil dependency.

Boundary conditions in analyzing the feasibility of the ethanol blend in gasoline can vary quite a
bit among government agencies, private sectors, political lobbyists, environmental groups, and
individual researchers. In many EPA, DOE, and DOA[A] papers, it is not clear that the fuel
economy decline of ethanol blend is being taking into account in providing the justifications of
implementing the current E10 regulation. Furthermore, the successes of other countries used in
comparisons (justifications) utilizing ethanol blend have different driving habits, physical miles
traveled, sizes and type of vehicle, and not the least, the vehicle density (car per individual).

It is sensible to revisit the further explore the following topics in regards to mandate ethanol in
the United States:

 Cost of ethanol blend E10, E15, E20, and up to E85 with EPA estimated fuel economy
decline compares to 100% gasoline in US.
 Driving habits, miles traveled, car density, sizes and types of vehicle, and regulations in
other countries.

It is prudent to reduce pollutions and cruel dependency anyway possible including mandating
ethanol in the gasoline. Perhaps other considerations can be also mandated in conjunction with
ethanol mix to boost the intended results.

Note [A]: EPA = Environmental Protection Agency; DOE = Department of Energy; DOA = Department of Agriculture.
Cost of Ethanol blend at the consumer level:

EPA estimates an average fuel consumption of 20.3 miles/gallon over passenger vehicles and
light trucks at a rate of 12,000 miles/year/vehicle. At the current gasoline price and based on
EPA’s estimates, the following cost can be formulated:

Current Gasoline Price  $/gal  3.6  dollars 

Annual travel millage  12000  miles 
EPA Fuel  Economy   20.3  mpg 

Ethanol Blend  EPA     Adjusted Fuel  Annual Adjusted  Fuel  Dollars/year 

      Adjustment  Economy (mpg)  Fuel Consumption  Cost  Increase 
E0     0     20.30     591.13     2128.08 n/a 
E10     3.68     19.55     613.72     2209.38 81.31 
E15     5.34     19.22     624.48     2248.13 120.05 
E20     7.71     18.73     640.52     2305.86 177.78 

Keep in mind the price at the gas pump will continue to rise in coming years and the EPA
estimate fuel economy decline is under estimating. Based on my personal experience over two
vehicles, I found the current E10 blend suffers around 7% lost in mileage on highway travel.

Utilizing E10 blend has an increase in annual cost of $82 dollars for an average Joe/Jane seems
to be a small price to pay for the goodness of the environment and for promoting the utilizing of
corn farming to produce ethanol. However, to push forward to E15 and E20 blends, majority of
the vehicle fleet in the US faces challenges in utilizing the these ecomixes.

End Use Challenges[3]:

 Ethanol as E85 can only be used in newer design of Flex Fuel Vehicles
 Approximately only 8 millions vehicle on the road in US.
 Approximately 2000 E85 pumps exist in US.

 E10 is the maximum allowable limit in gasoline for majority of the older vehicle fleet
 Can be served to all estimated 240 million vehicles in US
 About 150,000 gasoline pumps across the country.

 The excessive water content in E15 and E20 can severely damage the engines of older
vehicles, meaning the remaining 232 millions (240 - 8 = 232) will continue to utilize the
maximum allowable E10 limit until they’re being replaced. Conventional gasoline
vehicles can safely run on E0~E10 mixes without suffering long term damage in existing
engine parts, fuel delivery system, and fuel tank[4].
 Upgrade Requirement for vehicle to utilize higher ethanol blend fuel

With older vehicle fleet in the US, utilizing the E15, E20, or up to E85 is off the limit.
Individual wish to be kind to the environment while maintaining the freedom of driving should
replace the current older vehicle and upgrade to a newer design FFV car. Assuming the FFV
utilizes the maximum efficient blend of E85 mix suffering a 30% loss in fuel economy[5], the
driving cost to an individual consumer making the switch can be estimate as follow:

Current Gasoline Price  $/gal  3.6  dollars 

Annual travel millage  12000  miles 
EPA Fuel  Economy     20.3  mpg 

Ethanol Blend  Mileage decline  Adjusted Fuel  Annual Adjusted  Fuel  Dollars/year 

      Adjustment (%)  Economy (mpg)  Fuel Consumption  Cost  Increase 
E85     30     14.21     844.48     3040.11 912.03 

New Car Cost $28400 over 120,000 miles (10 
years)  
without inflation and maintainece adjustment  2840 
(Federal Trade Commission, Facts for Consumer) 
Total  3752.03 
The implementation of E85 will also involve in upgrading the current fuel pumping equipment,
storage, and delivery system to overcome low viscosity issues in cold temperature due to lower
vapor pressure in ethanol fuel.

Superficially, it appears that for around $4,000 per year a consumer can operate a vehicle
utilizing ethanol mix fuel to reduce the carbon footprint going forward. However, one must
consider the carbon footprint to produce the new car, upgrading the gas station pumps and
storage tanks across the country, and the current production of ethanol from corn farming. The
carbon emission decline in driving an ethanol blend capable vehicle seems minuscule compares
to the carbon footprint of implementing the concept across the country. Median income per
household is around $49,777.00 before taxes[6]; if one household has one E85 compatible vehicle
then 10% of the income can be expected to contribute toward the effort.

Geographic and social factors in implementing ethanol blend fuel:

Brazil has the most successful structure in utilizing ethanol fuel for internal combustion engines.
In addition to the ethanol mandate at earlier period and more efficient production from sugar
cane, few facts may indicate some important characteristics to reach far advanced applications.

   United States  Brazil 
Population  313232044  203429773
Area (sq km)  9826675  8459417 
        
Road Distance(km)  6506204  1751868 
Totol Vehicles  240000000  31740000 
Road Distance/Area (road density)  0.6621  0.2071 
        
Vehicle per Capita  0.7662  0.1560 

Total Vehicles[8]
Vehicle Per Capita and Road Density: calculated values
All other itmes[7]

Higher value in “vehicle per capita” indicates that more consumers are able to drive a vehicle
and higher value in “road density” indicates that there are more roads for vehicles to drive on.
Both higher values for US suggest that they trigger longer travel distance per vehicle and higher
usage of vehicle per person. In US, there are 3.2 times more road distance to travel per square
kilometer than Brazil. And there is 4.9 times more likely for a consumer to operate a vehicle in
US compare to Brazil.

The road density is an important geographic feature suggesting the conveniences for vehicular
travel and a good indication of population to converge or disperse. When the available roads is
less in the case of lower road density value, it is likely to be less convenience to travel and
encourages the population to congregate in the same area in order to interact with each other
more easily. In larger cities in Brazil, it is evident that majority of them are more densely
populated per area compare to major US cities. The open roads also encourage and allow the
population to disperse to larger areas where accessible by roads. The availability of open roads
fuels by more vehicles available to consumers, driving is inevitable to fulfill the functionality of
daily life over time.

2,964,694 millions of vehicle miles were traveled in 2009[8] in US. The travel distance in Brazil
is not available but an assumption can probably be made to be in direct proportion of the road
density. The cost to implement E85 can be evaluated as follow:

   United States  Brazil  Germany 

Highway/Area (road density)[7]  0.662096182  0.207090867  1.805 
Vehicle miles traveled (millions)  2964694  927299  327950[10] 
Fuel Economy (mpg)  20.3  20.3  20.3 
Mileage decline adjustment (%)  30  30  30 
Average Annual Travel (miles)  12000  3753  7749[10] 
Fuel Cost (dollars/gal)  3.6  4.5[11]  5.57 
Fuel Required (gallons)  844.5  264.1  545.3 
Fuel Cost (dollars/year) E85  3040  1189  3037 
           

927299: interpreted miles using US/Brazil road density ratio.

20.3 mpg: in Brazil and Germany, samller  and lighter vehicles are typically driven, so the fuel economy 
can be much better 
 
The average fuel economy of vehicles in Brazil and Germany should be much better than the number 
utilized in above calculations.  Typically the vehicles are much smaller and lighter in Brazil and Germany 
in resulting a better fuel economy.  With the assumed 20.3 mpg for Brazil, the fuel cost increases is 
much less than US scenario due to less driving.  The above exercise may not reflect an accurate 
interpretation in Brazil, but it demonstrates that with less road to drive and less vehicle available to 
consumers can result in much less increase in fuel cost along when mandating the ethanol blend fuel to 
a particular society.  In Germany, the higher fuel cost, road density, and vehicle per capita resulted the 
same costs to the consumers compares to US although less miles were driven.  With these simple driving 
statistics, the E85 fuel cost for consumers does not appear to be governed by a specific calculated index 
value or recorded data numbers.  Each country should evaluate the E85 implementation individually 
instead of relying the successful scenario of other countries. 
Conclusion

In order to implement ethanol blend exceeding 10% (E10) in volume for U.S., 231 millions of
older vehicles must be replaced or heavily modified. 231 million vehicles accounts for 96% of
the gasoline vehicles on the road.
In respect to gasoline consumption, 9,034,000 bbls/day of gasoline was reported in 2010[3]. For
demonstration of the magnitude, the total gasoline consumed can be calculated as:

9034000 365 42 138.5 10 /

Roughly only 10% by volume can be replaced by ethanol in current US vehicle fleet composition.
However, higher taxes on consumer vehicles for larger and heavier ones plus higher fuel taxes as
implemented in Asia and EU regions can quickly encourage the replacement of aging fleet with
ones with higher ethanol tolerances and better fuel economy. With the expected similar
vehicular travel behavior in the coming years, relying on E10 will only cut the gasoline demand
by around 10% each year. But replacing a vehicle with 30 mpg to the current average 20.3 mpg
will have a more dramatic impact of 33% gasoline consumption.

A mandate in higher taxes in larger and havier vehicles plus higher fuel taxes can contribute to
the following:

 Taxes collected can be reimbursed back to consumers to offset the cost in acquiring
ethanol tolerant and better fuel economy vehicles through the life of them. The
reimbursed amount can be proportioned to the fuel economy and engine size of the
particular vehicle.

 The higher taxes can alter the social travel behavior by utilizing more public and
active transportation.

 It can also reshape the community structure by congregating more population living
in one central area to cut down the vehicular travel requirement as seen in Asia and
EU regions.

Personally I dislike taxes and regulations as much as every individual working hard to earn a
living. However, it would be inconsiderate to ignore the pollution issues and upcoming energy
shortage reality. Humans are social animals and need to work together in solving problems to
survive as a whole community. We must realize that there is a “no pain no gain: Jane Fonda,
1982” reality. And also: “The right decision is not always popular and the popular decision is
not always right.”
 References

1. Fuel Economy and Emmisions of the Ethanol-optimized Saab 9-5 Biopower, 2007-01-
3994, SAE Technical Paper Series.

2. http://green.autoblog.com/2010/01/04/report-number-of-cars-in-the-u-s-dropped-by-four-
million-in-20/, web article.

3. CBES Forum – 3/18/2010, Managed by UT-Battelle for the Department of Energy.

4. Powertrain Component Inspection from Mid-Level Blends Vehicle Aging Study, Nov., 2010,
Oak Ridge National Laboratory.

5. Summary of the March 2010 Forum, Center for BioEnergy Sustainability (CEBS)

6. Current Population Survey, 2010, US Census Bureau.

7. The World Factbook, updated March, 2011, CIA website.

8. Traffic Volumn Trends – February 2010, US DOT/FHA.

9. Table 3-2. Number of U.S. Vehicles, Vessels, and Other Conveyances: 1980-2008, Freight
Facts and Figures 2010, USDOT/FHA.

10. Annual Automobile Vehicle Miles of Travel (VMT) per capita and number of
Automobiles per Capita 1997, Modified April 4, 2011, Office of Highway Policy
Information, USDOT/FHA.

11. Soybean and Corn Advisor, March 14, 2011.

12. Short Term Energy Outlook, March 2011, U.S. Energy Information Administration.