Cars and Corn?
I'm sure that by now most people have heard of the new GM E85 cars. These are the new cars that can run on gasoline or a blend of 85% ethanol and 15% gasoline. This ethanol is made from corn. Corn is a renewable resource that is readily available and relativly cheap. These cars are already out and about on America's roadways. They let the consumer choose which type of fuel that they wish to run their cars with. This is a large step towards finding better ways to fuel our cars. There are not many places to fuel cars with the ethanol blend yet but many are in the process of being built.
This new technology shows an absolute advantage against other competitiors in GM's field. These cars use resources that are cheeper than the common way of fueling. The cars also give the consumer a choice of which fuel that they want to use. This is going to push other companies to create more efficent cars. Is this the first step in making cars completely devoid of gasoline? How long before cars do not need gasoline at all?
1 comment:
I just returned from Brazil a week ago and they have a dual fuel system there. When you pull into a gas station you can select either gasoline or alcohol to fill up your engine. A large portion of their cars can handle either fuel. The Brazilians produce their ethanol (alcohol) from their vast sugar cane crop. Producing ethanol from corn is much more expensive than producing it from sugar cane. Thus, the US is at a comparative disadvantage when it comes to producing corn-based ethanol. We could lower ethanol prices in the US if we import Brazilian ethanol. However, the US government tries to protect its corn farmers by placing an import tax of 50 cents per gallon on Brazil's ethanol. Nothing like forcing your competitors to charge higher prices so that you (American corn farmers) can stay afloat!
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