The Illinois Corn Growers Association (ICGA), US, has unveiled the results of two studies this week that confirm ethanol can grow substantially without affecting the food or feed sectors' supply of corn and that the carbon footprint of ethanol is less than that of gasoline.
The studies' authors, Ross Korves, economic policy analyst at ProExporter Network, and Dr Steffen Mueller, principal research economist at the University of Illinois' Chicago's Energy Resources Center, joined the ICGA at a press conference in Chicago.
"The conclusions of these two scientific studies are historic," said Rob Elliott, vice president of the ICGA.
"Amid the long and sometimes heated debate between ethanol proponents and detractors, these studies indicate that modern ethanol plants have a superior carbon footprint and net energy benefit when compared to gasoline refineries.
"And, the Korves study provides compelling data that ethanol production can grow substantially at no risk to food supplies."
Mueller's study looked at the global warming and land use impact of corn ethanol produced at the Illinois River Energy ethanol plant – which is a modern, natural gas fueled facility - on a full life-cycle basis.
"We found conclusively that the global warming impact of the modern ethanol plant is 40pc lower than that of gasoline.
This is a sizable reduction from numbers currently being used by public agencies and in the public debate," Mueller said.
"The study also documents the significant net energy benefits of ethanol when compared to gasoline.
And, additional opportunities exist to expand that margin even more through technological improvements and on farm changes in corn production that reduce green house gas emissions."
A second study, Meeting US Energy Needs 2016–2030, authored by Korves, examined the technology revolution that could see the average corn yield per acre increase from the 155 bushels today to 289 bushels in the next 20 years.
Korves found that with current technology there would be enough corn to increase production of ethanol to 33 billion gallons by 2030 while still meeting increased future demand of corn for exports and livestock feed.
The two studies were done for the Illinois Corn Growers Association and can be viewed at http://www.ilcorn.org
Jefferson City, MO - The National Ethanol Vehicle Coalition (NEVC), the nation’s primary advocate of the use of E85 and high level blends of ethanol in flexible fuel vehicles, is pleased to announce that the number of E85 stations has now exceeded 1,800. There are currently 1,802 private and public refueling stations across the U.S. The number of facilities have grown 28 percent since October 2007. 
The 2009 HUMMER H2 will be the first HUMMER to utilize GM's E85 FlexPower, with the H3 following later in 2009. The new H2 will be able to run on E85 ethanol, standard gasoline, or any combination of the two fuels. E85 is a cleaner-burning, higher-octane fuel that can help reduce dependency on oil, but may not necessarily achieve the same fuel economy as regular gas.
The ethanol in E85 is an alcohol that can be distilled from a number of sources, including sugar cane, corn, biomass, and waste materials. With increases in the cost of food supplies, there has been increased emphasis on using ethanol sources that do not affect the prices of third-world food commodities.
GM is a leader in developing E85 ethanol made from waste wood collected as part of forest wildfire prevention programs. Waste wood would otherwise be burned and does not affect food prices compared with corn. In the United States, more than 3 million of the 7 million flexible-fuel vehicles on the road are GM cars and trucks.
In addition to the HUMMER H3 becoming E85-capable later in 2009, a four-cylinder turbodiesel engine also is being developed for it.
Source: General Motors
Lebanon, New Hampshire - September 17, 2008
Researchers at Mascoma Corp in Lebanon are on the cutting edge when it comes to ethanol production. The biofuel can be used to power cars with little impact on the environment.
"Photosynthesis begins by removing CO2 from the atmosphere, when you make a fuel, you return the same C02. And also the aspect that as long as the sun is shining, we can 
keep making it," said Lee Lynd, a professor at Dartmouth and co-founder of the Mascoma Corp.
Currently, using corn or sugar cane is the most cost effective way to make ethanol. But some say using corn to make the biofuel is depleting the world's food supply and driving up prices. Trees and other non-edible plants, like grass, can also produce ethanol, but it's more expensive-- until now.
"In many ways it is a dream come true," Lynd said.
Lynd and other researchers Dartmouth's Thayer School of Engineering have discovered a cheaper way to make ethanol from "woody plants" using a genetically modified bacterium. That means cars could eventually be powered by tall pines and other abundant plants.
"If your raw material was three times as expensive as oil that would be a big problem. 
But the fact that the raw material is-- I got to check because the price of oil is changing-- about 20 percent the price of oil, that gives you a lot of room to move in terms of lowering the processing costs," Lynd explained.
But Lynd says that when it comes to cutting emissions, people will still need to drive less or buy cars that get better gas mileage.
"I do not think it is physically possible to replace all the energy we use now, or all the 
energy we can expect to use if you extrapolate current trends, by renewable sources and only pull the supply level. I think you have to pull the demand lever as well," he said.
Lynd says that this is only the first step. More tests need to be done before the product hits the commercial market. But he says that if all goes well, large-scale production could begin in a year's time.
A old technology called gasification is getting a new look from researchers at the U.S. Department of Energy's Ames Laboratory and Iowa State University. By combining gasification with high-tech nanoscale porous catalysts, they hope to create ethanol from a wide range of biomass, including distiller's grain left over from ethanol production, corn stover from the field, grass, wood pulp, animal waste, and garbage.
With the Ethanol debate hinging on clams that; crops are being earmarked for ethanol production and therefore driving market prices, it is important for the ethanol industry to look for other materials for ethanol production.
Gasification is a process that turns carbon-based feedstocks under high temperature and pressure in an oxygen-controlled atmosphere into synthesis gas, or syngas. Syngas is made up primarily of carbon monoxide and hydrogen (more than 85 percent by volume) and smaller quantities of carbon dioxide and methane.
It's basically the same technique that was used to extract the gas from coal that fueled gas light fixtures prior to the advent of the electric light bulb. The advantage of gasification compared to fermentation technologies is that it can be used in a variety of applications, including process heat, electric power generation, and synthesis of commodity chemicals and fuels.
"There was some interest in converting syngas into ethanol during the first oil crisis back in the 70s," said Ames Lab chemist and Chemical and Biological Science Program Director Victor Lin. "The problem was that catalysis technology at that time didn't allow selectivity in the byproducts. They could produce ethanol, but you'd also get methane, aldehydes and a number of other undesirable products."
A catalyst is a material that facilitates and speeds up a chemical reaction without chemically changing the catalyst itself. In studying the chemical reactions in syngas conversion, Lin found that the carbon monoxide molecules that yielded ethanol could be "activated" in the presence of a catalyst with a unique structural feature.
"If we can increase this ‘activated' CO adsorption on the surface of the catalyst, it improves the opportunity for the formation of ethanol molecules," Lin said. "And if we can increase the amount of surface area for the catalyst, we can increase the amount of ethanol produced."
Lin's group looked at using a metal alloy as the catalyst. To increase the surface area, they used nano-scale catalyst particles dispersed widely within the structure of mesoporous nanospheres, tiny sponge-like balls with thousands of channels running through them. The total surface area of these dispersed catalyst nanoparticles is roughly 100 times greater than the surface area you'd get with the same quantity of catalyst material in larger, macro-scale particles.
It is also important to control the chemical makeup of the syngas. Researchers at ISU's Center for Sustainable Environmental Technologies , or CSET, have spent several years developing fluidized bed gasifiers to provide reliable operation and high-quality syngas for applications ranging from replacing natural gas in grain ethanol plants to providing hydrogen for fuel cells.
"Gasification to ethanol has received increasing attention as an attractive approach to reaching the Federal Renewable Fuel Standard of 36 billion gallons of biofuel," said Robert Brown, CSET director.
"The great thing about using syngas to produce ethanol is that it expands the kinds of materials that can be converted into fuels," Lin said. "You can use the waste product from the distilling process or any number of other sources of biomass, such as switchgrass or wood pulp. Basically any carbon-based material can be converted into syngas. And once we have syngas, we can turn that into ethanol."
The research is funded by the DOE's Offices of Basic Energy Sciences and Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy.
SOURCE: Ames Laboratory
V8 Supercar racing needs to lead the way in showing Australian drivers their cars can run just as well on ethanol as conventional petrol, according to one of the sport's most powerful figures. 
There's going to be changes in the energy sources we use. The fact is oil at some point will run out. And we need to be looking at alternatives for the future. Motor racing traditionally has helped people focus on changing and new technologies. Statistics about the use of Ethanol in the USA, and its effect on world oil prices: 
Michelle braces herself. Six months ago, she paid $65 for 50 litres of petrol. Last week, this cost her $87; petrol had climbed to $1.64 per litre – the best price available in her Melbourne suburb. 
The United service station on Victoria Rd at Rozelle (Sydney) became the first in Australia to carry the new E85 blend, which contains just 15 per cent regular petrol. Others, like Shoalhaven Ethanol in Nowra (NSW South Coast), have followed suit.
There has been great interest from motorists as the price is considerably cheaper than regular unleaded petrol.
Since being installed two weeks ago, Mr Rao (in Rozelle) estimates he had sold about 600 litres, compared with 50,000 litres of regular unleaded.
"We may get more people using it [soon] because petrol may go up to $2 a litre," Mr Rao said.
However, Renewable Fuels Australia executive director Bob Gordon warns: "This is a major advance, but it wouldn't be worth the risk of using it without a retro-fit, which you could have done for about $500 to $700.
"However there are components that may need to be adjusted on your vehicle's fuel computer board so it can adjust the air fuel ratio to the higher blend levels."