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ENVIROLENE®
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Ethanol
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| Feedstocks |
Any gaseous, solid or liquid carbonaceous materials | Cultivated seed (food) crops |
| Cost of production | Under $1 per gallon, profitable without government subsidies | Greater than $1 per gallon, must have government subsidies to at least break even |
| Quantity for production | Unlimited volumes using diverse feedstocks | Determined by agri-produced feedstock sources |
| Time for production | 24×7 continuous process using existing thermal technology processes | 4 to 7 day batch fermentation utilizing acidic enzymes, genetically-engineered biobugs or yeasts |
| Transport considerations | Uses existing fuel infrastructure including pipelines where ENVIROLENE® can be mixed with crude oil or refined derivatives | Separate tanker shipments between distillery, refinery or blending ports |
| Blending characteristics | Midrange 4.61 RVP, closer to gasoline which is 7.8 to 9.4 RVP | Lower 2.0 RVP |
| BTU value | 90,400 BTUs per gallon | 75,500 BTUs per gallon |
| Octane value | 138 | 107 |
| Oxygen content | 34% | 33% |
| Biodegradable | yes | yes |
| Emissions/CO | 37-69% reductions | 13-33% reductions |
| Emissions/VOC | 18% reduction | 5% reduction |
| Global applications | yes, anywhere | site specific to agricultural regions |
| Commercial scalability | yes – unlimited | limited by feedstock availability |
| Mfg. Byproducts |
Co-generated electricity, distilled water, inert slags when solids are gasified | CO2 fermentative emissions, Distillers Grains sold as animal feed |
| Miles per gallon when blended with gasoline | Increases mileage, increases engine torque because of increased combustion efficiencies |
Typically slightly reduced mileage |
| Considerations when blending with diesel | Blends into Diesel from 5% to 10% by volume. Eliminates black sooty exhaust. Can provide 20+% greater fuel economy in a non-adjusted diesel engine. No phase separation in cold conditions. | Ethanol hasn’t been utilized for blending with petroleum-derived diesel fuel because Ethanol has lower RVP and BTU values and may phase separate in cold conditions. |
| Considerations in cold weather | Stays blended into petroleum fuels without phase separation. As a neat, substitute fuel, ENVIROLENE® would integrate about 5% gasoline volume for increased vapor pressure for cold starts. ENVIROLENE®-95 vs: E-85 | As a neat fuel, ethanol has cold start problems with only 2.0 RVP of vapor pressure. Ethanol/gasoline blends work better with fuel injection systems versus carburetors. |
 Synthetic gasoline? Syndiesel from coal? Oil-based fuels from algae, grasses or waste grease? Single alcohols like ethanol? What about higher mixed alcohol fuels?
Which fuel is the best and why? |
ENVIROLENE® Compared to Ethanol1 comment to ENVIROLENE® versus Ethanol |
 
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I remember years ago a business calling themselves Syntroleum devised a process based on the fundamental idea of gasifying coal, natural gas, biomass, etc. to produce a carbon monoxide-hydrogen mixture, and then running said mixture over a catalyst to produce synthetic “white petroleum” (hence the name Syntroleum) which made a good feedstock for producing jet and Diesel fuels. For spark-ignited engines, your proposed mixture of alcohols may well be just what we in the Southeast Michigan automotive engineering community have been looking for: Reasonably high energy content AND high octane rating without tetraethyl lead or anything else objectionable.
Syntroleum advocated their process as a means of monetarizing natural gas in remote locations. Your process has the same possibility.
I wrote a letter which was published in the Society of Automotive Engineers monthly magazine somewhere in late 2006. You might want to look it up.