Ah, Ethanol. What Enviro-Marxists and Government love. Drivers not so much. If you visit the chat boards, you'll find everything from cars to motorboats to lawnmowwers suffering engine damage at the hands of Ethanol. Then there's this from Edmunds.com:
"Filling up With E85 in Las Vegas
The Flamingo Stop fuel station offers E85 out of the same nozzle from which gasoline is dispensed. We wondered if unsuspecting motorists have accidentally refueled with E85, intending to get gas. Unlike the diesel nozzle, which is a different size to prevent just such mishaps, the gas/E85 nozzle is one and the same.
Nearby, a man was pumping E85 into a brand-new Chevrolet Avalanche, complete with flex-fuel badges. It was a good opportunity to get some man-on-the-street reactions.
Edmunds.com: How do you like running on E85?
Avalanche Owner: The mileage sucks. On gas I can get 18 (miles per gallon). On E85 I get like 12.
Edmunds.com: Did you buy this truck so you could run on E85?
Avalanche Owner: Yup.
Edmunds.com: But you get worse gas mileage. So why do you do it?
Avalanche Owner: To help the environment.
Footnote: This man didn't seem to fit the profile of an environmentalist, tree-hugger or greenie. He was just a regular guy trying to do something good for the planet. We experienced a small burst of patriotic pride.
The Final Score — Fuel Economy and Cost
After refueling we put the fuel amounts and the prices paid into a spreadsheet and compiled a clear, side-by-side comparison for both fuel consumption and cost. Remember, these results apply only to this vehicle and to the prices in effect during our 667-mile test.
Gas Result: From San Diego to Las Vegas and back, we used 36.5 gallons of regular gasoline and achieved an average fuel economy of 18.3 mpg.
Gas Cost: We spent $124.66 for gasoline for the trip. The average pump price was $3.42 per gallon.
E85 Result: From San Diego to Las Vegas and back we used 50 gallons of E85 and achieved an average fuel economy of 13.5 mpg.
E85 Cost: We spent $154.29 on E85 for the trip. The average pump price was $3.09 per gallon
Gas/E85 difference:The fuel economy of our Tahoe on E85, under these conditions, was 26.5 percent worse than it was when running on gas.
A motorist, filling up and comparing the prices of regular gas and E85, might see the price advantage of E85 (in our case 33 cents or 9.7 percent less) as a bargain. However, since fuel economy is significantly reduced, the net effect is that a person choosing to run their flex-fuel vehicle on E85 on a trip like ours will spend 22.8 percent more to drive the same distance. For us, the E85 trip was about $30 more expensive — about 22.9 cents per mile on E85 versus 18.7 cents per mile with gasoline."
Not a good bargain, is it peeps? The effects on the economy are widespread. From Common Sense Logic:
"I believe that we are at a pivotal point in the country and the decision to use Corn Ethanol as an alternative fuel was wrong and is creating a problem worse than the original one. If we had not gone down the Corn Ethanol road, and expanded oil discovery and drilling in our own country, the cost of gas and food would be lower and the dollar would be much stronger. We would not be in this decaying economic mess that we are in now.
Instead as it stands now:
The dollar continues to decline.
The price of gas and food keeps going up.
Congressional committees continue to hoodwink the American people by putting “Big Oil” executives on display in the hot seat when it suits them politically or financially.
There are no new refineries being built.
There is no drilling in ANWR or off our coasts.
Will America wake up before a corrupt Congress destroys this once Great Nation?"
I sincerely hope so, The first step is to trow out Democrats in November. Then start making he push to kill the subsidies and ohter entitlements to get the economy moving again.
Background Reading:
Common Sense Logic: The Real Cost Of Corn Ethanol
Edmunds.com: E85 vs. Gasoline Comparison Test
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