Increase in ethanol in gasoline

jrb55gh

Although ethanol production from corn impacts the food supply, new research has made strides on producing it from switchgrass and other cellulosic plants. Also producing ethanol from plants is renewable. In other words as long as there is sun light we can make ethanol. Another advantage of ethanol is that it makes less carbon dioxide than petroleum when burned.

I understand that the best energy conversion rate (work out vs btu in) for an internal combustion engine running gasoline is about 28%. For ethanol the best energy conversion rate is about 40%. That means that if an engine is optimized to run ethanol with higher compression, ignition timing and valve timing, it can achieve about the same mpg as an engine tuned for gasoline.