Propolusion Choice of the future

[Aaron Clinton 2,372]

I was thinking about this recently with all the increasing pressure on raising MPG and emission requirements. Personally, my vote for me in my life time, would be turbo diesel. It seems to be the most natural way for now, no BS complaints about the infrastructure, similar performance to gas motors, and proven durability.

Was just curious as to what our other car nuts on here are thinking. Hydrogen has serious potential, and no waste product. BMW is proving some stellar performance with their's. Toyota has done very good work with Hybrids, but the system is still $$$. GM is getting credit for making their Tahoe get 20mpg with their hybrid system, all the while a standard MB ML350 is getting better mileage and is a better truck.

[Adrian_D 520]

I'm with you on the turbo diesels. Good performance and decent fuel consumption compared to petrol. Lots of cars sold in western europe are diesels.

Hydrogen sounds like a nice option too but refuelling would be a bit tricky for a few years.

[ddeitz 0]

i like good old gas myself

[///M5 2,833]

Europe is so far ahead of us right now. Electric/Hybrids are stupid. Diesels FTW

[onebadmonte 235]

Unfortunately, diesel doesn't alleviate our dependence on foreign oil. The real limiting factor on alternatives is how to a/c the thing.

[Big E 4]

Building a Toyota Prius causes more environmental damage than a Hummer that is on the road for three times longer than a Prius. As already noted, the Prius is partly driven by a battery which contains nickel. The nickel is mined and smelted at a plant in Sudbury, Ontario. This plant has caused so much environmental damage to the surrounding environment that NASA has used the

[Aaron Clinton 2,372]

Wow, nice article.

[johnecon2001 82]

Diesels do nothing to help out environment nor rid us of dependence on fossil fuel.

Hydrogen or vegetable oil are the way to go. I lean more towards vegetable oil since it's a renewable source.

[Big E 4]

Diesels do nothing to help out environment nor rid us of dependence on fossil fuel.

Hydrogen or vegetable oil are the way to go. I lean more towards vegetable oil since it's a renewable source.

While this is true, diesel would help to relieve some of the dependence, as diesel does not need to be refined as much, so there is not as much waste. Turbo diesels are also known to get 35 MPG+ when used in passenger vehicles, which again would help to alleviate some of the dependency while we search for a more permanent solution.

I have seen things about using vegetable oil/old frying grease for fuel...guess what kind of engines those get put into: diesels.

[Lord Baccus 1]

diesel cost more than Gas...

i want 1 that runs on water or air...

[johnecon2001 82]

Diesels do nothing to help out environment nor rid us of dependence on fossil fuel.

Hydrogen or vegetable oil are the way to go. I lean more towards vegetable oil since it's a renewable source.

While this is true, diesel would help to relieve some of the dependence, as diesel does not need to be refined as much, so there is not as much waste. Turbo diesels are also known to get 35 MPG+ when used in passenger vehicles, which again would help to alleviate some of the dependency while we search for a more permanent solution.

I have seen things about using vegetable oil/old frying grease for fuel...guess what kind of engines those get put into: diesels.

Oh, I know veggie oil goes into diesels. I was just stating that the diesel fuel itself was not the way to go vs veggie.

[JimJ 11]

Europe is so far ahead of us right now. Electric/Hybrids are stupid. Diesels FTW

A pure EV can be useful for something. Take someone who's just driving around town or commuting a short distance every day. An under-50 mile round trip can easily be done in an EV, and could be charged by a renewable source to offset the waste in the power grid. The biggest problem right now is the lifespan of the batteries, but that'll improve...right now, even heavy SLA's will last longer than most people keep their cars

Ultimately, I think veggie oil/other biologically derived fuels are going to be the future. Actually, it seems like this is one time where America's gluttonous habits could come in handy - the fast food industry is a huge producer of exactly the fuel we need

[ramos 2]

I think Brazil is headed in the right direction

[JimJ 11]

They're kicking our ass in both sugar and oranges

[Tirefryr 1,742]

I'm just going to give my opinion on the vehicle as I could debate this subject and all the political bullshit that goes along with it for ever.

Hydrogen is the only way to go. End of discussion.

Let's not be like the generations before us and not worry because we won't be around to suffer the consequences of our actions.

And somebody needs to blow China off the damn map.

[Big E 4]

diesel cost more than Gas...

i want 1 that runs on water or air...

It only costs more because they are refining less of it. If everything switched over to diesel, prices would go down on it. (not to mention we could use those other sources as well).

[///M5 2,833]

diesel cost more than Gas...

i want 1 that runs on water or air...

It only costs more because they are refining less of it. If everything switched over to diesel, prices would go down on it. (not to mention we could use those other sources as well).

Again, cheaper in Europe. Stupid American subsidies ftl.

Oh, and nuke China!

[Aaron Clinton 2,372]

I had initially mentioned a harsh statement about China and how they are out of control and there is little regulation on their pollution or waste or consumption. Their sheer population, if converted to auto addicts like we are, could cause near Al Gore inflated levels of damage. (you know, the line graph where he gets in the lift)

anyway, I agree with Ryan on Hydrogen about being the best way. But it would be fun to get and old MB diesel and hit up all the fast food places for cheap fuel.

[dem beats 1,223]

Hydrogen.

One guy even found a stellar way to make salt water turn into fuel through microwaves. Forever we have known you could seperate hydrogen and oxygen from salt water by running current though it, but when you don't need current. yeah. Cars running on water... only combustable would be from the hydrogen stored in the fuel rails and such. It would need some way to filter and get rid of the salt... but that isn't really that big of an issue for enginears we have today.

Something funny though. One of the strongest green house gasses is water vapor, and that being the ONLY emmision really from a hydrogen powered vehicle... well... hehehe. No one will care about the ozone when it's 120 and 99.9999% humid.

BIo deisel is one of the best things to happen as it is a great gateway to thinking more eco friendly, but really it produces more methane than normal gass.

I get really really tired of the politicing when it comes to the fuel crisis. I don't even beleive there is some impending crisis. we aren't even pumping our own oil here in the US the way we could. Deisel is a dang by product of the petrol manufacturing process, it's completely retarded and brain dead that we over charge for the refinement of what would otherwise be waste.

[mrray13 30]

i think alcohol is the immediate future. very renewable, not hard to refine and can be used in both diesel and standard combustion motors. e85 in gas motors and e100 in diesel is already available and with technology being what it is, IME, one doesn't notice a difference with it in the tank. adn the fact that one can homebrew the diesel version, and typically get the used oil for free, why wouldn't it be the future?

wheeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee

[JimJ 11]

I don't even beleive there is some impending crisis. we aren't even pumping our own oil here in the US the way we could.

True, but just because we can, does it mean we should?

I guess it depends on the technology, I'd be all for more offshore wind farms that some people are opposed to, but drilling in national wildlife refuges is a little meh...

The crisis is that the old business model is basically holding us hostage to a corporate system that's going to keep charging and charging us. If large amounts of people broke off from that, we'd have some very interesting results...

This isn't related to vehicles per say, but the cost of energy in general is making a lot of renewables suddenly very affordable. The last time I was at my folks' place, we spec'ed out a recirculating solar hot water system, at current propane rates ($3.50/gal) it'd pay for itself in five years. And that's only going to get better.

[Aaron Clinton 2,372]

I wish I could turn my house into geothermal.

[sqguy 0]

I think today the diesel is the way to go. Europe is looking at diesel hybrids that get over 50mpg the current ones get while the idiots here outlaw diesels and give us expensive gas hybrids everyone else laughs at. A diesel will use 1/3 less fuel over its entire lifespan, how can one say that does not help? Autoweek did a road run and the VW got better mpg than the eco car, what a joke.

Ethanol seems to hold promise, but we need a way to grow and process it properly and corn is not the way. Yet the liberal media turns around and makes a big joke out of Bush saying we should grow switch grass....those liberal tree hugging pos, when it can provide more ethanol per acre than sugar cane and way, way more than corn while it will grow better in our climate. You can't grow enough corn here for our gas needs, so what are you going to eat then?

Just goes to show you what f worthless two faced kinds of people run the media and the government. The government wants it this way, and that is why I will be voting against anyone in there. Here people complain about the 100 billion a year going into Iraq, yet it is fine when the government pukes out 30 billion of our money in one weekend to bail out some broker firm....one that likely runs up oil futures in its trading fun. Thanks but no thanks. I have stuff to do, I hardly drive anywhere maybe one trip a week aside from work. Driving around is like tossing money out the window every mile, at least if I buy something for my house/etc then I have it sitting here. It must suck for kids, when I was young I lived in my car was always going someplace.

There are many other points, like why did the government gut CAFE...take big SUVs off it years ago. Everyone knew gas would go up again like in the 80s and it is government's job to figure that in. Why do they outlaw diesels? Why not do anything about the current situation in supply, demand, or trading? Pelosi said she would cut gas prices and not let oil run free like the republicans....yeah right it has been a year plus and gas is more than ever and the only idea she had was to tax them! LOL, and who might pay that tax? Certainly not the oil co get real, it would be you and me just like the taxes already on it. Idiocy pure and simple, so I just figure they do lots of beer and hookers to fill their time since they sure don't work.

[Acidburn 10]

figure I might as well post this here too

Cause Du Jour

Thank you for the thoroughly enjoyable article on E85 in the Jan. '08 issue. You are to be lauded for refraining from the political environmental scaremongering from the far left and the denial from the far right. Biofuels are only the latest cause du jour that our nadless politicians use to appease the enviro-extremists among us and to extract lobbyist funds for their next re-election efforts (I call is criminal bribery). Energy independence from Middle East tyrants comes from only one decisive initiative - drill here at home for our own 20-plus trillion barrels of oil reserves, within and off our shores. Period.

It is well accepted that alcohols as racing fuels are superior to gasoline. So is nitro in any blend, and hydrazine. But none of those fuels is readily available, acceptable, or economically viable as everyday motor fuel. There is only one cheap, available, clean, and powerful liquid at our current state of scientific maturity: gasoline.

I have a flex-fuel vehicle that gets 32 mpg on gas but only 21 mpg on E85. Moreover, it runs poorly until warmed up a bit. Your admission that the Btu content (two-thirds) and volumes (almost double) of alcohol fuels required for the same power output are mostly correct. As for E85 costing $2.80 versus $3.15 for regular gas, that is the result of deep subsidies extracted from all of us taxpayers. Without those subsidies ethanol would retail for around $4.00 per gallon. At two-thirds mpg, that is about $5.25 per gallon. Economical? No to mention that the cost of corn has risen about 350 percent in the last 18 months. Some food prices have doubled, And at this level, plans for new ethanol distilleries are now on hold, with others cutting back production. Today's fat subsidies can't cover the losses at current corn prices. Yet our government still subsidizes sugar, a better biofuel stock.

The by-products of burning gas are known to us all: CO2, CO, water vapor (the most massive greenhouse gas), and NOx. All are currently treated by catalysts to a neraly imperceptible level per mile, reduced to about a hundredth of what my '58 Chevy emitted, and there are about 10 times more cars today. Do the math. Can you say clean air today? Biofuels also produce the same pollutant volumes per pound burned, plus the compound acetaldehyde, a respiratory irritant, a potential carcinogen, and the major contributor to photochemical smog. Here is some research data for you to digest. For the total production cycle to produce a gallon of liquid fuels, it takes 9 to 12 gallons of water to produce a gallon of ethanol, versus 1 to 2 gallons to produce a gallon of gasoline. Ethanol requires 10 to 12 gallons of petroleum crude (or 1 ton of coal) per gallon in the form of fertilizers, pesticides, cultivation, transportation, distribution, and storage controls. Gasoline, on the other hand, comes directly from crude. As for by-products of production, there are 19 gallons of recoverable liquid fuels from a standard 54.5 gallon barrel of crude. We get plastics, fertilizers, pesticides, medicines, and a diverse lubricants spectrum from the remaining 35.5 gallons of petroleum. And the dregs left over we use to pave our roads. In fact, petroleum is nearly 100 percent usable in a wide variety of industries, with little to no waste products. Biofuel production by-products have little value beyond maybe animal feed additives or bulk toxic landfill mass.

Finally, for us humans to supplant all our global liquid fuel needs with biofuels would require the conversion of about 40 percent of the total global arable land area to corn and/or sugar cane, which would not leave enough land to feed humanity. Nor can our planet accept the drawdown of CO2 these plants would absorb in the quantity required. Remember, CO2, is a plant food, not a pollutant that the environmentalists would have you believe. And, at only 320 parts per million in our atmosphere (0.032 percent), the drawdown of this crucial gas would be as, or more, environmentally catastrophic to all life in our closed biosphere as humanity (allegedly) is increasing it too much. This is the "duh factor" of using biofuels as our primary motor fuel.

[QuestionMan 0]

I definately don't think Corn/alcohol is the way to go. To me i see a big problem of a large demand and not enough supply, using more and more of our food sources for transportation. It kind of seems far-out, but i think it could eventually lead to world hunger (not that it isn't already here in some places). Diesel engines using veggie oil ftw.

Edit: My bad, just saw the post above me saying just about the same thing in the last paragraph.

Edited April 16, 2008 by QuestionMan