Home Ethanol Production

Home ethanol production tips.

The words home ethanol production are creating a buzz all of the USA, because of fears of fuel shortages and price increases, plus global warming and pollution, people are getting more interested in home ethanol production. One thing to take into consideration with the production of ethanol, is safety, so it would be a good idea to get as much information as you can before starting. If your intention is to run your car on it you will probably need to check ethanol conversion kits.

Relating to Home Ethanol Production:

Home ethanol production is considered essentially a major deal in the renewable energy debate, and in regards to the issue of homespun ethanol production, there are some facts that should really be known relative to an acre of US corn yielding approximately 7,100 pounds of grain for processing into 328 gallons of ethanol; the energy economics get worse at the processing plants, where the grain is crushed and fermented, as many as three distillation steps are needed in order to separate the 8% ethanol from the 92% water.

When adding up the energy costs of grain production and its following conversion to ethanol, it has been found that 131,000 BTUs are needed in order to be able to make just 1 gallon of ethanol; one gallon of ethanol only has an energy value of 77,000 BTU, which is considered as being clearly not good.

Some possible problems with producing ethanol:

Figures show that corn ethanol costs about $1.74 to produce one gallon, whilst the production costs of a gallon of gasoline is approximately 95 cents, its also possible that the environmental erosion problems are not being brought into the equation. Grain production at today's levels in the US erodes top soil 12 times quicker than it can be reformed and grain that is irrigated uses groundwater 25% quicker than can be naturally replaced.

Therefore, there are so many questions with regards to the production of ethanol and the environment and with regards to life in general, as to whether or not ethanol is the proper choice as renewable energy source; there are actually so many positive factors that stem from it, and yet many negative ones as well, and so this is a matter which is almost certainly going to take some serious time and consideration to accurately figure out.

So the big issue surrounding ethanol and the possible environmental problems are looked at closely by some very intelligent people around the world. So rest assured that they will take all the factors into account, including the impact of home ethanol production.