11/28, 2007 Alcohol Can Be A Gas Part 2

Alcohol Can Be A Gas Part 2. I'm Greg Martin with today's Line On Agriculture. Way back when automobiles were first being produced, alcohol was the fuel of choice. It was clean and green before we ever thought about such things. Then Prohibition caused alcohol to be an illegal commodity and that's when the fossil fuel gasoline took its place. But according to David Blume, author of Alcohol Can Be A Gas, alcohol is really a superior fuel in a lot of ways. BLUME: But in terms of what does for your engine, alcohol triples engine life so it kind makes the warranty immaterial. And the way it does that is that alcohol burns at about 300 degrees cooler than gasoline when you measure exhaust temperature so that's way less stress on all the metal of your engine. That is a major factor on the wear and tear of your engine but Blume says that's not all. BLUME: The other thing about alcohol is that it burns so clean, so pollution free, which is great for the environment, but what it means to the inside of your car is no carbon ever builds up on the inside of the cylinders or in your oil. So I've torn down engines after a half a million miles running on alcohol and I can still see 60% of the hone marks on the inside of the cylinder that were there when they put the engine together. Alcohol can be distilled from many different bio materials and even though corn has traditionally been used, many other materials like mesquite produce more alcohol. In his book, Blume describes in detail how to build your own still for the producing fuel grade alcohol and how to convert your family vehicle to run on alcohol. BLUME: You can convert most any post 1985 vehicle to alcohol for less than $300 and sometimes for as little as $50. But the cars that we have are actually smart enough to run at least 50% alcohol without making any changes what-so-ever and this is something that most people don't know. But in the Midwest where there are over a thousand alcohol stations, people are mixing alcohol and gasoline at the pump because the alcohol is 75 or 80 cents cheaper than gasoline. Blume will be the guest lecture at this years Western States Biofuels Associations Summit December 5th through the 7th in Pasco, Washington. He says it's important that we the people act to get the attention of the administration. BLUME: I think what we need to see is entrepreneurial farmers and others out there producing alcohol, making a profit doing it and that is the most convincing argument. Eventually the government will catch up to us but I really think it's up to us to do the job and it's up to American farmers to save this country from peak oil. For more information about alcohol, visit alcoholcanbeagas.com. That's today's Line On Agriculture. I'm Greg Martin on the Northwest Ag Information Network.