Indy 500 Race Cars Showcase Green Fuels - ScienceDaily

[Bill USA]

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2013/09/130909162025.htm

Indresh Mathur, Ph.D., who gave one of the talks, explained that cars on streets and highways in the U.S. run on a mixture of 90 percent unleaded gasoline and 10 percent ethanol. Race cars in the Indianapolis 500 burn mostly fuel-grade ethanol. This year the Indy 500 switched to a fuel containing 85 percent ethanol as opposed to 100 percent fuel ethanol. This makes the Indy fuel close to the real-life E-85 fuel sold at some U.S. gas stations.

"Even without the catalytic mufflers, there are much lower emissions of air pollutants that can have adverse effects on human health and promote the formation of smog."

Mathur, who is with Johann Haltermann Ltd., in Houston, said those include PAHs -- polycyclic aromatic compounds that exist naturally in the crude oil that becomes gasoline have been largely responsible for particulate matter emissions. The Indy fuel blend of E-85 sets a good example of the use of an alternative fuel use under very demanding engine conditions. It is a fertile ground for engineers to perfect the E-85 vehicle technology that can be leveraged into street vehicles.

Studies have shown that using fuels composed of more than 85 percent ethanol reduce a variety of air pollutants. These include sulfur emissions (80 percent lower), carbon monoxide (40 percent), particulate matter (20 percent), VOCs (15 percent) and nitrogen oxides (10 percent).
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IndyCar Makes Switch to Ethanol - WaPo

The open-wheel Indy cars have run on methanol since the late 1960s. The two fuels share many qualities; both are alcohol-based and have a higher octane rating than unleaded gasoline. But methanol is made from natural gas, a nonrenewable fossil fuel, while ethanol is a renewable fuel made from agricultural products such as corn.

Moreover, there's no performance drop-off with ethanol, according to Simmons, who used the fuel in his racecar last season, as well. Simmons says that [font color="red"]his racecar, powered by a Honda V-8 engine, actually accelerates better with ethanol. It also gets better fuel mileage, which has enabled the Indy Racing League to downsize its cars' fuel cells from 30 gallons to 22 (a 27% reduction in fuels needs or a 27% increase in fuel efficiency_Bill USA).[/font] On a full fuel load, that takes about 50 pounds out of the car's overall weight, which improves performance.

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"My major interest in this is as a national security issue," says Bayh, who earlier this year joined senators Norm Coleman (R-Minn.), Joseph I. Lieberman (I-Conn.) and Ken Salazar (D-Colo.) in introducing bipartisan legislation to reduce the country's dependence on foreign oil by increasing the availability of ethanol and providing tax credits for manufacturers who retool their factories to build hybrid cars, among other measures. "Most people would agree it's better to have American farmers producing our fuel than Middle East sheiks."
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[hunter]

1. I'll be waiting for electric.

Let's start pushing for truly innovative technology.

Ethanol isn't one.

[House of Roberts]

3. It's a start.

Formula One cars will run on electric motors only on pit road this season.

[Bill USA]

4. then you'll be waiting about 20 to 30 yrs to see electrics (hybrids and PHEVs) reach about 20-26% of

..the fleet ... maybe. At about 50% reductions in GHGs (vs gasoline) per car, you would see about a 10% to 13% reduction in Light Transportation GHG emissions. Meanwhile Global Warming will have accelerated beyond the point that we can pull it back. We have to get GHG emissions reductions much faster than that. The National Academy of Sciences published the results of their study (Transitions to Alternative Vehicles and Fuels) that concluded that no single technology would produce GHG emissions fast enough. That means we need renewable fuels as well as continued development of electric cars. Hybrids and PHEVs need to be developed but alone they will not produce large enough reductions fast enough. (http://www.democraticunderground.com/112740715#post5) and ( How to cut U.S. gasoline use in half by 2030).

Actually, I think we have already passed the point where we can hope to restrain GW - without a very serious commitment to renewables (Wind, Solar and renewable fuels for transportation) which it's pretty clear people are not prepared to support. However, we can still work to slow down GW to put off the worst effects ( oceans rising forcing resiting cities like New York, Los Angeles, Philadelphia, Baltimore etc).

As for renewable fuels for transportation, I think making methanol from biomass would be faster and more feasible than expanding ethanol production faster than farmers historical yield improvements (4% per yr) will produce (which is not fast enough). This methanol would enable us (added to the ethanol we currently produce) to more quickly get to renewable fuels being perhaps 20% -25% of our fuel supply . Using known technologies such as the Ethanol enabled Direct Injection engine developed by three MIT scientists which achieves 30% BETTER fuel efficiency than gasoline - which would double the current ethanol GHG reduction figure (66% GHG reduction vs 34% reduction at P50) (based on using ethanol in FFVs NOT Optimized for ethanol use). Beyond that, there is the Ethanol Boosted engine with on-board Methanol reforming system developed by two of the same MIT scientists which they estimate would achieve a 40% to 45% improvement in fuel efficiency - with an even greater increase in GHG reduction.

"The high compression ratio, high degree of turbocharging and aggressive engine downsizing enabled by the high effective octane number of methanol could provide an efficiency gain of 30 –35% (for combined city-highway driving) relative to conventional port fueled gasoline engines. An additional gain of around 10% can be obtained by using reforming of methanol to enable ultra lean operation at low loads. The combination of these gains could thus potentially provide an efficiency gain of 40–45% for direct injection methanol engines."

The marginal cost of the Ethanol Enabled Direct Injection Engine is estimated to be $1,000 - $1,500 - thus you get fuel effiiciency gains comparable to a conventional hybrid at about one fourth the cost. THe cost factor is important if you want rapid adoption - and we do want rapid adoption. THe ethanol enabled engine with on-board methanol reforming has an estimated marginal cost of, I believe, around $2,000 - $2,500. Again, a price that promises more rapid adoption vs hybrids and PHEVs.

A simpler approach of just using turbo-charging or super-charging to take advantage of ethanol's and methanol's higher octane ratings vs gasoline was used by several teams of university engineering students competing in the Ethanol Vehicle Challenge - 1998 (sponsored by the Dept of Energy (?!) ... yes, the same dept of energy that contends we are stuck with miserable mileage with ethanol) can achieve 15% BETTER fuel efficiency than gasoline powered engines. All the teams were given Chevy Malibus to optimize for ethanol use. The three best teams achieved 13% to 15% BETTER fuel efficiency (without downsizing) than the stock Malibus achieved using gasoline. (Ethanol Vehicle Challenge - 1998)

NOte: at 15% better fuel efficiency we would get 77% GREATER GHG reductions than currently estimated for ethanol used in current FFVs which are not optimized for ethanol use.


But of course, none of this will be done - well at least not until people see the ocean driving people out of coastal areas at which point the costs of moving people and re-siting cities will drastically reduce the money available to invest in any renewable technologies. We might be in for another Medieval period where there isn't adequate money to invest in much research of any kind. Won't that be fun?

[hunter]

5. I think personal automobiles are unnecessary.

My wife and I are fortunate, we were able to abandon the commuter lifestyle in the mid 'eighties. Sadly, we still have cars. Mine is thirty years old with a salvage title. I hate that car, it hates me. I'm sure it lives to spite me. Either that or I'm a pretty good shade-tree mechanic. I fill the tank with gasoline about once a month. I hate that too. I resent every second in my life I've spent driving, taking care of, paying for, or even thinking about automobiles.

My utopia is a walkable city with good public transportation. The "freedom" of an automobile is an illusion. How often do people who own cars walk an hour or more beyond a parking place? Without their Drivers License identification? Almost never. They might as well have a license number tattooed on their ass. I don't carry my Driver's License with me. I am who I am. I do have a license, I do have insurance. Treat me nice until it's confirmed. I'm mostly harmless, and sometimes amusing too.

Automobiles are a tool of the fascists or other sorts of authoritarians. I'm not buying that.

[Bill USA]

6. YOu reminded me of two things I forgot to mention, one being major support for public transportation

along with increased support of public transportation there is also ---

efficiency improvements - everywhere.

Efficiency improvements to appliances and residential and commercial construction can save about 1/4 of the total energy we produce today. This is actually the biggest 'bang for the buck' option there is. Unfortunately, it is even less 'sexy' than renewable fuels which many people turn up their noses at as being not techno-futuristic enough.

If you are lucky to live without having to use mechanical means of transportation very much that's cool. I would like to live in a cozy small town or enclave where more distant travel would not be necessary. Although, I must admit, I like the stimulation that can be found in a larger metro area - even though there are drawbacks to such a situation. Alas, I don't think that arrangement is a feasible prescription for many people working for a living - especially in a nation of about 300 million people. Concentration of production facilities and people seems to be an inevitability.

However, if we don't deal with GW, even if only to slow it down (so that, hopefully, some more ambitious technical solutions not yet imagined can be invented), we may become a nation of small, insular communities, operating at a subsistence level. That's not a prediction. IT's very hard to predict what life will be like in a World after major alterations of society caused by the inexorable progression of Global Warming.

[shenmue]

2. This is neat

I like Indy cars.