More about bioethanol

When Henry Ford first designed his Model T he intended it to run on ethanol derived from corn. It was only later that the economics of producing petrol from oil made it a more attractive proposition. Nowadays with the price of crude oil around $70 a barrel, increasing concern for the environment, and the very real possibility that exploitable oil reserves will come to an end, bioethanol is back on the menu. In fact, you may already be filling your car with a petrol/bioethanol mix without even knowing it.

What is bioethanol?

Ethanol is alcohol produced by the fermentation of sugars, and bioethanol is the form that uses naturally occurring feedstocks such as wheat, sugar cane and sugar beet. Bioethanol can be derived from the sugar in sugar cane or sugar beet, or from the starch in crops such as wheat, barley, maize and oats. It can also be derived from cellulose, grass or even waste materials, but the technology to do this on an economic scale does not yet exist.

Why bioethanol?

At the present time 28% of CO 2 emissions in this country come from road transport, and the government is committed to reducing these emissions by 20% by the year 2010. Recent research carried out the Central Science Laboratory on behalf of Home Grown Cereals Authority (HGCA) showed that:

‘Compared to fossil-derived petrol, bioethanol from wheat has the potential to reduce energy inputs by 61% and total greenhouse gas emissions by 65% for each MJ of energy created.' 1

The current situation

Although some retailers are currently including up to 5% imported bioethanol in the petrol available at the pumps, it accounts for a very small percentage of all the transport fuel sold in this country. Furthermore there is no guarantee that imported bioethanol will give the kind of carbon savings predicted for that produced from UK wheat.

Bioethanol has become an economic proposition partly because of the 20 pence per litre discount on duty available from the Government. This was introduced in January 2005, and there is a current commitment to continue until 2008/9.

In November 2005 the Government announced that it would introduce a Renewable Transport Fuels Obligation (RTFO), and details of this were included in the 2006 Budget announcement. The RTFO will start in April 2008, by which time Green Spirit will be producing bioethanol at its Henstridge plant. An inclusion rate of 2.5% will rise to 3.75% in 2009 and 5% by April 2010.

Driving on bioethanol

You can drive your current petrol car using a blend of up to 5% bioethanol, and not affect the manufacturer's warranty. Flexible Fuel Vehicles (FFVs) that use a blend of up to 85% bioethanol (E85) are in widespread use in the USA , and have been available in Sweden for some years. Green Spirit Fuels is part of a project which has begun to introduce such vehicles into the Somerset and Avon Constabulary and Wessex Water.

You can find out more about bioethanol at sites listed on our links page .

1 An Assessment of the Potential Environment al Impacts Arising from Cultivation of Wheat and Oilseed Rape for Liquid Bio-fuel Production. Central Science Laboratory. January 2005.

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