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Originally Posted by JSH
Ethanol is a dead end in the USA. We already dedicate 45% of our corn crop to making ethanol and that gets us to a 15% mix in our gasoline. Even if we used the 45% of corn we mostly waste in livestock feed we would only be up to 30% ethanol.
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I'm favorable to ethanol, not only due to the successful experience in my country where most ethanol is made out of sugarcane but also because it can be integrated with livestock feeding instead of competing against it for arable land. Grain recovered from distilleries actually has a better digestibility for cattle than raw corn. And other raw materials, including leftovers from food processing/canning plants can be used as a feedstock for ethanol.
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Natural gas was supposed to be the new green fuel 2 decades ago. Cheap, plentiful in the USA, and lower emissions than gas or diesel. It never got to more than a niche slice of the market even with national natural gas pipelines and NG in most homes and businesses. The problem was cost. Tens of thousands extra for the truck plus hundreds of thousands for fueling stations.
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I'm familiar with the downsides of CNG, not to mention home refuelling was never common in my country. Even though NG pipelines are more common in larger cities nowadays, to the point many people and businesses are switching from bottled LPG to NG for home appliances and other devices, I wouldn't hold my breath for home refuelling to become so common here. But I have seen much more dedicated-CNG and dual-fuel big rigs, and even some buses, in recent years due to the ESG agenda and the carbon credits market. Odd enough, while travelling by train to a neighboring city, I noticed some dedicated-CNG trucks inside a refinery located beside the railway.
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Then there is the simple fact that NG still has both GHG and local emissions. If the goal is zero emission than NG is off the table.
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I don't believe zero emission to be effectively achievable.
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Maybe the goals change but today the only portable fuel that is also potentially emission free is hydrogen
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Not only Hydrogen is much more reactive than other fuels, so it might be even more dangerous to handle, it will still lead to some NOx emissions, unless the engine is supplied with pure OČ instead of atmospheric air which has more Nitrogen than any other element.
In the end, there might be still room even for biodiesel and other heavy fuels in the middle to long term...