Ethynol for boats??

With gas over 100.00 per barrel and a heavy push toward ethynol, what about boat owners? Can a standard boat run on ethynol? is there a conversiion kit? What does it entail?

pure ethynol will require a full reprogramming of the ECU, changing of the fuel lines and you'd have to change the oil all the time since it's corresive nature.

Also a engine on gasoline will run a a/f mixture of about 12:1 ideally, but ethynol runs at a mixture of 4:1 a/f.

You may save money on the cost per gallon but you are going to use twice as much.

so what is the next alternative? I have been following this fuel thing and if the u.s. does not do something soon, it is projected to hit 10.00 per gallon within 4 years.

Gas & oil prices will likely fall dramatically over the next few years. To the contrary of popular belief, there is no shortage of oil, nor is their real demand to support $100/barrel of oil. Also wars are not likely to impact supply very much. With the amount of investment in new drilling going on it's likely there will be an oversupply that crushes prices.

Oil will fall just like tech stocks and real estate did.

Point being, don't waste you time with ethanol. Gas prices will come down unless Al Gore has something to do with it.

(Message edited by Antoddio on November 08, 2007)

Didn't Al Gore invent Ethynol?

Ethanol and boats don't mix. My boat specifically says not to use any alcohol mix in the fuel. The reason is that a boat's fuel system is open to the air (unlike a car which has an airtight fuel system). In an open air fuel system, ethanol, which absorbs water, will take water right out of the air and put it in your tank.

Additionally, ethanol serves as a solvent. Over time it can disolve rubber gaskets, fuel lines, etc.

Finally, if your boat has a fiberglass gas tank (found more in older boats and some Boston Whalers), ethanol reacts with some of the resins in the fiberglass creating a sludge that gets sucked into the engine.

Unfortunately for boaters, the EPA requires ethanol in areas with higher amounts of air pollution. In these areas you are stuck with E-10 (10% ethanol/90% gas). To see if you live in one of these areas, click here:

http://www.epa.gov/otaq/rfg/whereyoulive.htm

I live in one of these areas, but I'll drive the 40 miles needed to get to a non-ethanol county to buy good ol' gas. Even in a non RFG county, you must look at the pump carefully to see if it is labeled as 10% ethanol. The use of E-10 is spreading quickly because it has gained political support in Washington. Unfortunately, we boaters come up short on this one.

Some gasoline chains are getting wise to this and market themselves as ethanol-free. Cenex in the Duluth, MN area is an example. They clearly label their pumps as ethanol-free. More gasoline retailers need to follow Cenex's lead.

to the point of the 100.00 per barrel, in case you have not been paying attention we are at 98.00 per barrel as of wed and no plans on slowing down...it is going to get worse...
what are the alternatives? 600.00 weekends just do not cut it.

God I hope you don't see ethanol in boats. The idea that corn-based ethanol such as E85 is a 'green' alternative is one of the greatest deceptions of our time. Gallon for gallon, it takes more to create and transport corn ethanol than it does for regular gasoline. And as Castro correctly points out (and I would never agree with him on anything) by using corn as fuel we are wasting food that could be used to feed the hungry throughout the world, and in America. Problem is, ADM and other companies have such huge lobbying dollars that the US, for now, thinks corn ethanol is a good idea.
If we are going to use ethanol, it would be much more beneficial to use cellulosic ethanol that is ubiquitous in Brazil. But instead we tax the hell out of that and prevent that fuel from gaining any ground in America.
Sorry for the rant; bottom line, don't believe "Big Corn"!

Here's my input: 1st, don't put ethanol in your boat unless it was specifically designed for it. Otherwise, it will destroy it.

2nd, not that I'm preaching for ethanol, far from it, but as an investor in this environmental "movement", I know full well that there is some false information out there. For starters:
> "Gallon for gallon, it takes more to create and transport corn ethanol than it does for regular gasoline."

This statement is no longer true, actually. Technological advancements have made ethanol more productive than it was in the beginning. It no longer has a negative yield, as used to.

> "it would be much more beneficial to use cellulosic ethanol that is ubiquitous in Brazil"

Last time I checked, the technology for cellulosic ethanol was still being developed. As far as I know, it's not there yet, but it has promise. Post a link if you really know otherwise, and didn't just hear a rumor. Brazil is able to produce alot of ethanol because it's climate is conducive to sugar cane, which yields more ethanol than corn, for obvious reasons. This will change when we can ferment more than just the natural sugars in our crops...

Now, for the politics of it. Ethanol only exists as a gasoline replacement because politicians make it that way. They take your tax money and manipulate the markets through subsidies for ethanol production and increased taxes on gasoline consumption in order to make ethanol an economically viable alternative. IMHO, this is just plain vanilla stupid. Let it compete on it's own, and the market will dictate whether or not it will fly... On the other hand, anyone who thinks gasoline is competing on it's own hasn't put much thought into it. As it stands today, it takes our nations military to defend our oil supply chain so that we'll have gas for our cars.. talk about expensive! And then there are the direct subsidies for certain things in big oil production as well.

As for the starving children of the world, I'm not buying that argument. Any farmer will tell you that the US has been paying them NOT TO GROW CROPS forever. We do this so that we have excess capacity and there will never be a food shortage in this country. We also ship off a large portion of our excess food to starving kids around the world, who grow up to be adults who produce more starving kids... and so on and so forth. Is it really our place in the world change the natural order of things this way?

Oil supplies are not unlimited for sure. I am in Alberta and there is a slow down of drilling programs. The drilling for shallow gas short term wells does not seem to keep up with the demand. Right now the US takes the majority of the oil and gas that is produced in Canada. Alberta has recently changed it's royalty program that makes the oil companies pay more money to the government. That being said the price of oil has to stay consistently higher before the oil companies will make the profits that they need. I have worked in the oil and gas industry for most of my career and there is some real speculation out there for the next 5 to 10 years. The bubble will burst again as it has historically.

I read somewhere the the newest theory on oil is that it is continually being produced, at a much higher rate than scientists had previously thought, by a dynamic process going on under the earth's crust.

That would be nice. I would always have a job with no worries about the supplies drying up. I have seen lots of places where companies have drilled wells worth millions and have come up with nothing but dust. But then several years later with the new 3d seismic systems another company will come and drill in the same area and have great results.

Apparently they just discovered a huge new oilfield off the coast of Brazil.

Tim, you're right, ethanol no longer has a negative yield like it did even 2 years ago. What gets me is that so many people who are quick to adopt 'green' alternatives forget that it often requires just as much energy to create that alternative fuel as it does for gas or diesel. In the case of ethanol, the nationwide distribution network is still very limited, and since most corn-ethanol is produced in the midwest, you still need large diesel tankers carting it around the country (as opposed to gasoline, where there are refineries throughout the country). In the case of fuel cells, it requires oil to build and operate the factories that manufacture the batteries, and that the batteries have a very toxic emission in the form of acids that will ultimately need to be disposed of. Then there is Hydrogen fuel, whose emission seems benign enough but people forget that the biggest greenhouse gas is water vapor.

As far as the food argument goes, let's just say for the sake of the unknown, I would rather industry focus on making fuel from the inedible (ie corn stalks and grass) than the actual corn itself. You never know when we'll need to use that as food supplies. I don't advocate growing as much as possible so that we can constantly ship it off to people who become too reliant on it, but from what I've read, the diversion of corn from food to fuel on a large scale would have a negative impact on the cost of corn in the market:
http://www.nytimes.com/cfr/world/20070501faessay_v86n3_runge_senauer.html?_r=1&oref =slogin

Now in regards to the production of cellulosic ethanol, there are areas that currently produce the fuel, albeit on a smaller scale (currently only sugarcane and corn ethanol are produced on an 'industrial scale'). Advances in technology will make it much more viable on a large scale, especially since the densities of this type of ethanol allow for a greater yield compared to corn http://www.energycommission.org/files/finalReport/IV.4.c%20-%20Cellulosic%20Ethanol%20Fact%20Sheet.pdf
http://www.iht.com/articles/ap/2007/10/25/business/LA-FIN-Brazil-Cellulosic-Ethanol.php

I guess I'll just stick with diesel for now...though since you don't see many boats with those engines, I wonder why I'm even advocating this in a boat thread?!

My guess is if gas prices get too high, like $6-8 gallon, somebody will be selling a lot of propane conversion kits for boats. Similar to the ones they currently use for boats in Europe.

someone posted earlier that mastercraft has a diesel option.

heres an interesting fact,
ethanol uses corn one of the worlds leading food sources for all countries. Driving up the world wide cost of corn believe it or not, causing more nations to becomed starved that have already been for the last few hundred years

The fact of the matter is that E-10 can harm boats and boat performance.

Just Google "Boats and Ethanol" and you'll see many (sad) news accounts of the boat problems that are already out there.

If you want to help, write a quick note to your congressman/senator asking that ethanol-free gasoline remain available for marine use.

You'll find Washington is familiar with the issue. In fact, Rep. John Shadegg of Arizona had his boat engine destroyed by E-10.

Write those letters now because there's a move already afoot to take our country to E-20. Presently, Minnesota is considering a mandate requiring the use of E-20 by 2013. (I wonder if ADM and Cargill's fingerprints are on this one.) This would make a bad problem worse for boat owners.

Fortunately, Shadegg is co-sponsoring legislation, along with Rep. Charlie Melancon of Louisiana, to put roadblocks in place to slow or block increases of ethanol concentrations any higher than E-10.

Unfortunately, E-10 is already a problem.

If you like your boat and want it to perform properly into the future, write a letter. Let your state and federal politicians know that ethanol damages marine engines and that you want to maintain the availability of ethanol-free gas for marine use.