Alternative Fuels and the Renewable Fuel Standard
In the contemporary world, the environment is becoming constantly polluted with several pollutants that are extremely harmful to human beings and the environment as well. Several of these pollutants emanate from trash that we pile and the emissions from vehicles. As a result of gasoline becoming scarcer, there is a strong push for transportation companies to use alternative fuels that are clean and safe for the environment. Several searches have been put in place to replace the oil industry in as far as alternative fuels are concerned. However, the costs of producing these alternative fuels are not as cheap as producing oil (Newman, 2008). Some of these alternative fuels include; biodiesel,
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Bio-fuels use corn together with other agricultural produce to manufacture ethanol, an important alternative to petroleum-based fuel. Recent reports indicate that the quantity of corn and other agriculture produce are declining leading to the rise in the price of bio-fuel based agriculture. The main controversy that arose with this was the food crisis of 2007 and 2008 (Elam, 2008). Additionally, the increase in oil cost has also contributed a great deal to the upsurge in the costs of industrial agriculture, food transportation, as well as fertilizers. These increases may be attributed to the rise of bio-fuels in third world countries and the demand for various diets across the growing middle class of Asia. All these factors combined with a decline in food stockpiles lead to a global rise in the cost of food (Spencer, 2008). Bio-fuel use increased the price of food since food was being used to produce fuel instead of being consumed by human beings. Consequently, a decrease in the food stockpiles led to an increase in the price of daily …show more content…
In this regard, the interests in alternative sources of fuel are steadily increasing since oil prices are also on the upsurge. It is a fact that the nearly the entire American transport sector depends on oil. Since oil is not renewable, the available oil sources should not be used entirely on transportation. Oil is still being used to supply power in the country and other areas that need oil. Therefore, before oil runs out completely, cars should be made that do not rely on oil (U.S. Department of Energy, Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy, n.d.). These cars will not only assist in the preservation of the depleting oil supply, but they will also help in protecting the environment from pollution from carbon dioxide as well as other harmful emissions. Some of the car companies that are responsible for producing some of these hybrid vehicles are Mazda, Mercury, Lexus, Ford, Chevrolet, Saturn, just to mention but a
McCormick R, Graboski M, Alleman T, and Herring A. (2001). Impact of biodiesel source material and chemical structure on emissions of criteria pollutants from a heavy-duty engine. Environmental Science Technology, 35 (9): pp. 1742-1747.
Biofuels, fuels that provide energy using relatively recent organic sources, have been around just as long as cars have. In fact, the first cars ran on peanut oil. Henry Ford, founder of a multimillion dollar American car company, planned to fuel his massively successful Model T’s with ethanol (National Geographic 2013.) However, this revolutionary idea was swept under the rug when the discovery of massive petroleum deposits kept gasoline and diesel cheap and affordable. As 2014 rolls around, consumers are starting see that the amount of petroleum in the Earth is shrinking and the same story goes for their wallets (Avro 2012.) Not only does burning gas and diesel empty out the wallet, it is also slowly covering the Earth with a warm carbon dioxide blanket that causes global warming. Transportation, which is the third largest emitter of greenhouse gasses (Biofuel Association of Australia 2013), is dependent on finite amounts of gas and diesel for its energy needs so it is very important we move towards a more renewable and sustainable fuel source. Biofuels, both ethanol and biodiesel, have the potential to fuel transportation efficiently and drastically reduce the carbon footprint, thus reducing the warm blanket of carbon dioxide on the Earth.
As stated earlier, the burning of fossil fuels to produce energy is one of the largest contributors to global warming. This non-environmentally friendly energy source has to be replaced in order to keep the world going. There is a type of energy source that seems easy to create and doesn’t require radical changes: Biofuels. Biofuels are a greener version of diesel and oil. They are any solid, liquid, or gas fuels produced from organic matter; the range of organic materials used for biofuel production includes plants such as corn, sugar cane, soy, and wheat; vegetable oils and animal fats; ...
Remember when gasoline vehicles were the newest trend, but now everyone is saying how hybrid vehicles are so much better for the environment than gasoline vehicles, but no one seems to know how they are better for the environment. Now the newest trend is going to be hybrid cars. Gas vehicles are not just going to up and vanish one day, they will always be available to buy. You may have to special order it, but they will still be available to buy in most name brand car manufactures.
Most American cars are not hybrids or fuel-efficient, they are usually big SUV’s or trucks that get eighteen to ten miles per gallon. Most of Hondas, Toyotas, and Hyundai’s get around 20 to 30 miles per gallon, and hybrids get 50 miles per gallon. Peoples demand fuel-efficient cars because oil is i...
The Low-Carbon fuel is good for the environment, species around it, and almost all living organisms. Almost all the oil in the U.S. contains ethanol, which is processe...
With a gasoline-fueled vehicle, buying gas to operate your car is a never-ending process. With the high price change of gasoline and oil, operating a gasoline-fueled vehicle tends to be very costly. While there are some types of small gasoline vehicles that get much better gas mileage than larger vehicles, even the most powerful gasoline cars will normally desire a contribution every month. According to some experts the only way a mainstream market for green vehicles wills materlize is with a pronounced and prolonged rise in fuel prices. (Buss, 4)
Hybrid vehicles, which are environmentally friendly vehicles, which will replace fossil fueled car in the future but they currently have a limited range and long fueling time. As fossil fuel resources start to become limited and non-environmentally friendly, car manufacturers are looking to find ways to make hybrid vehicles the future of transportation. Hybrid vehicles are beneficial since they are efficient, reduce pollution, and cut global emission than the current hybrids models. As such, hybrid-electric vehicles can have substantial public benefits for both the environment and for energy security. Hybrid vehicles can help reduce smog pollution by ninety percent or more in comparison to the cleanest conventional vehicles today. Hybrids
There has been many new technologies that are surfacing into our generation. These inventions are created in order to help protect our planet and help people to start being more efficient while using energy. One of these inventions is hybrid cars.
The high price of gas at the pump has many Americans looking for alternates to their gas powered vehicles. One of the most popular option right now is a hybrid vehicle. The question that comes to mind is, are hybrid vehicles worth it? With record high gas prices due to the price of oil, most car owners out there have major concerns over their gas usage. Over the past ten years, the cost of gasoline has grown 250%! The price of oil has doubled since January of this year. The high prices of oil and gas is the driving factor for most of the people to trade their gas powered vehicles for hybrid vehicles. These vehicles promise to give consumers more mileage per gallon, the truth is that only a few vehicles currently in the market actually make any sort of financial sense.
In comparing diesel and biodiesel, it is obvious to assume that diesel is evil and biodiesel a safe-for-the-environment product. Biodiesel has many superiorities in terms of reducing pollution. In over 15 million miles of in-field testing, biodiesel showed comparable fuel consumption, horsepower, torque, and haulage rates as conventional diesel fuel.
As oil prices increased, the demand for bio-fuel also increased, this made the prices of food to increase steadily. The rise of food prices increased as farm crops are used to make bio-fuels. Bio-fuels are attained from agricultural products mostly from corns. As the demand for bio-fuels increased in 2011, the prices of food increased, making food to be less affordable.
Coal and crude oil are non-renewable resources. They take an extreme amount of time to form and due to that, they cannot be replaced once they have all been used up. However, when it comes to the biofuels, they are produced from plant material and are renewable. There are two types of biofuels: Biodiesel, which is made from rapeseed oil and other plant oils and is used in diesel-powered vehicles without needing any modifications to the engine, and Bioethanol, which is a liquid fuel that burns quite well and is made by fermenting sugars from sugar cane, wheat and other plants. In this essay, whether or not biofuels are becoming an increasingly important alternative to traditional forms of energy under environmental and economic benefits and
Vehicles in this day and time are nothing like what they used to be. Over half of the car manufacturers are now trying to build new cars and trucks to be as fuel efficient as they can be. Although hybrids conserve more gas than standard vehicles do, they use gas, also. Hybrids do not use as much gas as the ol...
More farmers are now planting crops for biofuel, resulting to an intense drop in food production. According to experts this promising alternative energy source is seemingly causing a global decrease of food supply. As the demand for biofuels increases, more industrialized countries are offering encouragements and subsidizing farmers to grow crops for fuel rather than for food. The biofuel production method was also anticipated to be carbon neutral, as the crops would absorb the carbon dioxide released when the biofuel was burned. However crops for fuel are now grown at such a rate that they need more energy to cultivate, grow and harvest. By the time it reaches households, it would have consumed more energy and released more greenhouse causing substances than the feared fossil fuels would have. The fact that emissions are released during production, processing, fertilizer application and as a result of land use change is highly ignored. Somehow biofuels can sidetrack less harmful and clean resources like renewable energies such as solar and wind energy. Large scale cultivation of biofuel crops, unlike small scale, locally produced and biofuel owned farms are commonly challenged by problems such as severe use of water, chemicals, fertilizers and pesticides. These also often lead to pollution, depleting and degrading available water resources which can cause famines. According to contrary believe of analysts, it has also shown that there is not enough farming land on earth to produce biofuel crops to meet the huge energy needs encouraged by our current and unmaintainable ways of living. http://www.greenerideal.com/science/0516-biofuels/ &