US Green Living .com
With the fossil fuels depleting and demand for energy growing continuously, alternate renewable energy sources are being explored extensively. The automobile industry at present is totally dependent on the fossil fuels. Moreover, the fossil fuels release a lot of harmful gases and cause air pollution and global warming. The renewable energy sources are environmental friendly and cause less or no pollution. One of the promising sources
for renewable energy is the organic compound Ethyl Alcohol also known as Ethanol. This is widely used in alcoholic beverages and can be generated from sugarcane and corn.
BioEthanol refers to the ethanol produced by fermenting cellulose. BioEthanol can be used as a replacement for fossil fuel. BioEthanol is an alternate option for the automobile industry. When the water content in ethanol is less than one percent it is referred to as the anhydrous ethanol and can be used along with gasoline. BioEthanol is widely used in Brazil. The combustion of ethanol is similar to inverse process of photosynthesis and releases no by products that cause air pollution. Ethanol can also be produced from petroleum ethylene and acetylene. Synthetic ethanol is chemically same as that of the ethanol synthesized from cellulose. This article brings out the key aspects of BioEthanol as a vital renewable energy source.
BioEthanol Production: Production process basically depends on the type of ethanol being produced. For BioEthanol, the process of fermenting the cellulose or sugar using yeast is common. Before fermentation, hydrolysis converts the cellulose and starch into sugar for fermentation. Even certain enzymes are used for this process. Sugarcane is the most common crop from which ethanol is produced In case of synthetic ethanol, the process of dehydration and distillation are followed.
Before using BioEthanol as fuel, distillation process is employed to remove the water content from BioEthanol. The chemical process of dehydration utilizes dehydrators like benzene, calcium oxide or zeochem for removing water from ethanol.
BioEthanol for Automobiles: Already many car companies are producing high compression engines which are suitable for combustion of ethanol. BioEthanol has less energy for the equal volume of gasoline. Hence a higher compression ration engine can produce the same power as that of a pure gasoline engine. Higher compression engines aid in proper combustion and less smoke. Better combustion also leads to higher fuel efficiency and less pollution. Ethanol is used in automobiles in two ways. Small proportions of ethanol can be mixed with gasoline up to 15% and used in normal internal combustion engines. This will reduce the pollution without hampering the performance of the automobile. The second method of using ethanol is in pure ethanol internal combustion engines. Modern automobile technology has also produced dual fuel engines where either ethanol or gasoline can be used without any modification to the engine design. Many countries like Brazil, United States of America, Sweden, and Australia are promoting the production and use of ethanol for automobiles.
Advantages: Bio-ethanol production process does not cause any environmental pollution since it involves fermentation. BioEthanol can be produced from any cellulose compound available in plants. Hence the production of BioEthanol will not lead to food shortage. BioEthanol burns well and does not contain harmful particles and is much better than gasoline with regards to air pollution.
