Next Gen Biofuel, Biobutanol: Better Than Ethanol?

October 1, 2006 – Vol.11 No.28

NEXT GEN BIOFUEL, BIOBUTANOL: BETTER THAN ETHANOL?

Since the Energy Policy Act of 1995 (EPACT 1995) was signed into law in August 2005, ethanol has been a hot commodity. Ethanol producers got a hefty tax break that spurred significant investment in new ethanol plants. Some three dozen now under construction and another 10 are expanding to meet the demand.

The law was promoted as a way increasing the supply of ethanol to help kick the US oil habit. But since cars and trucks that can run on ethanol - even in the E85 blend - are few and far between, most of the new ethanol was to be phased in as a replacement for gasoline additive MTBE - methyl tert-butyl ether - an oxygenate that makes gasoline burn a little cleaner.

But by the first days of 2006, gasoline distributors, growing ever wary of lawsuits connected to MTBE, decided to dump that additive in favor of environmentally tolerable ethanol. The result was an ethanol shortage which led to very high gasoline prices in some markets where the cleaner boutique fuels are mandated by law: The markets with the worst air pollution from vehicles.

(This time of the year - conveniently around election time - the ethanol isn’t added, thus the price of gas is noticeably less. Well, at least that’s one reason it’s cheaper.)

Ethanol got its way in Congress in 1995 because it has powerful trade associations with presumably effective lobbying.

Ethanol is a political fuel. Mostly made from corn (for now) in the US, it is another income producer for farmers. Congressmen facing reelection need to make sure that farmers in their home states are happy and voting for the incumbent.

But as a fuel, how good is ethanol?

For now - until the dream of mass scale cellulose ethanol from just about any waste green matter becomes reality - ethanol will likely need a tax break to keep it alive.

Ethanol burns OK in cars and trucks, provided fuel systems are adapted to cope with its corrosive manners and burn the fuel in the richer mixtures it needs. It, too, has a lower energy content than gasoline, so more gallons are needed for the same miles driven on gasoline.

On the upbeat side, ethanol does burn cleaner than gasoline. It isn’t imported from nations that don’t like us much. And, of course, as long as the next season’s fuel crop is grown, it’s greenhouse gas neutral. (There is still the lingering debate on whether more energy is needed to make ethanol than is given back as fuel.)

But if biobutanol (the bio-version of butanol, aka butyl alcohol) had a powerful lobby in Washington, the nation might be building biobutanol plants instead of ethanol.

What is butanol? It’s another liquid hydrocarbon that is now used for things like paint thinner and perfume. Unlike ethanol it can be made from petroleum sources or bio-sources: waste or purposely grown fuel crops.

In terms of energy content and octane rating it is very much like gasoline and blends well with gasoline without fear of separation that goes along with ethanol. It can be transported via gasoline pipelines, and cars need little modification, if any at all, to run on butanol. (Don’t try this at home, though.)

Does biobutanol sound like a better replacement for gasoline than ethanol? Could be. Especially when ethanol plants can be converted to make butanol instead, so not all the investment is wasted.

Butanol has caught the eye of one of the world’s leading chemical companies: Dupont.

The company is now considering biobutanol as a next generation biofuel that “is significantly improved and complements incumbents” according to the company. (Read that to mean a better fuel than ethanol and blends well with gasoline as well as ethanol.)

The company is also working with BP to bring biobutanol to the market at first as an additional component to ethanol-blended gasoline.

Biobutanol has a long way to go before it begins to take root as a mainstream fuel in the US. But what does biobutanol need now more than anything?

A powerful Washington lobby.

Visit Dupont at http://www.dupont.com/