Ethanol

[quteasabutton]

so does anyone much about ethanol fueled cars? or any possible websites i could check out? i have to do my physics final project on it and info would be great.

[2.2 Straight six]

you'd be better off looking into chemistry for the hydrocarbon and homologous series stuff, that explains the formation of it. otherwise just google and look around. Brazil i think is the largest user of ethanol powered cars, since they can produce up to 8 billion gallons of ethanol from sugar cane every year.

the reason it burns cleaner that petrol/gasoline i that the molecule of ethanol already has oxygen in it, so when it burn the oxygen already on there helps for C02, instead of CO which can be formed under conditions where incomplete combustion occurs.

PM if you need more...

[SaabJohan]

http://www.engr.unl.edu/~ethanol/unl-sae2.pdf

[Akira13126]

The only thing I really know about it is that it is made from organic materials and that it burns at half the heat of gas.

[SaabJohan]

Originally Posted by Akira13126

The only thing I really know about it is that it is made from organic materials and that it burns at half the heat of gas.

It can be made from fossil sources too. It has a energy content of about 26 MJ/kg compared to about 43 MJ/kg for gasoline.

When it's made from organic sources this also require the input of some fossil energy. How much depends on how you make it and who have done the analysis. If you make ethanol from corn for example it is said to need from about 70% to 130% fossil energy input. An energy input of more than 100% if of course bad.