Green Vehicles
What is a "green vehicle"?
Probably the "greenest" vehicle is your bicycle and, of course, there's nothing wrong with your feet and your shoes. We could all stand to do a little more walking and a little more use of bicycles or mass transit, especially in the United States. But, if we've got to buy a personal vehicle, then, right now, there are alternatives to petroleum like natural gas, which, I drive a natural gas Honda Civic. There are Ford and General Motors and other manufacturers that make natural gas-powered cars. And while natural gas is also a fossil fuel and when you burn it, it does emit some greenhouse gases, it's exponentially cleaner than petroleum and, of course, we're not in foreign countries killing people for our supply of it. And then, of course, there are bio-fuels, there are a lot of, the manufacturers make what are now called "flex fuel" vehicles that are designed to run on either gasoline or ethanol and other bio-fuels. And we're beginning to see the electric car make a comeback, not necessarily with the major automakers, but smaller companies are beginning to make and sell electric cars. And then, finally, I think in the next couple of years, you'll be able to purchase a hydrogen-powered vehicle. And that will be the cleanest choice of all.
What are "alternative fuel sources"?
Alternative fuel sources would include things like biofuels, ethanol which is made from plants, biodiesel which is made from soy and soybeans and other plants. Sugarcane can also produce biofuels. We're beginning to learn how to make biofuels out of what's called cellulosic material, meaning the stalk of the plant or woody debris or other waste materials rather than the corn or other high value products. Then other alternatives are things like natural gas, which, although it's a fossil fuel, we're beginning to harvest from renewable resources like the methane from sewage treatment plants, from animal confinement (dairy herds and things like that), and from decomposing material in our landfills. Other alternatives include electricity, from battery electric cars, and hydrogen.
How are "biodiesel" and "ethanol" created?
Ethanol today in the United States is made mostly from corn, by taking the sugar out of corn and distilling it into a combustible liquid creating ethanol. Biodiesel is made from soybeans using a similar method: crushing the oil out of a bean and then turning that into a combustible liquid such as biodiesel.
What is "cellulosic ethanol" and why is cleaner than regular ethanol?
Cellulosic ethanol is the 'bio gasoline' that's made from the stalk or the debris part of agricultural products. So right now, ethanol is made mostly from corn, but it would be much cheaper and more energy efficient if we could make it from the stalk of the corn.
How do I know if my car will run on either biodiesel or ethanol?
There are a couple of million cars and trucks in the United States today that are called FlexFuel vehicles. These run on either biofuel or petroleum-based fuels. You can find out if your car runs on either biofuel or ethanol by looking in your owner's manual. Most people are not even aware that they have a car that can run on biofuel or ethanol. More and more cars are being produced that way. In Brazil today, for example, the only cars you can buy are FlexFuel vehicles, and 50 percent of the fuel sold in a country like Brazil is, in fact, Ethanol.
How easy is it to convert my car to run on biodiesel or ethanol?
It's not terribly easy to convert an existing car to run on biodiesel or ethanol, although in California, for example, about six percent of every gallon of gasoline has ethanol in it as blend. This percentage will probably be increasing over time to about ten percent. It does take a certain kind of carburation; the way you burn the ethanol and they way you combust the ethanol, and so it's not terribly easy to convert. Old diesel cars can easily be converted with very minor modifications to run on vegetable oil (biodiesel) for a couple of hundred dollars. Of course diesel engines tend to last a long time so it's well worth that small investment, especially when you consider that you can buy vegetable oil for as little as 99 cents a gallon.
What is "natural gas" and why is it the cleanest burning of all the fossil fuels?
Natural gas is probably the cleanest of all the fossil fuels because, first of all, there is very little refining done to it. A gallon of gasoline comes by going to some far off country, drilling deep into the earth to get the oil, transporting it back to a refinery and running it through the refinery. All of that takes a tremendous amount of energy and pollution before you get a useable unit of energy you can put into your car. Natural gas such as methane comes out of the ground, out of landfills, or out of decomposing agricultural waste. Natural gas is pretty much in useable form and goes straight into your tank. When you burn gasoline, because its a liquid and because there's a lot of sulfur and other materials in it, most of that just goes right out of your tailpipe in the form of pollution. But natural gas being a gas, doesn't have those pollutants in it. So when you combust natural gas, it's much cleaner.
Can I buy a car that runs on natural gas?
You can buy a car that runs on natural gas. Today I bought a Honda Civic GX which is a standard production model Honda Civic. It has an internal combustion engine that's designed to run on natural gas, and there's about 300 natural gas fueling stations in California alone. You can also put a home fueler in your home, where you can take the natural gas supply from your own home and compress it into your car and never go to the fueling station again.
