87, 89, 91: What even is Super Premium Gasoline?

[Lost_in_the_Woods]

I ride an antique motorcycle so I can't buy any of them... But we'll get to that.
First things first, what is the difference between 87, 89, and 91? What do those numbers even mean? and why are there all these new ones?

Why do they do this to me?

The numbers are called "Octane Ratings" which is where we get the phrase "high octane" but what does that measure and why is having more a good thing? In technical terms, the number represents the amount of heat required to ignite the fuel, as expressed in a percentage related to isooctane where heptane is 0. But that probably doesn't help you unless you already know a lot about petroleum products. So I'll start with some common misconceptions and work up to a more understandable explanation.

Octane ratings are NOT a measure of how much energy (or power) is in the fuel.
And while they are a measure of how combustible it is, Higher numbers actually mean the fuel is more difficult to ignite. If you held a match up to the different fuels, the 87 would ignite most easily, but realistically... you wouldn't notice much difference. They would all burn about the same. It's not like we're talking about jet fuel here! (but again, we'll get to that)

To understand the importance of the numbers and what they mean, first you have to understand why faster cars need a higher number. In the beginning, there was just "gasoline" and it was all about the same. But as engineers started to tune for more and more power they started to run into problems. Lots of problems... But the one we are interested in is called "Detonation" or "ping". Fuel detonation might not sound like a bad thing. It's supposed to explode right? But it's more accurately called "Early" or "Spontaneous" Detonation. When things are going well, the spark plug ignites the fuel, and the expanding gas created by that explosion pushes the piston down to create power, almost like pushing the pedal of a bicycle. But when the engine gets too hot, or the pressure inside the engine gets too high, (both problems that crop up when trying to make more power) the fuel can Spontanioulsy ignite itself. When that happens, you have TWO explosions happening at the same time, in the same small sealed compartment... and that isn't good. What happens is that the pressure shockwaves smash into each other and combine to make an enormous amount of heat and pressure. This can cause massive stress and damage to the engine, and can even blow holes right through the pistons. And that gets expensive to fix.

Over time, engines have become more and more high-tech, and people have come to expect more performance from less fuel. The way that is possible is by designing engines that create more pressure from smaller doses of Gasoline. General design changes account for most of it, but then you add something like a Turbo or a Supercharger and the pressure in the engine increases dramatically. High pressure means more heat. High heat and High pressure cause Detonation, and that can lead to expensive engine replacements!

This is a piston that has been destroyed by detonation. It should be round like the side of a soup can but it's missing a chunk.

And that's where the High Octane fuels come into play. 87 Octane takes 87% as much more heat to ignite as isooctane does compared to Heptane. Or, in other words, it takes 87 Octane units of heat to ignite it. 93, takes MORE heat to ignite. So you can use it in higher performance engines like ones with Turbochargers without the increased heat and pressure causing Detonation.

Put very simply, the higher the number, the more heat and pressure the fuel can withstand without going off by accident!

So what does this mean for the average consumer? It means that there is practically NO DIFFERENCE between the three grades of fuel unless your engine was designed to run on the expensive stuff. Faster, higher-end cars are likely to be tuned for better performance over cost savings so many of them require the better fuel. But if your car doesn't require it, it's a waste of money. Putting the expensive stuff in your corolla will not make it more powerful, more efficient, or more reliable unless something else is seriously wrong. Putting the cheap stuff in a car that is designed for Premium can cause enormous damage, but luckily most modern cars have electronic sensors that will notice and change the tuning to reduce power output and prevent any damage to the engine. So you CAN use it in a pinch, but it's definitely not a good idea.

Something like 10% of cars require premium, maybe 1% require the mid-grade, and the rest see no benefits from the higher grades whatsoever. But, sales break down at about 5% for mid-grade and about 10% for premium. This suggests that a lot of people are putting midgrade gas in their regular cars, and studies have estimated that costs consumers over 2 billion dollars a year nationwide! Not to mention... the majority of stations only have two tanks. "mid-grade" is really just regular with a bit of premium mixed in. There is a very small number of cars that require this, but in general, you usually end up paying closer to premium rates for mostly regular gas. And that's before you consider the increased environmental impact of burning the premium stuff for no reason.

But if that wasn't complicated enough... Now we have Ethanol. Ethanol isn't gasoline at all. It's alcohol. It's actually exactly the same alcohol we drink which is probably the only reason we haven't seen any vehicles designed to run on 100%. Imagine a gas pump that dispensed the best moonshine imaginable for less than the price of cheap gasoline. Sounds dangerous to me. It's a shame we can't all be responsible and cut our dependence on foreign oil but realistically, I don't see that happening any time soon. Not to mention, the oil companies and the alcoholic beverage companies can't have people finding out we can grow and produce this stuff renewably for like $2 a gallon and get both for one low price.

Way too many buttons... and that's not even all of them!

But what's the difference? Can we really just fill our cars with moonshine to save money? That sounds like a bad idea you're crazy uncle told you about.... But the short answer is yes. They work about the same. Minor tuning adjustments and it would work great in the cars we already have. A lot of them wouldn't even need a tune-up. The bigger problem with Ethanol is that it dissolves rubber. Fuel lines are made of rubber, and in a modern car they can be pressurized to well over 100PSI! (a regular tire is about 30PSI) Dissolving your fuel lines is NOT a good idea. So most pumps dispense about 10% ethanol and 90% gasoline. This keeps the Ethanol diluted enough that it doesn't cause a problem.

But newer cars have been designed with Ethanol in mind. They use fuel lines built out of more resistant stuff that doesn't dissolve. This means they can run the E15 (15% ethanol), E30 (30% ethanol), or even E85! (170 proof corn liquor with some gasoline mixed in for taste!)

The benefits of Ethanol are HUGE! For one, it's cheaper and it literally grows on trees. (or corn stalks) But it also burns cleaner and has an octane rating of 113!!! That's why the regular jumped up from 85 to 87 when they started mixing in some Ethanol. 91 became 93, and a lot of racecars require E85 these days. There really isn't a downside if you have fuel lines that can deliver it and enough self-control to avoid a cheap sip of shine while you're filling up.

She was ahead of her time. I just hope she didn't fall for that "Plus" crap.

So then... why do some crazies resist? Why are some people so angry about progress that they insist on paying more for Ethanol Free? Well, that one's easy. My carburetters have rubber parts inside of them. Ethanol dissolves rubber. The rubber diaphragms are very thin, cost $150 each and there are 4 of them. Under normal circumstances the fuel doesn't come into contact with them... but that's a $600 risk I just don't want to take. And that's if you can even find new ones. But it's not just people with old cars, old carbs, and old rubber gas lines. There's another group who buys it and they are even angrier than we are because they use it to do actual work. A lot of small engines aren't as sophisticated and aren't able to mix the fuel and air together as well as a regular car. Most lawnmowers, weed whackers, and small equipment struggle to burn ethanol, and a lot of people have really expensive ones they use to make their living. Sure, they could upgrade but... that hurts profits and they probably like the old reliable ones better anyway.

You'd think we'd get along but my bike is modified to have a higher compression ratio for more power so I want 97 Octane and I'm happy to pay $4.50 a gallon when I can find it.
Their lawnmowers usually aren't modified for horsepower... So they would rather buy the 85 for as cheap as possible and keep more of their profits.

Oh beautiful California!

But this is getting to be an issue for the gas stations. That's 2 tanks for regular gas, A tank for Ethanol, 2 tanks for Ethanol-free, and someone is still going to show up and ask for Flex-fuel. (Flex fuel is pretty much gasoline sausage. It's something like 50-70% ethanol, mixed with regular gasoline and it's cheap because it can vary so they just use whatever they have leftover, but those cars can use all of the above.)

Most stations don't have 6 tanks! And that's before you mention Diesel which they make a lot of money off. So that leaves them in a position where they have to choose. A lot of stations were using all their tanks before things got weird so they have 3 grades of regular gas and that's it. I don't think I've ever seen more than 5 on one pump, so you end up seeing weird things like 85 (ethanol-free), 88 for midgrade, and then regular 93 for premium which makes the lawncare guys happy, but it's no good for me and it means the regular is going to be more expensive than the competition. Or, they go the other way and you see 87, 89, and then 93 (ethanol-free) which is great for me and great for regular cars, but the landscaping guys get scalped and the people who already don't want to pay for Premium have to pay more than usual.

Some stations get new tanks put in for new fuels, or have one around the back for something other than the normal 3. I envision a world where the pumps are sophisticated enough to mix any combination on the fly so they could fill the three tanks they have with Low octane ethanol-free, High octane ethanol-free, and pure Ethanol to make any of the 8 options on the fly. But, the oil companies aren't going to let that happen because they like watering down the tankers with 10% Ethanol before they send them out to save money on their end, they like to stay in control of the ratios and the pricing, and most importantly... People would be outraged if they found out a gallon of pure, drinkable, 200 proof ethanol actually has a retail value of about $2 but they are paying $4 for oil-based petroleum and 15 to 20 bucks for a bottle of 70 proof vodka that's 60% water.

So the stations pick what works for them and their customers. And a lot of them have invested in more tanks and new pumps to get people what they are looking for at competitive prices.

That'll be $250,000 for the tank and $20,000 to fill er up for ya.

So just to recap, we have covered 9 different products that you might fill your tank up with and haven't even started on diesel. There's Regular [87], Plus [89] which is mostly a scam, Premium [93] which has a higher octane rating meaning that it can withstand more heat in a high-performance engine without exploding too early, E15, and E30 which are Regular gas mixed with moonshine to save money, E85 which is dirt cheap and has a SUPER high octane rating but only works in cars that were specifically designed for it, Low Test Ethanol Free [85]-[89] which the landscapers buy to run their lawnmowers, High Test Ethanol-Free [90]-[93] which is just good old fashioned high-quality gasoline for people who are stuck in the past, And Flex Fuel, which is pretty much just a random mix of whatever they had leftover when they made the rest of those.

Add it all up and that was about 123.73 billion gallons of fuel in 2020. Which was actually 14% less than 2018 and the least we have used since 1997! (mostly because of covid)
But then there was the 44.61 billion gallons of diesel and over 10 billion gallons of Jet fuel (WAY down from the 18 billion in 2019) If my math is correct, that would fill enough milk jugs placed side by side to wrap around the earth 673 and a half times! That's a lot of fuel! But it's 4 am so don't quote that on your environmental studies.

But wait, there's more!

Diesel doesn't have an octane rating. Diesel is actually sort of a byproduct of gasoline production, it's made up of some of the heavier less-flammable parts that are left over after gasoline is refined out of crude oil. Unlike gasoline, Diesel will not burn when exposed to an open flame. It must be exposed to extreme heat and pressure to cause an explosion. Because of this, Diesel would have an octane rating so high it would not be a relevant measurement. Instead, Diesel has a Cetane Number. Cetane is a chemical compound found naturally in diesel that ignites easily under pressure. Because of its high flammability, it serves as the industry-standard measure for evaluating fuel combustion quality.

A Cetane Number is a measure of the ignition value of a diesel fuel that represents the percentage by volume of cetane in a mixture of liquid methylnaphthalene that gives the same ignition lag as the oil being tested or in other words, it's a measurement of how much Cetane the fuel contains which gives an indication of how well it will ignite and burn in an engine. The scale for measuring cetane ranges from 0 to 100, and the higher the number, the better. Modern highway diesel engines tend to require fuel with a cetane number ranging from 45 to 55. Typically, Regular No. 2 Diesel has a cetane number of 40 to 42, while Premium Diesel has a cetane number of 47 to 52.

It always says "Low Sulfer" but Low Sulfer Diesel fuel is sort of an oxymoron. In 2001, the EPA finalized a federally mandated program called the 2007 Heavy-Duty Highway Diesel Program. This program was established to further decrease emissions by enabling the use of advanced emission control technologies for new highway diesel engines. Although effective, these technologies were found to be easily damaged by sulfur, requiring serious sulfur reductions in diesel fuel in order for them to be used. Effective June 2006, the maximum sulfur limit in diesel was slashed from 500 to 15 parts per million (ppm). Low Sulfer really just means "EPA approved for highway use".

Diesel spouts are intentionally too big to fit in most cars.

The last type of fuel you will usually see at the pumps is Off-Road Diesel, and while some guys might be tempted to put this in their pickups to make them even more rugged, it really isn't a good idea. The only real difference between the two is that Off-Road Diesel is dyed red so that the cops can easily check your tank and make sure you bought the stuff that includes road taxes. It's literally the same stuff, but you get a better rate if you are using it for a tractor or something because the price of on-road diesel includes taxes used to maintain the roads and bridges.

Tax evasion is bad. Especially when you get caught.

DEF (often seen for sale alongside highway Diesel) is not Fuel at all. It's Diesel Exhaust Fluid. This is a solution of 32.5% urea in 67.5% de-ionized water. DEF is clear and colorless and looks exactly like water. It has a slight smell of ammonia, similar to some home cleaning agents. DEF is used by Selective Catalytic Reduction (SCR) technology to remove harmful NOx emissions from diesel engines. These systems are required for further emission control on all large Diesel highway vehicles produced after 2010.

This is mostly water, don't fill your car with it.

Oh, but there is one more thing you might see at some stations. Kerosene! In America this is usually used to run heaters, but in a lot of countries it is still used in lanterns which are the main source of lighting in many homes. I use it to clean my motorcycle chain every 300 miles, and there are countless other uses for it too. One particular use that might shock you is that kerosene is often known by another far more exciting name... Jet Fuel! They are essentially the same thing. Throw a match in a bucket of either one and the match will go out. Jet fuel isn't half as exciting as Hollywood seems to think it is.

My Personal Dietz D-Lite no.2 - This one is an antique, but they still sell new ones just like it.

On occasion, you might see a station that still has a Water pump. Those are for filling radiators, but most modern radiators are pretty good at staying full all on their own so most of the water pumps have been phased out or replaced by pressurized air for filling tires.

Some places even have reverse air pumps to fluff your carpets.

And of course, that Nasty Bean Juice they sell inside. Some freaks actually fuel THEMSELVES with this stuff! But me, I try to avoid anything that addictive... It's literally just water they heat up and drip over some fancy imported dirt to make some knock-off Columbian bam bam. And it tastes like it. But some fools pay like $16-$20 a GALLON for that crap so most places have it on tap. If you thought 2 billion was a lot to waste on Plus grade gasoline, just think what we could do with the 80 billion Americans spend on Coffee every year. I'll save my money for that 93 Octane ethanol-free gas. It's a lot cheaper and a lot more fun.

Disgusting....

So there you have it. The 14 different fuels that keep America moving. What the numbers mean, what they have in common and why they go in different tanks. But the most important thing you need to remember is that the vast majority of people buying "plus" grade gasoline are just throwing billions of dollars away for absolutely no reason. Don't do it, unless you are one of the few people whose car actually requires it. You should buy the LOWEST octane rating that isn't less than your vehicle requires. If it doesn't require fancy gas, buying the expensive one won't make it any faster.

[sensible27]

Read it : )

This is odd. I used to think the presence of petroleum gave a real technological advantage to our species. Always sort of assumed there was something odd with ethanol either chemically, or if we could actually produce enough of it. Can we? I think I had heard of ethanol being used for engines before but assumed they were for smaller engines, I think they're used in nascar? My thought process was something like the engines have to be modified and it's probably harder to get.

[Lost_in_the_Woods]

At the moment it's a lot cheaper but demand for high ethanol fuels is low. So far 0 out of about 30 people said they primarily use E15-E85. So, for the time being the low price is more to do with low production cost and low demand than it is with oversupply.

Can we produce 124+ Billion Gallons a year? What will happen to Diesel if we do? And what will happen to the price of corn and cornflakes?

I don't really know. Those are important question that I'm not knolodgeable enough to answer. But, my guess is that globally, the corn market would expand to meet demands and the price would stay lower than gasoline. We would see China, Australia and South America growing a lot more corn and the middle east suffer a major economic collapse.

It also brings up the issue of GMO's but I'm not going to go down that rabbit hole.

I will say that I think we absolutely could make the switch in a relitively short time, but there are some powerful political and economic forced holding that back.

Politicians don't care about the environment, they want to mandate electric cars that run on coal before they invest in the needed renewable power generation and transmission infrastructure.

And the oil companies have every interest in adding just enough ethanol that they save some money without cutting anyone's dependence on their product. I think some of them have made big investments into bio fuels but there's no way they can make it MORE profitable without charging the same and they won't get away with that unless the oil actually runs out so... Their motivation is to resist the transition to biofuels, and they have a lot of control over the markets.

Russia is a huge player in the oil industry and I think it's too cold to grow corn there. But Europe burns a lot more ethanol than we do because they are paying extorted prices.

[Lost_in_the_Woods]

I think politics has a lot more to do with if and when that transition will happen.

Right now, it looks like the US and EU governments are intent on banning combustion engines to replace them with short range electric vehicles that actually make more polutuion and are easy to track, tax, and remotely disable. So we might never see ethanol be the most popular fuel.

So far as actually using it, it's a very easy transition. The vast majority of new cars wouldn't need any physical modifications and could be switched over just by plugging them into a computer. A lot of them already run great on ethanol.

Older cars would need new fuel line and some tuning adjustments. But pretty much anything with fuel injectors could be updated for probably $200-$500.

Very few cars still use carburetors but they would need new carburetor jets and new fuel lines. That tends to take a bit of trial and error so it could be considerably more expensive unless you do the work yourself which takes a fair amount of skill.

I'm not getting a modern car with a GPS and remote shut off features. I'm definitely not interested in a self driving one. I'm keeping my old motorcycle until they ban riding it or start programing the AI to crash into us and take us off the roads.

Most I would have to do is change or rebuild my carburetors and find a place to grow the corn.

Race cars are already using it because it's better and they retune them all the time so that was a non issue.

But the vast majority of cars could easily be swapped over in an hour or two for less than the cost of a nice set of tires.

I think it's mostly politics to keep people paying more than they have to.

[Lost_in_the_Woods]

But, I don't like to talk about that because it's already hard to find the ethanol free gas I use and I'm not in any hurry to spend hundred of dollars and many hours of misery to convert my antique CV Carburetors to run on pure Ethanol.

But, my 06 Subaru would be easy. If they sold ethanol for $2 a gallon I'd probably put a license plate on that because it might bring the cost down a lot closer to the motorcycle.

But until then, 30mpg on the more expensive ethanol free is so much cheaper than spending an extra $1500 a year on taxes and insurance.

I pay less than $200 for taxes and insurance for the whole year and get 30+ mpg with acceleration comparable to a Lamborghini Gallardo or a Dodge Viper SRT. I don't really worry about gas prices. Premium Ethanol free was like $4.50 at one point and it still didn't come close to paying for car insurance.

Small simple engines are actually the only ones that struggle to burn ethanol. They are usually running of very small simple carburetors that doesn't do a great job of mixing the fuel and air together. Ethanol isn't as easy to ignite so that can leave them running pretty poorly.

But, I'm sure they could design replacement carbs that would solve that for under $100.

Overall, it's a pretty direct upgrade in most cases. I think it also produces considerably less polutuion and leaves less residue behind in the engine.

People would be demanding it if they knew how much money they could save.

[sensible27]

Thank you : )

is car insurance compulsory?

I might need to read up a little on farming, and if that amount of corn production would actually be sustainable. And maybe if we have enough land? I'd think we easily do but depends. If I had to guessa realistic transition if everybody agreed would take about 20 years but not really sure. Infrastructure would have to be developed to produce that amount of corn and produce ethanol out of it and so on and so forths

[Lost_in_the_Woods]

Yes. In the US liability insurance is required for everyone and collision insurance is required for most cars that are still financed through loans. You can choose to pay a $500 uninsured driver fee but if you crash into a $90,000 Volvo or BMW you will owe the whole thing and probably have your wages garnished for deccades.

The $500 fee is a good option for a millionaire to save money. But I tell people if you can't afford the insurance you definitely can't afford to pay $500 to not have insurance.

But, on my motorcycle, liability is $130 a year. For a car, it's more like $130 a month. (For me, as a male with some speeding tickets)

So far as how long it would take to switch, If everyone was on board, I bet it could be done in 5. People underestimate our collective strength because it's never actually been deployed.

Problem is, you'll never have everybody on board. Every development hurts someone's profits. And they are usually the people who are actively controlling the markets.

Ethanol doesn't have to come from corn. Potatoes are another great source and we had farmers in the US renting backhoes to dig giant potato graves and turn them into fertilizer because so many restaurants were closed and they waste such a huge amount of food.

I think in America the stat is 1/3 of all food we produce goes straight in the garbage before it gets to your plate or your local grocery store. And probably a third of the stuff that does gets tossed by the consumer. I try, but I still let a lot of stuff expire.

If everyone actually worked together we would live in a different world... But I've come to understand that is totally unrealistic. So yeah, 20 years sounds reasonable to me.

But The EU is trying to ban internal combustion engines in a similar timeframe. Biden says the same thing but I doubt they will actually pull it off so only time will tell.

[Lost_in_the_Woods]

Oil companies are in a tight spot. They want to underproduce and jack up the price to make back the money they lost from covid keeping everyone off the road, while keeping as much as possible in the ground for the future.

Russia is in a bad mood because they have spent billions to finally finish their pipeline and the EU is taking their time to give them the thumbs up to turn it on so... They raise prices and say it's because they need the pipeline.

But they know better than anyone that if prices get too high people will go looking for an alternative and find out we could have used all those potatoes to make cheap ethanol Instead of charging the farmers who lost their incomes to dispose of them. And the oil companies definitely don't want that.

But that also gets into politics. I think they shut the restaurants down for so long to intentionally bankrupt farmers and force them to sell their land to Billionaires like Gill Gates, Jeff Bezos and Monsanto who are gearing up to start autonomous AI farming operations that grow way more food for way less cost.

I don't think ethanol is held back by logistics. I think it is held back because controlling the sources and costs of energy is the number one most effective way to control a population and force people to depend on the rich and powerful to eat, move around, and live their daily lives.

But that's a whole separate my take.

[sensible27]

Oh, when I said "everybody on board" I didn't mean literally everyone on board. Humanity would look far different if everyone was rational and really tried to be productive. It was meant more along the lines of general public agreeing it's a good idea. I don't remember the exact statistics but a huge amount of land goes to raising and feeding livestock, much more than is required for vegetarian food, the huge amount of land also produces enough food that accounts for about 10% of the energy for a normal human. I don't think lands a problem, or agree with the whole restaurants were closed to bankrupt farmers statement. I doubt most food demand comes from restaurants and it'd odd to close every other place and not close a non critical place like restaurants. Additionally, logistics is a sort of a problem there could probably be a buisness here if there could be a demand and someone's able to fulfill it, I'm assuming using ethanol is not illegal.

[Lost_in_the_Woods]

That's what they want you to believe.

But farmland absolutely is a limited resource. You can raise cows in the outback but growing crops is a different story. Doesn't matter how much of it there is. What matters is that if you control the majority of the farmland you control the food prices and everybody has to eat.

If you really think it was about safety... You have to ask yourself why so many of the people who made the decisions to close down the majority of restaurants and small businesses were caught eating at restaurants and having enormous parties unmasked with their lobbyist friends.

If they really thought it was unsafe... they wouldn't be doing it themselves. That much is common sense.

But like I said, that is a totally different discussion.

Here's a direct quote from a potato farmer who was spending money to dispose of huge mountains of potatoes.

"We might be able to send them somewhere for some kind of processing... But we're just takin em out, taking them into a burial pit"

Agracultural supply is obviously not the limiting factor in Ethanol production.

https://youtu.be/ALtfQVbHtM0

[sensible27]

In the end it's logistics. If the potatoes were cheap enough to transport and could be sold for even part of the profit to someone, they would be.

A lot of food goes to waste in lots of parts of the world, but it's because of people how much they think they need and logistics. The world is decentralised enough that if someone wanted to buy lots of land they would probably choose somewhere more agriculturally suited with possibly cheaper labour and cheaper land costs. Us doesn't seem to be the place

i never said it was about safety, possibly to give an image for safety or under public pressure. There's also the case that the things that work on larger scales don't need to be applied on smaller scales. Similar to how every politician might promote eco friendly choices and minimising waste, but aren't the most efficient at it themselves. The more of a do as I say, scenario. Not really possibly leading by example or thinking it's necessary for them to do or scenarios are different. It's also possible for people to think the country should be closed down for actual good as a whole but not believe they need to wear a mask. Because as a whole their impact doesn't matter much, but their decisions might

[Lost_in_the_Woods]

I used to think that way.

Nobody wants to believe they do it on purpose but... They do it on purpose.

Bill gates is a computer guy. In the last two years he became the largest owner of private farmland in the world. He has been working with Monsanto to destroy India's farmers and literally starve them to death making them buy seeds they used to get for free for extorted prices.

And sure, do as I say not as I do is exactly it. But the point is if they actually thought that covid was deadly and global warming would destroy the planet they wouldn't be having gigantic parties at their seaside resorts. That's common sense.

Nobody wants to believe it's all a lie to gain more power at the people's expense, but that is what's happening.

You think it's more expensive to ship fuel all the way across the ocean than it is to have someone pay you to pick up potatoes and turn them into fuel?

E85 is like ¢50 to a dollar cheaper than the regular because it's so cheap to produce.

I understand your perspective, but I just have a way better understanding of the logistics and your making excuses where there aren't any.

It's not cheaper to buy oil from the middle east than it is to get free potatoes and turn them into fuel. If it was... They wouldn't be adding ethanol to the pump gas to save money.

You just have to think about what makes sense and you will figure it out. If the rich were concerned about global warming and covid 19 THEY would be protected. You can be certain they care about themselves more than they care about you.

So why the beachfront property and blatant disregard for their own safety precautions? Because it isn't about safety. It's about the fact that our population is increasing faster than our food supply. They don't care about you. They shut down the supply chain and the economy to bankrupt the farmers and take their land.

[Lost_in_the_Woods]

Then they set up AI farms that don't require workers so they control the food production. They don't try to increase food production, they try to take it for themselves.

Farmers wouldn't have sold their land like that. But if you were paying attention they had no choice because of the pointless lockdowns making them unable to sell their crops while food prices soared and then Bill Gates bought more farmland in the last two years than anyone has ever bought in the history of the world. (so far as I know)

Nobody wants to think their governments and heroes would do that but you look at the facts... The motives they claim are obviously false.

So you start to wonder why and you see the answer is extremely obvious.

We could produce more food just like OPEC could produce more oil. But instead they force farmers to throw their crops away, and buy the land for pennies as the prices skyrocket.

The hard truth is it's about keeping them rich and us poor.

But shit, keep thinking they are on your side and expecting results that help you. You'll figure it out soon enough.

[Lost_in_the_Woods]

But then again... If you think it's cheaper to buy oil from Saudi Arabia, ship it here and then refine it than it is to pick up free starch and make Ethanol,

but they add 10% ethanol to every tanker just because it's more expensive and sell E85 for a dollar less than Gasoline... Maybe you won't figure it out.

It's common sense that doesn't add up but that's getting to be a rare thing.

I know a lot about this stuff. You think there isn't enough corn and potatoes to go around? You are living in a false reality.

[Lost_in_the_Woods]

If they can buy starch, turn it into ethanol, sell it for a third the price of cheap gas and make money...

They can get free starch and turn it into ethanol, sell it for what gasoline was a year ago and get filthy rich.

But that's not enough for these people. OPEC could produce way more gas but they monopolize it and all agree explicitly NOT to produce more.

You think they do that because they don't want to sell more? You think they do it because they care about poor people? They do it to drive the price up.

Same thing is happening with food. You think they let people go hungry because they wanted to keep the country safe? You think they let farmers go bankrupt torching their own crops to help the economy?

That's what they will tell you but it's pretty obviously bullshit.

They let covid out on purpose so they could control the food and energy production. Fauci signed the order to circumnavigate the ban on gain of function and fund the Whuhan Lab of Virology.

People just don't pay any attention and it shows.

If they can buy starch, turn it into ethanol and sell it cheaper than gas.

They can get free starch, turn it into ethanol and make a profit.

But here you are thinking they don't because there aren't enough potatoes, your car won't run on it, and it's cheaper to ship things all the way across the ocean and than it is to pick up use what we already have for free?

They literally drill oil from the bottom of the ocean and you think it's to expensive to drive a truck full of potatoes?

You think they take a loss undercutting their own product with ethanol? Why would anyone do that if it wasn't cheaper to produce? Of course its cheaper. It's readily available and it's not buried a mile underground.

[Lost_in_the_Woods]

I don't mean to be hostile about it but smart people who don't think for themselves are the reason people are losing their houses and farms and paying $5 a gallon while Bill Gates makes money faster than ever driving them out and literally starving people in India to take their land.

And I have more sympathy for those people than I do for you.

Listen to Vandana Shiva talk about what Bill Gates and Monsanto are doing in India and you'll see that there is absolutely no chance they are doing it because they think it's the right thing to do. They know they are killing people. But the masses are stupid enough to sit there and defend them like "no, they couldn't possibly be trying to get richer than they already are at the expense of someone else losing what little they had"

But shit, that is the only way. You either get rich by producing something or taking something it from someone else.

Bill gates hasn't been involved with Microsoft for years but he went from owning almost no farmland to the worlds #1 owner of private farmland in less than a year.

That should raise peoples eyebrows. Especially when the source is people who starved and people who were put out of business by "safety" regulations that obviously have nothing to do with safety.

It makes me mad when people don't pay attention, don't know about this stuff then try to tell me they know better.

You are entitled to your opinion. But this is why people are starving in India and losing their homes all over America. When good people mindlessly support the tyrants we don't stand a chance.

[Lost_in_the_Woods]

You know it wasn't about safety. It obvious wasn't in the public best interest... But we're over 500 days into 14 days to flatten the curve and some people are still nodding there head like "they said it was to help us, they know what they are doing"

And they do. They know exactly what they are doing. They get away with it because people who don't insist it can't possibly be trying to wrongfully and unfairly gain enormous wealth and power over the rest of us more than any king ever has. Regardless of the fact the rich have always abused their power since the beginning of written history.

But "Nah, it's cool. They are probably just trying to do the right thing by profiting off people starving and losing their homes while they drive up the price of food and gas for the entire world"

But honestly, I tried to avoid this discussion here so you think what you want to think about it and someday it will hit you like... "I should have listened and paid attention to the facts instead of the narrative"

[sensible27]

I think there are some wrong assumptions there. What you're basically doing is you're assuming people are rational and have perfect information but are still doing odd things out of ill intent but often it's the case that people don't really know what to do and they're trying to minimise risk.

I don't mean to be repeating the same points again, but let's say you really think global warming is a real threat, you might still invite your friends who might come via a plane over if you think you can discuss it. I'm not saying this is always the case but just a scenario. The problem with these sort of threats, ie global warming and covid is. They're somewhat servere but the affects are not as apparent, or it takes a long time for them to reach a stage of real catastrophe. Which is one of the things human brains seem not to be so good at, presumably because evolutionary we benefited far more from dealing with short term problems and the long term thinking and threat detection aspect didn't have much time to develop.

Who said you'll produce in south america and then transport it to places. If you're only concerned with power and money, you can possibly earn almost as much from other places. Say places like india, which have a decent enough population size, enough farm lands, enough people for workers on cheap enough labour that automation might not really matter, and cheap farm land. Basically the perfect market in some sense. And say the cost stinginess of people might help. Isn't some of the fuel needs of the us fullfilled by saudi arabia
They're transporting it no, it must not be that inefficient

You do realise bill gates would've been worth possibly upwards of 400b if he still had his microsoft stock and hadn't liquidated it or given to charity. And not sure how the "bill gates is a computer guy" thing matter, yes, that's what he used to do and possibly still somewhat does but people can learn new things and change fields decently easily.

[sensible27]

Lastly, have you actually run the numbers on how much farm land would be required? If constant potato production or corn production would harm agricultural fields. And what it would actually cost after refining?/? Can I get the numbers if you have them

[Lost_in_the_Woods]

Again, I understand your perspective but you aren't informed about the reality. The earth has never had a stable temperature. We are actually currently in what's called an interglacial period of an ICE AGE. Look it up, you can't follow the science by talking to a politician. Ask a fucking climate scientist. Yes, we contribute to rising temperatures. In fact... according to the experts if we keep it up we might just prevent or delay three miles of ice from forming over top of NYC and killing everyone like the day after tomorrow on steroids. Seriously, go do your own actual research on the change in earth's climate over time. Things are going pretty great for us, the climate has never been stable, warmer is WAY better for us than colder, and the climatologists say we are currently experiencing an ice age that is likely to burry us in ice and kill us all.
But no, Obama and Nancy Pelosi are not concerned about rising sea levels. If sea levels rise a foot Obama is going to have water in his living room. And he bought the place after he left office so... yeah. Cut the political crap about global warming. Yes the earth is getting warmer, but the idea that we should be concerned about that is an intentional fabrication designed to trick you into an electric car and god knows what else.

[Lost_in_the_Woods]

So no, if I thought Global Warming was a real threat, I absolutely would not spend hundreds of millions on beachfront property and fly everywhere in a private jet. I ride an antique motorcycle and diligently recycle. I actually love the "Well you wouldn't actually do the right thing either" game because I already do. My carbon footprint is tiny compared to the average American, let alone Bill Gates or Barrack Obama. I have plans to build cheap self-sustaining mobile homes out of the things other people throw away so poor people can buy instead of being stuck in the rent loop of modern-day slavery. That sentence will hit you differently after 8 years of trying to make it on your own unless someone is paying your bills for you.

Global warming isn't the problem, ecological destruction and largescale pollution are the problems. They make billions doing those two things while they fool the nieve into thinking they are mandating electric cars for the environment to prevent the end of the world when PRODUCING an electric car makes more pollution and CO2 than driving your old one for another 30 years before it even leaves the lot and starts burning coal. I could set my tires on fire and change my oil twice a week without coming close to the CO2 produced by a Prius or a Tesla. It's not about CO2, its about controlling you. If it was about CO2 they wouldn't be trying to mandate cars that produce more of it by telling you the world would be destroyed if you don't buy one. Ignorance is the lack of knowledge, and that's the real global pandemic.

What I've learned is that most global warming doomsayers actually know almost nothing about climatology. You are yet another shining example. Don't give me that crap about how you think I can't understand the long term. You're smart, but you are ignorant. I've been looking into this stuff for a long time. I understand it way better than you do. And that's not an attack, it's just good advice.

[Lost_in_the_Woods]

So far as the third paragraph... Honestly, I have no idea what you are on about.

Ethanol is cheaper in Europe too. The transportation cost isn't even relevant at this point because one, we already ship the oil all over the place so it would be no different, and two... we are throwing away literal mountains of potatoes right here in our own country instead of using them to make Ethanol.

How much would it take to switch the whole world off Oil? A fucking lot. More than we are producing right now. And a lot of experts (including the UN) are predicting massive food shortages in the next 30-50 years. But that's also beside the point.

You can't say the reason we don't use more ethanol is that we don't have enough starch to make the ethanol out of when people are literally spending money to bury billions of dollars worth of it in the ground because it's in their way. That's... literally one of the worst arguments I have ever heard.

Do we have enough to stop using oil today? No, of course not.
Do we use what we already have? Not even close.
So is the problem that we don't have enough?

No, the problem is that we aren't using it. And why not? It isn't because of shipping. We ship oil from literally the other side of the world, refine it, then put it in trucks. Biden just shut down our pipeline and approved the Russians one that congress passed bipartisan legislation to stop. So guess how they move the fuel, oil, and natural gas... They use trucks. So your argument about transportation is as uninformed as the one about not having enough starch.

Ethanol is cheaper and more readily available. You literally just started learning about it.
You ask the right questions but you don't know the answers better than I do.

[Lost_in_the_Woods]

Why does it matter that Bill Gates turned down 400 billion dollars to become a farmer? Name one other coder who just woke up one day and decided to be a farmer. It matters because there must be a reason. Look into these "charities" he is involved in. He said he was drilling wells in Africa for 10 years. Took donations and didn’t actually drill very many wells. If one man in one truck can drill 3 wells a day… that’s 1000 wells a year. Send 10 guys and ten trucks and they do 100,000 wells in 10 years. Costs bill gates what… 50-100 million tops. So… where are the fucking wells? Why are people still thirsty?

Because Bill Gates is a fucking liar.
He is over there selling seeds that don't grow for extorted prices while he helps Monsanto change the laws so the farmers can't profit off what they do produce. And they are buying up the land when these people starve to death. They have been rioting in the streets and practically fighting a civil war for years and most Americans have absolutely no idea because the media doesn't cover it.

I'll let the experts give you the overview but my office hours are ending for the day.
You are asking the right questions, you just need to dig deeper than the first answer that the media puts in your mouth for you. Those are usually not as sweet as they first seem.
Kind of like Bill Gate's magic seeds.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3_8owv2dtP0
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gmEc7_jV3j0
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HktSUWkg5JM

[sensible27]

This is odd, because assuming even if what you say is true you have no idea what I do or do not know about global warming since I haven't actually talked about it, seems more like you're creating arguments you think I would come up with and are essentially trying to answer them.

I do know about interglacial and glacial periods, and how earths environment varies over large periods of time. If you follow global warming closely you probably know this, but just for the sake of repetition. Global warming also causes extreme climate in localised regions. And worse, affects the ecological balance. The temperature rising might not be as big a problem and so might not the ice caps melting but global warming is just shown to be bad and climatologists seem to unanimously agree on that, so I don't understand that whole warming is good argument.

Here are two articles

climate.nasa.gov/.../

www.quantamagazine.org/.../

And I think you're trying to say ev's are bad. And assuming that's true yes, it's about the long term. Not sure what the problem is with that

www.epa.gov/greenvehicles/electric-vehicle-myths

Lastly, if you had the resources no you possibly wouldn't have lower carbon emissions than an average American because assuming you cared you would be trying to minimise the overall emissions than caring personally about your own

[Lost_in_the_Woods]

No, I'm responding to the stupid shit you say. You are Quoting what the government told you. And I just happen to know better.

And you contradict yourself like a politician.

So reducing carbon emissions is critical to the long term survival of the planet because of global warming but producing massive amount of carbon emissions is worth it in the long run because electric cars?

Congratulations, you are officially too brainwashed to use linear reasoning.

[Lost_in_the_Woods]

Private jets and half billion dollar personal cruise ships don't reduce CO2 emissions.

And no, I wouldn't have those things. I'd have a Cessna and a mining barge full of dirt so I could grow my own food and not have to come back to America.

Do you know who funds NASA and the EPA? They are the same people who want to make you buy cars that polite more to save the environment.

The production emissions don't go away ovet time. they get worse as the resources get harder to find just like the oil did.

And they aren't making any real progress to converting the grid to renewable energy. Wind Mills look great on a campaign poster but they don't make a lot of power, and they only do it when and where it's windy.

The long term solution is solar, but we need high quality transmission infrastructure to move it across the country and we don't have that.

Meanwhile Biden wants 3 trillion dollars to "fix bridges"

You'd have to be an idiot to think it costs that much but most people have no concept of what a trillion dollars is.

If you made a dollar a second, $3600 an hour. All day every day even when you slept it would take 12 days to make a million, 30 years to make a billion, and 31,000 years to make a trillion.

He wants 4 of those. To paint concrete. When we are already like 23 trillion in debt.

And that's why they stopped teaching math and science and replaced it with CRT.

But hey, you're getting your political stupid all over my educational gas station post. Please knock it off. I'm out of patience for it.

[Lost_in_the_Woods]

I never said global warming is good. I said the Earth's temperature has never stayed the same. It has always changed.

So there are two options, warmer... Or colder.

I'll take a hurricane over three solid miles of ice covering the entire landmass any day.

[Lost_in_the_Woods]

If you would rather have the three miles of ice... You're going to have to find a fuel source other than oil or Ethanol because neither one is going to be an option at that point.

Global warming is neither good nor bad. It's simply what happens when there isn't a fucking ice age.

And thankfully, it isn't up to NASA or the EPA. They don't have control over that any more than the weatherman has control over the weather.

But if one thing is certain, governments have an absolutely atrocious track record trying to control nature.

[Surely]

Being probably the only person that read your post in its entirety. You missed one thing.
The reason some drivers experience lower fuel mileage when using a larger percentage of alcohol infused gasoline.

[Lost_in_the_Woods]

It contains less chemical energy by Volume.

Burning the same amount per stroke creates less power so you'll end up using slightly more throttle for the same result. IF your car is tuned for regular gasoline. If it's retuned for ethanol you can usually take advantage of the higher octane rating and lean out the ratio to produce more power from less fuel.

But even without a remap, the milage is usually offset by the lower prices.

But, that's more a performance and tuning point than it is about understanding different fuels. I was trying to keep it relitively to the point of understanding what is actually coming out of the pumps.

I do wish I had mentioned that a lot of Diesel is mixed with biodiesel these days but they don't really have different opinions and very few places actually sell biodiesel separately so, that's kind of just a part of regular diesel now.

[Lost_in_the_Woods]

Edit: the remaps help but the millage will still usually be lower per gallon. But, better than without one.

And gas mileage isn't really the goal. Its about overall cost and ecological impact and the Ethanol wins both.

People are concerned they will get worse millage but it's like, why do you care? You spend less to get to work and you do less damage on the way so... I don't really see the downside.

[Lost_in_the_Woods]

" Its about overall cost and ecological impact and the Ethanol wins both."

After some further reading, I no longer believe this to be true.
I will try to remember to link the new take here, but the short version is I think we've been lied to by the corn farming unions and Ethanol is not actually more cost-effective or better for the environment.

Safe to say I'm pretty upset about that.

[strateguy632]

sounds like for city driving no benefit of high octane.

[Lost_in_the_Woods]

If your car requires it, it requires it all the time.

If your car doesn't require it, there is never any benefit.

[greenpowersaver]

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