Well some of you more knowlegable ones probably already knew this. I'll just tell ya what happened and what I learned today, beings I was ignorant prior.
Today I went to remove the broken fuel line from my chain saw (it's just a plastic line inside the tank) and it disintegrated into pieces. Biggest mess I ever saw. I had to pour gas into the tank, swish it around, and turn the saw sideways to flush the gas and the plastic bits out of the tank. Then let it dry and blow it out with the compressor. I had plastic bits up inside the pump bulb line so bad the pump bulb would not return from a push.
So went to my local Lawnmower repair shop and told them I needed a Walbro carb rebuild kit and some new fuel line. I asked them did they sell any fuel line that would not rot in the tank. They say no but they could sell me premixed 'ethanol-free' gas that would not deteriorate the plastic lines.
I said huh ? Yep our good old ethanol that we are forced to buy at most pumps, deteriorates plastic fuel lines over time. The more I hear about ethanol I just don't get it. It's like global warming, a scientific theory gone wild.
Here are some interesting facts I got off the net today.
1.Creating plant-based biofuels requires too much farmland to be practical or sustainable—land that would be better used to grow food. Plus it runs the cost of food up comparatively.
2.Producing ethanol and other biofuels takes more energy than the fuel can generate.
In a 2005 study, Cornell University researcher David Pimental factored in the energy needed to grow crops and convert them to biofuels and concluded that producing ethanol from corn required 29 percent more energy than ethanol is capable of generating. Pimental found similar problems with making biodiesel from soybeans.
“There is just no energy benefit to using plant biomass for liquid fuel,” Pimentel says.
Now here's the part your gonna love. How much you reckon all of this seemingly futile effort to keep us from drilling where environmentalist won't let us is costing us. You ain't JUST paying for it at the pump. Nope our good old tax dollars are paying for it before we ever even get to the pump.
Corn ethanol subsidies totaled $7.0 billion in 2006 for 4.9 billion gallons of ethanol. Even with high gas prices in 2006, producing a gallon of ethanol cost 38¢ more than making gasoline with the same energy.
Where did those subsidies come from:
1. 51¢ per gallon federal blenders credit for $2.5 billion = your tax dollars.
2. $0.9 billion in corn subsidies for ethanol corn = your tax dollars.
3. $3.6 billion extra paid at the pump.
Life on planet earth, it almost seems like the whole planet is flying with blinders on. Unfortunately I fear the powers that be, see all to clearly and feed us the mushroom medium.
