for Gas 2.0Water conservation has always been a hot button for aid organizations and environmentalists, and with a world wide lack of drinking water, and third world countries getting involved in the growing bio-economy, I think it’s time to look behind the curtain of the fuel movement that calls itself “green.”
Most of us are familiar with the “food vs. fuel” controversy that’s been making news, but in addition to this, one of the things that many people are taking a good hard look at, is water sustainability in reference to this corn ethanol fuel.
If we look at the raw data, it becomes apparent that it takes 1 bushel of corn to make 2.5 gallons of ethanol. Now that doesn’t seem so bad, until you ask yourself, “How much water does it take to grow that bushel of corn?”
Let’s look at some more raw data. Did you know that it takes 2,500 gallons of water to produce that one bushel of corn? That’s a lot of water for 2 and half gallons of Ethanol. Let’s take this thinking a step further. If it takes 2,500 gallons of water to create 2.5 gallons of ethanol, then it takes 20,000 gallons of water, to make 20 gallons of Ethanol.
Think of it like this, the average firetruck holds up to 1,000 gallons of water. Now imagine 20 firetrucks lined up side by side, that’s how much water it takes to make 20 gallons of Ethanol.
I realize that not all of the water that’s needed to grow corn, is fed to the crop through irrigation. In the United States, about 15 percent of a crops total water usage comes from irrigation. But the United States is not the only country that’s growing corn for ethanol. In the growing bio-economy, many smaller (and less water laden countries) are jumping on the corn bandwagon, and some of these countries don’t have the average yearly rainfall, or depth of top-soil that the United States has.
The best source of any type of renewable fuel, should be as environmentally friendly as possible, and until other technologies become available, I for one, will keeping my eye out for other options.
Photo courtesy of SouthernPixel via Creative Commons License.
Source: Domestic Fuel
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{ 23 comments… read them below or add one }
So you know what is an even more wasteful use of corn. Feeding it to cows. When you look at the cost (in water) of grain fed beef cows we are talking 2,500 gallons per pound of beef. That quarter pounder you ate the other day: 625 gallons just for the meat.
Also, it takes 10 times the energy (i.e. fuel) to produce a pound of meat than a pound of grain. Cutting your meat consumption is the number one easiest way to reduce your carbon footprint and you’ll save money too!
You’re riigh Tom,
I did an article entitled “Beefs Effects on People, the Environment and Society” in which I talk about this. (You can find it by typing “beef” into the search bar.)
Like you said, not eating beef, or cutting back, is one of the best thing that people can do to lower their carbon footprint and improve their health.
Thanks for the excellent comment, and please stop in again.
Adam
of course fossil fuel is better. Let’s dump the planet with fossil fuel.
this is the lamest article I ever read.
I was raised on a farm and the figure of 2,500 gallons to produce one bushel of corn seems way high.
The direct process where corn is turned into ethanol takes around 5 gallons of water per gallon of ethanol, so that leaves 2,495 gallons of water in the growing cycle.
Do you have a source for these figures?
Thanks
greg
All the water that is fed to the corn and all other vegetables ends up back in the ground and can be reused. The same amount of water that is on the earth right now, has always been here, and most likely will be here forever. SO, if the water is fed to plants or animals, it eventually ends up back in the environment for later use. Your argument lacks any research. Also, if we fed the corn to the cattle once it has been already used to create ethanol, we can kill 2 birds with one stone. It takes 15 pounds of corn to add 1 pound of weight to a cow, but only 2 pounds of processed corn(from making ethanol) to do the same thing. If we used all the corn we fed to our cattle to make ethanol, then gave the cows the leftover protein, we would be able to feed our cows and half of our country’s poor. WAKE UP! GET THE FACTS!
I am tired of this argument.
Greg,
The number (2500 gallons) comes from an article entitled “Managing Water for Future Sustainability.” The link to the article is at the bottom of my articles. But for convienance, I’ll quote the article.
“About 15 percent of corn that is in counties that have ethanol plants is irrigated.” He adds that it takes 2,500 gallons for a bushel of corn. Now, while a large amount of that is grown in areas that uses the natural rainfall, what is worrisome is the corn grown in the drier western plains.”
Thanks for you’re comment
Adam
John,
if you had followed the “Source” link at the bottom of the article, you would have seen my research source.
I also suspect that you did not read the full post, so I’ll quote the post.
“I realize that not all of the water that’s needed to grow corn, is fed to the crop through irrigation. In the United States, about 15 percent of a crops total water usage comes from irrigation. But the United States is not the only country that’s growing corn for ethanol. In the growing bio-economy, many smaller (and less water laden countries) are jumping on the corn bandwagon, and some of these countries don’t have the average yearly rainfall, or depth of top-soil that the United States has.”
My question to you is, “How can we use all the corn we feed to cows to make ethanol?” They have already eaten it! In addition, we don’t just take left over feed corn to make ethanol out of, we grow it specifically for ethanol.
Please also take into consideration that corn is not a natural part of a cows diet. Corn actually kills them. That is why we shoot them full of antibiotics starting the day they are born, in order to keep them alive until we can kill them.
These are the facts John. Thanks for you’re comment.
Adam
Did you know that when you heat that one gallon of water up to above 212F, it starts becoming steam, achieving the third state of matter, a gas?
Did you also know that there are many ways of heating that water to such a temperature, including burning methanol, methane, oil, coal, and ethanol, as well as propane, butane, gasoline, diesel, even benzene? But wait, there’s more, there’s other ways to heat the water, mechanical friction, concentrated solar energy, microwaves, and even rapid agitation. Doesn’t really matter how you boil the water, what is important is that, once you have steam, you have vapor pressure, which can be used to move a piston. I say, ’screw dependency on middle east fuel sources’, if it takes 30,000 gallons to turn out the ethanol, then do it. But, let’s work alternatives like we mean it, here. Put the sheiks and the oil barons out of business. Make their product obsolete. Investigate other means of ethanol production besides corn. Potatoes work, too. Anything that you can make into a mash, and ferment, pretty much. France did it with unsold wine. Where there’s a will, there’s a way. What’s in YOUR investment portfolio? What, indeed. Let’s end this energy poker game, and work the science aspects. Hydrogen’s out there…
Water is our most important, most abused, and taken for granted natural resource. The plant has so much water that we just don’t seem to be to concerned about it. They didnt build all the ethanol plants in the midwest just because that’s where the corn is, it’s also the last place in the U.S. to start running out of water – yet that is.
Great Article!
These pagan earth worshiping hypocrites have already caused food riots across the globe in their quest to stop the non-existent “warming” problem.
They’re little more than meddling, ignorant, religious zealots making people across the globe miserable to appease their dirt based deity.
There’s plenty of good reasons to doubt this pseudo-science but, like most true believers, they happily cast inconvenient facts aside and cheer as untold millions suffer.
While your numbers might be correct, you are including rainfall to grow crops. About 96% of America’s corn is grown without irrigation. So while your argument may hold water for irrigated crops, it really doesn’t with respect to non-irrigated ones.
Wow, what a great article. I think I’ll add it to my list of other useless information such as it takes:
2072 gallons to produce 4 car tires
39,090 gallons to produce a new car
107,000 gallons for personnel consumption
11.6 gallons for 1 chicken
1,500 gallons for one barrel of beer
1.5 gallons to flush a urinal
13 gallons to make a gallon of paint
62,500 gallons to make a ton of steel
1,360 gallons to make a ton of cement
And you know what? Not one single gallon of water was lost. It all eventually makes it’s way after use by either evaporation or by way of municipal wastewater back into the watershed to be used again for some other use.
So go drown your self – it can take less than a single gallon.
How about making methanol from hemp?? It was being done just before hemp was declared a controlled substance. Geez, with legalized hemp what would the oil companies, paper companies and fabric companies do??!!?? Probably not do as much damage to the environment. Hemp is renewable and it’s a weed. It grows to full maturity in about six weeks and if you get the right genus it’s fun to smoke. SO???????
Hey, also, hemp seeds are nutricious. Hemp is a very verstaile plant!!
Excellent piece, Adam. I’m going to link to it on my own blog.
The basic fact is that energy supply is merely an aspect of physics and Earth geology. Even electric cars require a fuel source for making the electricity. Coal and uranium and the very energy-intensive materials and processes needed to build wind and solar are all finite.
The reign of automobiles is the problem, and it has no viable long-term solution, wish and dream as we might. Every day we waste on the sponsored “alt-fuel” fantasies is one more weight we are adding to the punishment we are imposing on our children and grandchildren.
Bert,
You’re right, there are all different types of alternative fuels out there. I’ve written about this quite a bit on Gas 2.0, but unfortunately, it seems as if the first one to market with a “Government Approved” technology gets the cake, regardless of whether or not the technology makes sense.
News in the last few days has shown that the Ethanol Industry is not doing to well right now with the falling gas prices. But neither are any of the other good alternative fuel industries. People care more about the price of the object they are buying than the price that object has on society and the environment.
Thanks for you’re comment
C,
Along the same lines, Al Gore wrote 5 strategic threats to our earths water system. I you type Al Gore into the search engine, you will find an article I wrote for each of the five threats.
People are fond of saying, and you will find it in these comments also, that the water used to grow fuel returns to the earth. This is true to a certain extent, but we do irrigate. It’s also true that the water that returns to the earth is often poisoned with chemicals, and those gallons of water that do return to the earth, don’t just sit there ready to feed the next crop. If they did, we wouldn’t need to irrigate right?
Thanks for you’re comment,
Adam
Ed,
Actually, it’s 85 percent of rainfall that crops use, not 96 percent. The other 15%, we pump from the tap to put on the crops. With this being said, 375 gallons is still a lot more water than I feel comfortable using, for 1 gallon of ethanol.
Adam
Adam
Ben,
You’ve just done a good job of making my point for me. It takes a lot of water to live our lives. Do we want to add more to that list of yours?
Michael,
Thanks for the great comment, and for the link love. It’s an important issue. I’ll check out you’re site.
Keep up the good fight,
Adam
The comments about meat took me by surprise.
If you want more reason not to eat meat, see the PBS video “King Corn”
You’ll probably stop drinking soft drinks as well.
Its ok to have an opinion that says you dont think ethanol is sustainable but please , you should at very least use accurate data in your hypothetical articles. In a area where we would expect 48 inches of rain to fall a year and all of it to go towards producing the corn crop, which it does not) you would have 4 acre feet of water divided by the yeild say 110 or about 1100K gallons of water. By useing the same figures we could say that the average homeowner with a 2 acre yard uses 2.2 million gallons of water a year to grow grass. So I conclude that your yard and street are a total waist of water.
Holy crap. You have to be kidding me!!! In reading posts, I have come to conclude that there are some great minds at waste here. Water??? Give me a break. Water is only a valuable resource to those areas not afforded by consistant and measurable rainfall, like Australia, arid regions of California, and the heavily populated areas of the world. You want to sit here and complain about wasting water, in order for the usage of an alternative fuel. How much water did you waste writing this message. <–see that made no sense to me either. So why create (fabricate) something to start a panic, or serious doubt in the minds of the weak? We have a cycle of life right? you live, you die, you decompose, and you fertilize the earth to create valuable nutrition for the growth of plants to feed the cows, that feed that new born child from its use of formula all the way through until its last Big Mac. Water, goes in ground. Water soaked up through roots of plants. Water consumed by plant. EVAPORATION (water to a gaseous form, that floats to the atmosphere, where it has a social gathering with other EVAPORATED water, they get so excited they start crashing into each other, joining hands and singing gayly!!!! Then before you know it, they weigh so stinking much that they fall back to the earth CONDENSATION-PRECIPITATION. So cylce of life for water. I cannot see a significant waste of water. Infact, all the tree hugging save the planet hippies should be happy with your lame theory, global warming (fallacy as well) evaporating the polar icecaps, raising water levels across the world, and depleting natural habitats. So we need to use more water, to decrease the CO2 emmissions, that deplete our ozone, causing temperatures to rise and melt ice, that creates more water.
Thank you all for this completley entertaining waste of my time. It was a good release from my normal day to day activities of opening all the faucets in my house, and flushing the toilets, and watering the drive way…. I like water abuse!!!!!
Shawn