Petroleumworld`s
Opinion Forum:
viewpoints on issues in energy, international
politics & civilization.
Saturday's
Lagniappe
Henry Ford’s farsighted
endorsement of ethanol
Henry
Ford designed his Model A to run on ethanol in the 1930's. (Seems
he was way ahead of his time.)
By
Robert H. Campbell
Henry Ford
was indeed a man ahead of his time. The grandfather of the American
automobile and the great innovator of the automotive assembly
line, Ford was also an outspoken proponent of alcohol based
fuels. But like most visionaries of his time, his logic couldn’t
compete with the profits that petroleum companies promised investors.
In the early
1900s the world’s first automobile makers searched for
efficient fuels to propel their new creations. Rudolph Diesel
used peanut oil in the engine he debuted at the World’s
Fair in Paris, while most early British car makers preferred
kerosene. Gasoline was a waste product that Rockefeller’s
lamp oil refineries dumped straight into the Cleveland River
until 1905.
Henry Ford,
who was the son of a Michigan farmer, always advocated using
ethanol as fuel for his automobile’s engines - he hoped
to foster an industrial market for American farm crops. In 1925,
Ford told a New York Times reporter that ethyl alcohol was "the
fuel of the future", and that it would “come from
fruit like that sumac out by the road, or from apples, weeds,
sawdust -- almost anything," he said. "There is fuel
in every bit of vegetable matter that can be fermented.”
And for
Ford who had a farm background and was supportive of agriculture,
making what would today be known as biofuel, had potential to
alleviate a mounting economic crisis for many Mid-Western farmers
(that would intensify in the Great Depression five years later).
Although the economics of American agriculture’s misery
were indeed complex, one possible solution could have been the
creation of a domestic fuel market from homegrown crops. Through
Ford's own financial and political assistance, the idea of creating
such a market for farm goods would translate into a broad movement
for scientific research labeled "Farm Chemurgy" which
also advocated using hemp and soybean plastic.
In the end,
gasoline won out over ethanol even though Henry Ford actually
designed the 1908 engine of his famous Model T to burn a mixture
of gasoline and alcohol. Unfortunately, gasoline emerged as
the dominant transportation fuel due to several factors, including
its ease of operation of gas powered engines, a growing supply
of cheaper petroleum from oil field discoveries, and finally
due to intense lobbying by petroleum companies to maintain steep
alcohol taxes… Remember alcohol had a very bad reputation
in the United States during the Prohibition Era of 1920-1933.
It wasn’t
that gasoline was considered a miracle fuel; it too had a bad
reputation. Gasoline had a lower octane rating than ethanol,
was far more toxic, and generally more hazardous. Early refineries
were dangerous places - gasoline was famous for spontaneous
ignition and catastrophic explosions. Gasoline combustion produced
more air pollution and was much more physically and chemically
complex than ethanol, necessitating intensive refining procedures
to ensure a consistent gasoline product.
Yet in the
end, two key reasons pushed petroleum fuels to forefront of
automobile transportation for the last 75 years. First, cost
per mile of travel became virtually the sole selection criteria
at the gas pump, and secondly, large investments made by the
oil refining industry in physical capital, human skills and
technology made the entry of a new cost-competitive fuel difficult
in the existing marketplace.
Unfortunately, Ford’s vision for a new kind of fuel was
lost to political and economic forces he couldn’t control.
In fact, throughout American history any legislation proposing
a ‘national energy program’ to employ agricultural
resources for fuel production has always been extinguished by
well funded public relations campaigns launched by petroleum
interest groups. One noteworthy claim forwarded by petrol companies
in 1928 was that the U.S. government planned to fleece taxpayers
to make farmers rich.
If you read
some of the websites and blogs on ethanol today you’ll
hear the same thing. A common misconception is that large agribusinesses
control the ethanol industry. In fact, according to data on
www.ethanol.org, nearly half of the ethanol plants in the U.S.
are owned by groups of local farmers or local investors in cooperatives
or limited liability companies. And at least half of the plants
under construction are also locally owned.
The largest
producer of ethanol in Canada, GreenField Ethanol, works closely
with farmers in communities in Ontario and Quebec, which directly
creates jobs and new forms of revenue in these communities.
So in the
end Henry Ford, long regarded as a genius for bringing us the
automobile, was actually on to something even more intelligent.
Ethanol, the fuel of the future has finally arrived at many
gas stations all over North America. Mr. Ford would likely feel
a sense of vindication to see GreenField Ethanol helping agricultural
communities by buying corn directly from Canadian farmers. His
vision would be validating by the fact that over 70 percent
of the revenue generated by ethanol producers is spent within
a 150 miles of the plant. Already ethanol production in Canada
has grown from zero litres a year in the early 80s, to almost
238 million litres a year in 2006. According to the Canadian
Renewable Fuels Association Canada’s ethanol production
is expected to triple in the next four years and reach a total
of 650 million litres by 2010.
And just
like Henry Ford’s1908 Model T, most vehicles manufactured
after 1980 will tolerate up to 10 per cent ethanol, known as
E-10, which is the most common blend in Canada. Some newer vehicles
however can tolerate E-85, a blend of 85 percent ethanol and
15 per cent gasoline. In Brazil, a country rich in sugar cane,
the automotive industry supports 100 percent pure ethanol fuel.
If the price of oil and gas continues to rise in North America,
100 percent pure ethyl alcohol could be our future as well.
Robert
H. Campbell
is the editor of
Fuel Ghoul blog. Petroleumworld do not necessarily
share these views.
