La Nina and Pacific Decadal Oscillation Cool the Pacific
Click here to view full image (228 kb)
“The shift in the PDO can have significant implications for global climate, affecting Pacific and Atlantic hurricane activity, droughts and flooding around the Pacific basin, the productivity of marine ecosystems, and global land temperature patterns. ” – NASA JPL
A cool-water anomaly known as La Niña occupied the tropical Pacific Ocean throughout 2007 and early 2008. In April 2008, scientists at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory announced that while the La Niña was weakening, the Pacific Decadal Oscillation—a larger-scale, slower-cycling ocean pattern—had shifted to its cool phase.
This image shows the sea surface temperature anomaly in the Pacific Ocean from April 14–21, 2008. The anomaly compares the recent temperatures measured by the Advanced Microwave Scanning Radiometer for EOS (AMSR-E) on NASA’s Aqua satellite with an average of data collected by the NOAA Pathfinder satellites from 1985–1997. Places where the Pacific was cooler than normal are blue, places where temperatures were average are white, and places where the ocean was warmer than normal are red.
The cool water anomaly in the center of the image shows the lingering effect of the year-old La Niña. However, the much broader area of cooler-than-average water off the coast of North America from Alaska (top center) to the equator is a classic feature of the cool phase of the Pacific Decadal Oscillation (PDO). The cool waters wrap in a horseshoe shape around a core of warmer-than-average water. (In the warm phase, the pattern is reversed).
See the entire story here:
http://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/Newsroom/NewImages/images.php3?img_id=18012
See the PRESS RELEASE from JPL here:
http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/news/news.cfm?release=2008-066
Look out California agriculture. The wine industry, fruits and nut growers will be hit with a shorter growing season and more threats of frost, among other things.
Recently in Nevada County, much of their grape crop was wiped out. From The Union in Nevada County (h/t Russ Steele)
Nevada County’s agricultural commissioner will seek disaster relief from the state after tens of thousands of dollars worth of crops were ruined from last week’s freezing temperatures.
Orchard trees, wine grapes and pastures were hardest hit, Pylman said. The commissioner is compiling a report of damages that he will send to the state Office of Emergency Services in coming weeks.
“Growers don’t have anything to harvest. That’s a disaster in my mind,” Pylman said.
In Paradise, CA, Noble Orchards reports damage to their Apple crop from recent colder weather, as well as reports of issue with vineyards in the Paradise ridge area suffering from frost damage recently.
Here is a short history of PDO phase shifts:
In 1905, PDO switched to a warm phase.
In 1946, PDO switched to a cool phase.
In 1977, PDO switched to a warm phase.
California agriculture has ridden a wave of success on that PDO warm phase since 1977, experiencing unprecedented growth. Now that PDO is shifting to a cooler phase, areas that supported crops during the warm phase may no longer be able to do so.
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The debate on the economics of ethanol/energy balance of ethanol has been going on for 20 odd years. Its a life cycle assessment, and a very difficult one. Probably the best source is from ORNL – the ethanol institute is not one that I would go to for that.
Kum Dollison – are you saying that 76000 Btus of ethanol is equivalent to 116000 Btus of gasoline? Wow! Thats good physics! Ethanol on a per gallon basis cannot drive a car as much as a gallon of gasoline. Even I, a supporter of methanol, will admit that you’re going to have to have more methanol to go the same number of miles as gasoline. LHV is LHV – the octane value touches on issues of flame front speed and uniformity, which has an effect on a vehicle reaction rate, but at steady state, you can’t eliminate basic physics.
A few years ago I watched a very good presentation on ethanol plant baselining. If you could take the best energy aspects from all the plants, you got a positive output – but it was a close run thing. To me, the real issue is one of food supply. My first exposure to this was an article in Mathematical Geology 15+ years ago that showed that we could use all food grown in the US and convert it all to fuel – and we could use the annual output in a few months time, and there would be no food left. Since plants convert maybe 5 percent(?) of sunlight to useful energy, and to replace our equivalent “fuel” source with solar would take something on the order of 400 x 400 miles – that means we need plants taking up 895 by 895 miles to do the same thing. (all approximate – its 10 PM and I’ve got to hit the sack!). That’s basically ~23% of US land area (CIA fact book). SInce we’ve only got 20 arable land, the rquired land area by photosynthesis is greater than our land area….
A reader criticized me on my numbers in a past posting, and when you’re trying to hammer out some order of magnitude numbers to prove your point (instead of using someone else’s unsubtantiated numbers) you do make mistakes… I’ve put my assumptions here – they can be either proved or disproved pretty easily, and in the LHV case for fuels, the physics are unquestionable. If you don’t liek my numbers, please replace them and give us your thinking – I’m not trying to be snide, but I’m trying to get my thoughts out as rapidly as I can – and I’m not writing a paper for publication I hate sending people to wiki, since sometimes it can be sporadic in quality, but the article there reflects pretty well what I knew, including some of the major people arguing their case on both sides (Wang is from ORNL and has put substantial effort into examing life cycle issues).
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ethanol_fuel_energy_balance
None of the wiki’s arguements go into the issue of food supply. The US is the world’s foodbasket, and although WE won’t starve, it doesn’t mean that people on the edge won’t be affected. For what its worth, I’m still pushing the nuclear option. Jobs, energy security and stability, and no one starves (and if we reprocess, only 5% of the current waste lasting only on the order of hundred years)…
RC: Har! I’ll add (from Kahn, The Next 200 Years)
Synthetics Avalable if oil production should end. (U.S. Revenue Commission, 1866)
Little or no chance for oil in Kansas or Texas (USGS, 1885)
Maximum future supply of 22.5 bil. bbls. (officials of Geological Survey, 1908 )
Total future production only 5.7 billion bbls. (official of U.S. Bureau of Mines, 1914)
U.S. needs foreign oil and synthetics: peak domestic production almost reached (Dir. USGS, 1920)
Must import as much foreign oil as possible to save domestic supply. (Sec. of Interior, 1931)
U.S. oil supplies will last only 13 years. (radio broadcast, Interior Dept., 1939)
Sufficient oil cannot be found in the U.S. (Chief of Petroleum Div., State Dept., 1947)
End of U.S. oil supply almost in sight. (Sec. of Interior, 1949)
Just change the dates. You could pretty much keep the same cast of characters.
And now we have an estimated 400 to 500 bil. bbls sitting under North Dakota and Wyoming. And I bet you that’s the usual pessimistic underestimation.
Peak oil: Peek and ye shall find.
I copped snow on my farm this week (bout 8 falls and small hail) and Im only a couple of hours out of Sydney Australia. The weather systems that normally come in June have this year started in April and this week record cold temps were broken all over the place. The resorts got bout 30cm of snow and third time its snowed so far there this year. Last year was cold but this year on many weather stations on the BOM sites (www.bom.gov.au) temps around eastern seaboard/Sydney are 1 – 2d cooler than last year.
In speaking to the local farmers they say the climate shifted in the late 70s from cold wet to warm dry. The old guys are saying that it looks like weve shifted back to cold wet which fits and gives circumstantial evidence to the PDO cycle.
Brendan, ethanol has, as a result of it’s 113 OCTANE Rating (gasoline has 86,) achieved 40% Efficiency under proper compression. This is compared to gasoline’s 23 – 25%.
http://www.rhapsodyingreen.com/rhapsody_in_green/files/optimal_ethanol_blend_level_study.pdf
In This test, conducted by the Univ. of N. Dakota, and Mn State at Mankatow Three out of the Four cars tested achieved BETTER GAS MILEAGE with a Midlevel (e20, or e30) ethanol blend than when running straight gasoline. Fuel Combustion is very complex. BTU is very important; but there are many other factors at play (Octane, obviously, being chief among them.)
The FIRST RULE of Life Cycle Analysis is to use the most up to date data. ANYTHING published before 2006 is hopelessly outdated. Even 2006 data is too old to be used in a serious discussion. An example would be: a couple of years ago, Pimental stated that you could never get more than 2.7 gallons of ethanol from a bushel of corn. As you can see by my above post, some plants are now getting 2.96 gal/bu. Some of the older studies use 125 bu/acre. Last year we averaged 151, and I’ll betcha a dollar to a doughnut we’ll do 155 this year, and 160 with 3 years. In fact, Pioneer says they will up yields by 40% within a Decade.
The CIA is NEVER RIGHT. We have 1.2 Billion Acres of Arable Land in the U.S. We “RowCrop” about 20% of That. After allowing for Distillers Grains (Distillers Grains are 33% more effective cattle feed than corn, and we get 17.5 lbs of distillers grains from every bushel (56 lbs) of corn that we process for ethanol) we will use about 20 million acres of corn to reach our RFS of 15 Billion Gallons of Ethanol from corn.
Poor People don’t eat Field Corn (a kewpie doll for anyone who can eat a pound of it in a week;) Poor Cows eat Field Corn. Then, they’re slaughtered for Food for Rich People. Probably, the best thing that could happen for the impoverished in Africa (over 70% of which are subsistence farmers) would be for corn to remain in the $5.00/bu range. But, that’s a subject for another rant. G’nite 🙂
sunsettommy wrote :
< Almost all trends are a cooling one now.
< Ocean,
< Solar,
< PDO,
< AO,
< Tropics,
< S. Hemisphere.
Meanwhile, here in Belgium the media a few days ago said that the northern polar ice is melting 3 times faster than previously thougth!
Evan, I don’t know if we’re at “Peak” Oil, or if we’re a couple of years out, or what. But, Oil is at $115.00/bbl, and “Exports” (the Real “name of the game”) have been falling for Two Years.
http://netoilexports.blogspot.com/2008/04/net-oil-exports-april-2008-update.html
It doesn’t seem like THAT could be Good.
Jean,
Unfortunately Europe is in the middle of a warm oasis at the moment, and the euro-media keeps telling the citizens how warm it is.
It will be interesting when Europe gets hit with a real old fashioned winter.
Reprint of email
From: Allan MacRae
Sent: Sunday, December 30, 2007 6:43 AM
Subject: 9 Global Cooling Predictions
Hi Gentlemen,
I believe that human influences on climate are minor compared to natural influences.
I also believe that global warming is much less threatening to humanity than global cooling.
Several credible parties are now predicting that global cooling will start by 2020 or much sooner (see below). These predictions come from nine different scientific researchers/organizations including NASA and the Russian Academy of Sciences, and are derived from two scientific bases:
1. Solar cycles, such as the ~80-90 year Gleissberg Cycle.
2. Studies of solar physics and current solar activity trends.
Wouldn’t it be truly ironic if our society wasted hundreds of billions of dollars in a futile fight against global warming, only to conclude in the very near future that it is getting much colder, and we are not at all prepared for it, and we have squandered our scarce capital and resources to prevent a global warming crisis that did not exist?
Hope I’m wrong…
Best regards, Allan
______________________________________________________________________
Excerpt from:
Kyoto hot air can’t replace fossil fuels September 1, 2002; Allan M.R. MacRae; Calgary Herald
Over the past one thousand years, global temperatures exhibited strong correlation with variations in the sun’s activity. This warming and cooling was certainly not caused by manmade variations in atmospheric CO2, because fossil fuel use was insignificant until the 20th century.
Temperatures in the 20th century also correlate poorly with atmospheric CO2 levels, which increased throughout the century. However, much of the observed warming in the 20th century occurred before 1940, there was cooling from 1940 to 1975 and more warming after 1975. Since 80 per cent of manmade CO2 was produced after 1940, why did much of the warming occur before that time? Also, why did the cooling occur between 1940 and 1975 while CO2 levels were increasing? Again, these warming and cooling trends correlate well with variations in solar activity.
Only since 1975 does warming correlate with increased CO2, but solar activity also increased during this period. This warming has only been measured at the earth’s surface, and satellites have measured little or no warming at altitudes of 1.5 to eight kilometres. This pattern is inconsistent with CO2 being the primary driver for warming.
If solar activity is the main driver of surface temperature rather than CO2, we should begin the next cooling period by 2020 to 2030.
___________________________________________________________
Other Excerpts, in chronological order:
In 2003, Dr. Theodor Landscheidt wrote a paper predicting serious global cooling: “Analysis of the sun’s varying activity in the last two millennia indicates that contrary to the IPCC’s speculation about man-made global warming as high as 5.8° C within the next hundred years, a long period of cool climate with its coldest phase around 2030 is to be expected.” http://mitosyfraudes.8k.com/Calen/Landscheidt-1.html
In 2005, Piers Corbyn predicted cooling by 2040:
On the 2nd February 2005, he gave this presentation to the Institute of Physics Energy Management Group. It contained the following:
In the next 5 or 10 years warming is likely to be maintained as a transpolar shift occurs. This will be followed by the magnetic pole moving away from the geographic pole, a decrease in solar activity, a southward shift in the Gulf stream and considerable world cooling by 2040 AD.
http://julesandjames.blogspot.com/2005/05/trying-to-bet-on-climate-with-piers.html
In 2006, NASA predicted that “Solar Cycle 25, peaking around the year 2022, could be one of the weakest in centuries”. http://science.nasa.gov/headlines/y2006/10may_longrange.htm
Global cooling could develop on Earth in 50 years and have serious consequences before it is replaced by a period of warming in the early 22nd century, a Russian Academy of Sciences’ astronomical observatory’s report says. http://www.mosnews.com/news/2006/08/25/globalcooling.shtml
–MosNews, 25 August 2006
The Kyoto initiatives to save the planet from the greenhouse effect should be put off until better times. The global temperature maximum has been reached on Earth, and Earth’s global temperature will decline to a climatic minimum even without the Kyoto protocol.
http://www.mosnews.com/news/2006/08/25/globalcooling.shtml
–Khabibullo Abdusamatov, Russian Academy of Science, 25 August 2006
If you look back into the sun’s past, you find that we live in a period of abnormally high solar activity. Periods of high solar activity do not last long, perhaps 50 to 100 years, then you get a crash. It’s a boom-bust system, and I would expect a crash soon. http://www.newscientist.com/unpwlogin.ns
–Nigel Weiss, University of Cambridge, 16 September 2006
Sunspot numbers are well on the way down in the next decade. Sunspot numbers will be extremely small, and when the sun crashes, it crashes hard. The upcoming sunspot crash could cause the Earth to cool.
http://www.newscientist.com/unpwlogin.ns
–Leif Svalgaard, Stanford University, 16 September 2006
*****************************************************************************
An 8th prediction of cooling from China in 2007:
THE COMING GLOBAL COOLING?
World Climate Report, 16 March 2007
http://www.worldclimatereport.com/index.php/2007/03/16/the-coming-global-cooling/
An article has appeared in a recent issue of Meteorology and Atmospheric Physics with a curious title “Multi-scale analysis of global temperature changes and trend of a drop in temperature in the next 20 years.” … …”Despite the increasing trend of atmospheric CO2 concentration, the components IMF2, IMF3 and IMF4 of global temperature changes are all in falling”… …”the effect of greenhouse warming is deficient in counterchecking the natural cooling of global climate change in the coming 20 years. Consequently, we believe global climate changes will be in a trend of falling in the following 20 years.”… …”The global climate warming is not solely affected by the CO2 greenhouse effect. The best example is temperature obviously cooling however atmospheric CO2 concentration is ascending from 1940s to 1970s. Although the CO2 greenhouse effect on global climate changes is unsuspicious, it could have been excessively exaggerated. It is high time to re-consider the global climate changes.”
Reference
Zhen-Shan, L. and S. Xian. 2007. Multi-scale analysis of global temperature changes and trend of a drop in temperature in the next 20 years. Meteorology and Atmospheric Physics, 95, 115-121.
********************************************************************************
And a 9th prediction of cooling from Finland
Timo Niroma:
http://personal.inet.fi/tiede/tilmari/sunspots.html
Alert note 31.10.2007 – A probable new Dalton minimum.
According to my theory about Jovian effect on sunspots, based on facts measured since 1700 and estimated since 1500 (Schove)
– The Jupiter perihelion and sunspot minimum never coincide and the nearing perihelion will slow the rise of the height of sunspot cycle, as happened to the cycle 23 and will happen still more dramatically to cycle 24.
– The Gleissberg cycle has almost reached its lower limit, which is 72 years.
— In fact this low it has not been ever after the Maunder minimum.
— So it must go up, the short cycles of the 20th century has created a debt that must be paid.
Now the next Jovian perihelion is in late March in 2011. I predict that the length of the cycle 23 is in the range of 12.2-13 years. This means a minimum earliest in October 2008 and latest in July 2009 (I use the minimum of 1996.6). This means that the cycle 24 is very low, in the range of 40-70, or a Dalton level. This means that the maximum will be reached only in 2014. All this means there will be a cooling for decades, probable one Geissberg or nearly 80 years. (A sidestep: The rise of the CO2 in atmosphere from 0.03 to 0.04 % does not have any meaning in this play. The rise should be to more than 1 % to affect the complicated feedback system of Earth if the last 200 million history of Earth is used as a proxy of what has happened yesterday.)
Assuming that the last 500 years in solar behaviour can be used as a proxy for the normal behaviour of the Sun, the estimated probability of the first prediction is .91 and for the latter .96, making the total probability of this prediction to be true as 87%. (A sidestep: I’m a statistician and this is a statistical study, but a remark for those, who urgently for years have asked me about the physical reason: I find the Svensmark theory (2006) of cosmic rays oscillating to the rhythm of the Sun’s magnetic field as most promising. The CERN investigations in 2008 probably will settle the issue.)
**********************************************************
WHAT CAUSES THE PDO ?
Julian W,
I put this question to Lubos, who generously devoted his time to comment on this (Thank you Lubos!):
————————————-
“Dear Pierre, I don’t believe that PDO is linked to solar activity in either direction. In principle it might but the key thing is that I believe that such a relationship is not necessary from any viewpoint I can see.
PDO is a result of a turbulent and not-easily calculable process. I imagine that a cool PDO phase attracts La Ninas because the cool equatorial waters naturally “fit into” the cool horseshoe of PDO.
And vice versa, warm PDO attracts El Ninos.
The second part of the question is why El Nino and La Nina warm up or cool down the Earth. Well, the Pacific ocean is large so what happens in its center matters.
Of course, you are right that these effects seem unnatural from the viewpoint of the “total” energy budget of the whole ocean and atmosphere.
But the flows of “total energy” are surely influenced by the internal structure of the system, too – by the non-uniformities. And different pieces of the land and ocean have different abilities to influence the flow of heat, via the changing ability of ocean basins and continents to emit or absorb heat from the neighborhood.
So it probably matters a lot whether you put the solar heat in the middle of the ocean or the boundary. I think that experimentally it is very clear that it matters. The people – and models – who ignore such things are making a serious and naive mistake. It might be a “second order effect” but such effects are damn important for the climate.
It’s like a bank account where you get 10% a year and lose 10% next year. And so on. It looks like everything is balanced, but is it? Will your account stay the same? What will you have from USD 1 after 100 years? Well, you will have (1.1 * 0.9)^50 = 0.99^50 = 0.605. ”
—————————–
Looking at different charts, the global temperature seems to correlate with both solar activity and PDOs. Is this a coincidence?
‘Corn was just the necessary first step to get there.’
So What if the corn used is usually only fit for cows. If they are going to push biofuels, then MORE corn of that type will be grown, and less for People.
Way to genocide, Oy.
“In fact,” said Willis, “these natural climate phenomena can sometimes hide global warming caused by human activities. Or they can have the opposite effect of accentuating it.”
If the PDO can hide AGW, then AGW can’t possibly be the main cause of warming as stated by the IPCC.
Interesting analysis here by Jim Clarke
http://abc-7blogs.com/clarke/?p=4
This helps explain why the monthly average high temperature in San Diego has been below normal for 11 of the last 12 months. The only exception being August 2007 when it was 0.3f above normal. December 2007 and January 2008 were each 4.7f below normal.
Atmoz (19:54:20) :
“By definition, the PDO cannot contribute to global warming. Nor can it contribute to global cooling.”
A curious statement. What definition? I thought it was an observation from data?
I did have a look at the link provided, http://www.jisao.washington.edu/pdo/
and the two phases look drastically different in ocean temperatures. Are you saying that two degrees differences do not affect cloud cover, weather systems, and hence albedo, snow cover ice extent etc?
Strange model you must have there.
This paper examines the significance of the 1976 PDO positive shift for the climate of Alaska –
http://climate.gi.alaska.edu/Research Projects/Hartmann and Wendler 2005.pdf
The abstract in part says,
“Mean annual and seasonal temperatures for the positive phase were up to 3.1C higher…..Likewise, mean cloudiness, wind speeds, and precipitation amounts increased, while mean sea level pressure and geopotential heights decreased. The pressure decrease resulted in a deepening of the Aleutian low in winter and spring. The intensification of the Aleutian low increased the advection of relatively warm and moist air to Alaska and storminess over the state during winter and spring.
The regime shift is also examined for its effect on the long-term temperature trends throughout the state. The trends that have shown climate warming are strongly biased by the sudden shift in 1976from the cooler regime to a warmer regime.”
Atmoz: we have witnessed the direct cooling effects of La-Nina in the past several months. How can the broader cool PDO NOT have an effect??
re: Jean Meeus:
A mere 3 times 😉 We’ll see this summer how it works out.
Re: various biofuels:
The only demand the EU have to biofuels is that they emit >35% less CO2 compared to fossil fuels. If we put 5% biofuel in the fuel that would mean we reduce CO2 emission by an amazing 1.75% compared to all fossile fuel fuels.
That wouldn’t make a difference to just about anything, except food prices. If you get by on 2 dollar or less a year that’s nightmarish.
kum dollison,
It is interesting that you enjoy the thought of reducing the “rich” who eat high quality protein rich diets to the level of the poor who are forced to eat low quality starch diets and suffer from malnutrition. Incidentally, corn is also used in chicken feed, if that makes any difference to you. Many of the “poor” in the US rely on cheap poultry and eggs for their protein, and rising prices will mean that their health will decline as they spend more of their food dollars on cheap sugar or starch-filled alternatives. Not to mention the affect that rising feed prices have on dairy products. Diabetes anyone? Also, you are assuming that farmers will respond to the market by planting more corn for ethanol. But apparently, this is not always the case. See: http://www1.pressdemocrat.com/article/20080404/WIRE/804040363/1036/BUSINESS01
Just as the oil companies have been accused of intentionally limiting supply to raise prices, the farmers can choose to push the price higher possibly driving the ethanol producers out of profitability. Also, all of that “arable” land you are talking about happens to serve a purpose already. Do we have to turn all of the prairies and woods into waving fields of corn, saturated with pesticides and fertilizer? Corn is notoriously hard on soil, thus the need for crop rotation. In your ideal world, will demand for biofuel outstrip the intelligent management of farmland. If we do see a shift in climate towards drought, will we be back to the Dust Bowl of the Great Depression? You are very optimistic about biofuels, but I’d say there are a few weevils in the corn.
Classic lines of our times…
Peak oil:
Peek and ye shall find.
(Evan Jones)
OMG! A hockeystick….
http://icecap.us/images/uploads/Soy.jpg
Jean,
Daily sea ice map:
http://igloo.atmos.uiuc.edu/cgi-bin/test/print.sh
You are wrong on octane ratings. Most vehicles are not designed to take advantage of the faster and more even flame front introduced by a higher octane rating. You can soup up a vehicle to get better mileage on it, but it involves changing a whole slew of issues (did I not indicate that there was complexity in it when I mentioned the flame front issue? But in general, LHV is a better indicator of mileage than octane rating). Even with modifications, an increase in octane rating will not significantly change mileage. EPA (not an ethanol backed organization, like the one you mentioned) at their Ann Arbor test center found significant differences in mileage for E85 vehicles. The web link is
http://www.fueleconomy.gov/feg/download.shtml
Do a search on E85 and you will see back to back comparisons of fuel economy.
CIA’s facts are correct on this, despite your remark to the contrary (http://www.epa.gov/agriculture/ag101/landuse.html). My language may have been slightly misleading, but not if taken in context. I should have said that a simple calculation shows that the amount of land needed for ethanol production exceeds our current crop land (areable) use.
I was not trying to perform a life cycle analysis – of which I have performed many, by the way – but I did in fact point out the most respected group for doing life cycle analysis of this type in the US – the ORNL group. The Wiki was merely an overview of the arguements. Go check out ORNL for the latest (and I do mean latest) in life cycle assessments. The wiki gives a pretty fair overview of where that is – as stated.
You’re arguement over corn is a straw man. Crops are being rotated out to produce fuel or sold primarily as a fuel supply, tying for the first time the world energy market to food. That’s simple supply and demand – if a better price is paid for a product, that product will seek the price. Food prices can’t compete with fuel prices.
PS – Had a chance to look more closely at your ethanol study – the executive study says it all. An E30 blend increase gas mileage by 1% (probably statistically insignificant) and E20 by 15%. There’s your complexity curve. A 20% blend will (108000 Btu) increase the overall octane rating and smooth out flame front issues enough to overcome a slightly average lower LHV – but by the time it reaches 30% (104000 Btu), that octane advantage vanishes. E85 (82000 Btu) vehicles will operate as advertised – delivering less miles per gallon.
We would have a hard time increasing areable (do you understand that definition?) land beyond where it is, since that begins to impact on water supplies. Oh, water, we haven’t talked about that! Well, here we go! We may not have a food issue here (by the way, deliver that junk corn to the third world and they will wolf it down – starving people don’t discriminate on food… you can ask my wife who was a refuge in the Bosnian war and my mom who grew up one of 9 children in Ireland) but we do have water issues.
Here…
http://www.fuelsandenergy.com/reprints/MakingTheFarmBeltThirsty_WSJ.pdf
and the followup editorial…
http://www.dep.state.fl.us/ClimateChange/team/file/2007_1017_wsj_ethanol_editorial.pdf
And how about the increasing impacts to the Gulf of Mexico?
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2008/04/080421143836.htm
and the more tabloidy titled:Corn-Based Biofuels Spell Death for Gulf of Mexico
http://blog.wired.com/wiredscience/2008/03/corn-based-biof.html
KD – you got me humming! (CIA is always wrong? Hell, even a stopped clock is right twice a day – at least give CIA some credit for having some pride in their Fact Book and being able to get basics right – its actually very good if you don’t have an agenda blinding you…)
kum dollison (23:25:44) : “Brendan, ethanol has, as a result of it’s 113 OCTANE Rating (gasoline has 86,) achieved 40% Efficiency under proper compression.”
Hardly has anything to do with octane rating. The rating is an indicator of resistance to detonation induce by compression. 89 octane gasoline with 10% ethanol is still 89 octane and the compression ratios have to be set for 89 octane. For a given compression ratio, using a lower than optimum octane rated fuel results in predetonation (high speed burning really) with its characteristic ‘knock’ sound while the use of higher than optimum fuel results in less efficient burn. All off-optimum fuel use results in decreased efficiency and increased waste.
So, if ethanol indeed has a 113 rating, then mixing it with 89 octane and burning it in an engine ‘tuned’ for 89 octane is mostly detrimental. Running pure ethanol in an engine with a compression ratio properly set for ethanol will, almost by definition, give a better efficiency than running a compromise mixture.
If higher octane alone where the key to better efficiency, then a return to the muscle cars along with 120 octane fuel would be the key, no?
You statements are a mixture of half-truths.