Question
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Europe
Can guzzling wine help save the planet? Ask Prince Charles. The eco-friendly heir to the British throne runs his 38-year-old Aston Martin on biofuel made from wine, according to a new annual report detailing his income and activities. The review says Charles reduced his carbon footprint by 18 percent last year.
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Answered Awesome
If it's true can use a really really cheap wine to run your car.
I think Prince Charles is a wanna be King and would say whatever the people want to hear to improve his chances. He is no different than the low life politicians in this country. -
Answered Thumbs down
First and foremost, the carbon footprint reduction was archived primarily by traveling less and using alternative energy sources. Not by the car alone.
Yes it's a novel idea. But what they have done is taken wine, which is usually 12% alcohol, and distilled it. You end up with 100% ethanol.
But keep in mind you are distilling nearly 8 liters of wine to make 1 liter of ethanol. Also we know that ethanol produces only 2/3 the power of gasoline.
So you end up burning more of it per mile.
And what about the impact of producing the wine?
How many acres of land is tilled releasing Co2 every time you plow it.
How many acres of grapes do you need to to grow to produce a tankful of fuel? That Aston would require nearly 670 liters of wine to fill it's 22 gallon tank. This one I can answer. 1 acre of grapes would produce enough wine to fill the tank 3.3 times.
How many thousands of gallons of water is used to irrigate the grapes?
And the thousands of gallons of diesel fuel burned to run the pumps that run the irrigation system? Or if the pumps were electric, how much coal or natural gas was burned to produce the power?
And then there is the concern of the wine fermentation waste water having an environmental impact and when combined with chlorinated water, ie. your municipal supply, forms a cancer causing compound called trihalomethane.
Talk about finding a worm in your apple! -
Grace..
Just for grins I did a little calculation you'll find interesting
We use 388.whatever Million gallons of gasoline per day in the U.S. Per DAY!
It would require cultivating grapes exclusively for fuel on slightly less than 1/3 of the land in the entire U.S., 1,038,062 square miles. And that would produce enough fuel to meet the demand of a single day. Ouch.
Next great idea?
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Answered Thumbs down
First and foremost, the carbon footprint reduction was archived primarily by traveling less and using alternative energy sources. Not by the car alone.Yes it's a novel idea. But what they have done is taken wine, which is usually 12% alcohol, and distilled it. You end up with 100% ethanol.
But keep in mind you are distilling nearly 8 liters of wine to make 1 liter of ethanol. Also we know that ethanol produces only 2/3 the power of gasoline.
So you end up burning more of it per mile.
And what about the impact of producing the wine?
How many acres of land is tilled releasing Co2 every time you plow it.
How many acres of grapes do you need to to grow to produce a tankful of fuel? That Aston would require nearly 670 liters of wine to fill it's 22 gallon tank. This one I can answer. 1 acre of grapes would produce enough wine to fill the tank 3.3 times.
How many thousands of gallons of water is used to irrigate the grapes?
And the thousands of gallons of diesel fuel burned to run the pumps that run the irrigation system? Or if the pumps were electric, how much coal or natural gas was burned to produce the power?
And then there is the concern of the wine fermentation waste water having an environmental impact and when combined with chlorinated water, ie. your municipal supply, forms a cancer causing compound called trihalomethane.
Talk about finding a worm in your apple!