I am going to have to say this carefully, or you will think this is an announcement that I am in love. You see there is this guy, David Ramsey, and I love some of what he has done, but I hate (mother said not to use that word, but it is a classic "love/hate" problem) some other action he has taken, or rather, appears to have taken.

You see, Dave is this guy who took his old Buick (an obvious sign of good taste in the first place) and fueled it, without modification of any kind, with pure 100% butanol. Then he took it and drove it across the country, coast to coast, with lots of wandering inbetween. "This demonstration-test-drive was the culmination of my work to demonstrate to my colleagues that butanol definitely works as a superior alternative fuel to ethanol," Ramey told AutoblogGreen.(You'll find I left a comment there at the bottom of that article, too.) Can you imagine that? And in his meandering, along the way he took that old Park Avenue, vintage 1992, in to be tested for emissions compliance in 10 states. In every instance he passed, he says. You almost have to love a guy like that.

You probably should read both the above article in AutoblogGreen.com, as well as another about DuPont's alliance with British Petroleum and their plans to produce butanol from sugar beets (according to this article). Although you can also access that article via this reference in AutoblogGreen.com, where you'll find another of my comments. And in that article, they claim BP/DuPont expect to have it "on the market" in 2007 in Britain at least.

More applause should accompany other laud to Mr. Ramsey, because his reasearch has, reportedly, created a far more efficient way to produce butanol, that should nearly half the cost, making it an economically viable alternative to ethanol. Check out his web site at www.butanol.com. But what I don't like (there, I avoided saying "hate") is that he has used the "trademark" symbol along with the term "biobutanol" on that website. The USPTO would be crazy (not the first time, mind you) to issue such protection to Mr. Ramsey. Congratulations to him, again, on his patented process, but let's not go putting constraints on the language, please, Mr. Ramsey. After all, how are people going to know about the biomass origins of your version of butanol, as opposed to petroleum derived butanol, if you won't even let us talk about it????? Duh!!

Now, just in case you are disinclined to pop over to those several links, the story of Dave's 10,000 mile trip in the biobutanol Buick is that he got almost equal mileage/performance gallon for gallon with butanol as with previous gasoline use in the same car. In fact, mileage was a little better, 24 vs. 22 on gas. The car was not modified in any way to accommodate the engine running on butanol, and he reports no problems with the vehicle in spite of the fact that it has a previous 60,000 miles on the odometer when he started his trip in July of 2005. Unlike with "flex-fuel" vehicles starting to hit the market now in the US, where some seals, gaskets and other parts have to be made of different materials to utilize the gasoline/ethanol blend called E85 which is only 85% ethanol, no blending of fuel was required or desired. Dave ran on pure biobutanol. No leaks or gasket replacements were needed after 10,000 miles.

There is not a lot of question that big agri-business and the farming lobby have affected policy in the development of alternative fuels, and both existing and future blending with gasoline have a fairly firm fix of the compass. But biobutanol, with being pipeline, pump and engine friendly sure looks like the bathing beauty of the month from my perspective.

Okay, I kept this week's column short. So take a few minutes to look at some of those other articles (with or without my contributions) for a fuller picture of biobutanol. You might be glad you did.

Oh, yes, and a Happy New Year, to all.

love

Stafford "Doc" Williamson

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