Fill your Focus with Maxol biofuel

Sarsfield

I haven't seen this mentioned before.

Maxol started selling bio-ethanol on from the forecourt at its Sandymount station today and a biofuel-ready Ford Focus will be on sale here from November.

http://www.rte.ie/business/2005/0927/fuel.html

netwhizkid

Well its a step in the right direction, the bio-ethanol is made out of cheese leftover from its manufacturing so as its coming from milk, it can be described as being carbon neutral, although some would argue that the cattle in the production release methane (which they do) so this greenhouse gas is not being wasted anymore as when you drive your car some of the emissions have actually come out of the cow's rear already, and whatever you release will be re-absorbed by the grass or grain whatever the cow consumed. It is not the best solution as greenhouse gas is still released however, it is going around in a circle which doesnt happen when you burn petroleum based products,

Takeshi_Kovacs

this is from the above link...

Mr Roche said the Government had given a two year derogation on duty tax on bio-fuels, making bio-ethanol cheaper than petrol at the pumps.

does this mean so that , any biofuel used is exempt from tax, including homebrewed stuff such as biodiesel, veggie oil, homemade ethanol e.t.c ?
or do we still have to let the government know what we are up to...??

also from what i've read on the net about ethanol as a fuel, it seems that it is possible to convert your engine to run on ethanol (the main bits being increasing the jets on on carbed engines, and on newer injection engines, tweaking the computer to allow for extra fuel to flow. also i think some hoses and stuff have to be upgraded to be resistant to the ethanol.. although there is probaly a lot more to it than that...)
this site explains a bit better http://running_on_alcohol.tripod.com/id1.html

hmm i think i'll have to get cracking on that reflux still......

WILKEL

Just seen article on rte news on the focus mentioned above - Dick Roche was at the launch today and hinted that there would be a VRT reduction on it in the forthcoming budget - ford said if this was the case they would bring it to market for around the 20k mark.
It also said that the fuel would be about 25 cent cheaper than petrol -but i am not sure what the duty situation on it is.

Genghis

Speaking on the Right Hook last night, Maxol also said tat the were planning to introduc nationally an "E5" fuel (5% ethanol), which can be used without modification in any car engine. It will also be a bit cheaper.

So 5% is not much, but there you go.