How can that be? Are you including the solar energy? Well, in that case, every process out there has a less than 100% efficiency, so the claim may be true, but also vacuous.
If you don't include the solar energy, then are you saying that all the energy used to make the fertilizers, to plow the fields, then harvest them, then brew the corn and distill it, is less than the energy content of the ethanol produced? I heard this type of argument before, but I find it really difficult to believe. For example the study [1] claims you need 140 gallons of fossil fuel to plant/harvest/process one acre of corn that will produce 328 gallons of ethanol. Ethanol is less energy dense than crude oil (30 MJ/kg vs 42), but overall, 328 gallons of ethanol has about 67% more energy than 140 gallons of crude.
Yes, but wikipedia provides zero evidence for the number. If you follow the link (7), you'll see they only talk about the EROI for oil and gas. The claim about the 1.5:1 EROI for ethanol is unsubstantiated. In any case, my back of the envelope was 1.67:1, which is not that far. Saying that 1.5:1, or even 1.67:1 is pathetic is one thing, saying that you put more energy into getting ethanol than you get out is still quite the wrong.
How can that be? Are you including the solar energy? Well, in that case, every process out there has a less than 100% efficiency, so the claim may be true, but also vacuous.
If you don't include the solar energy, then are you saying that all the energy used to make the fertilizers, to plow the fields, then harvest them, then brew the corn and distill it, is less than the energy content of the ethanol produced? I heard this type of argument before, but I find it really difficult to believe. For example the study [1] claims you need 140 gallons of fossil fuel to plant/harvest/process one acre of corn that will produce 328 gallons of ethanol. Ethanol is less energy dense than crude oil (30 MJ/kg vs 42), but overall, 328 gallons of ethanol has about 67% more energy than 140 gallons of crude.
[1] https://news.cornell.edu/stories/2001/08/ethanol-corn-faulte...