BostonUrbEx
Senior Member
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- Mar 13, 2010
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If an EROEI of an energy source is less than 1, should it be immediately debunked and not pursued?
Ethanol seems to have some negatives, including an EROEI of less than 1, with than only benefit being less carbon output (of which I'm not even sure it's a significant amount). So why do we pursue using ethanol? Burning food for fuel seems like insanity.
Also, I have found that many claim there is supposedly no EROEI for wind, hydro, solar, etc... Which I do not understand... Let's take a solar panel for example:
(((energy invested in manufacturing solar panel + energy invested in solar plant construction) / expected useful plant life span) + energy invested in maintaining optimal plant and panel condition) / energy returned = solar EROEI.
Ethanol seems to have some negatives, including an EROEI of less than 1, with than only benefit being less carbon output (of which I'm not even sure it's a significant amount). So why do we pursue using ethanol? Burning food for fuel seems like insanity.
Also, I have found that many claim there is supposedly no EROEI for wind, hydro, solar, etc... Which I do not understand... Let's take a solar panel for example:
(((energy invested in manufacturing solar panel + energy invested in solar plant construction) / expected useful plant life span) + energy invested in maintaining optimal plant and panel condition) / energy returned = solar EROEI.