To: Ferick who wrote (9218 ) 4/21/1998 11:19:00 PM From: Norman H. Hostetler Read Replies (3) | Respond to
Ned & Charles & Ron, etc.: 1) "10% alternative fuels" means ethanol in the 10-90 blend that is available quite widely in corn country. The Nebraska legislature, in a fit of enthusiasm for their farmer-voters, once considered a bill requiring this mixture. I wouldn't put Iowa past the same motivation. When it was politically popular, some congress people from these states (and a few others) spoke of advancing the idea nationally. That stuff has been dead for years--I suspect your truck tractor dealer is either working on very old news, or some sort of folklore myth. Charles--to the best of my knowledge, there aren't any subsidies for ethanol any more (even Nebraska abandoned theirs two years ago), though there is certainly money for research. 2) ConAgra is one of the 3 megacorps (ADM is one of the other two) that virtually control the corn market in this country. Research on more uses for corn makes sense. Also on soy oil--there is a bus in my city running around now on 100% soy oil, as part of a research project. 3) Of much more practical use is the discovery by another research outfit that the addition of 1/2%-1% soy oil to diesel replaces all the lubricant qualities lost when the sulphur is removed, thus suggesting a potential happy solution to that problem. This blend can be bought at Farmer's Union Co-ops in the Midwest, including in Iowa. 4) Many things are carcinogenic in sufficient concentration. Carbon has a long-standing history as a carcinogen, and not just in Black Lung disease--char-broiled meats aren't the best things in the world for you in this regard, either. A major question regarding these concentrations is cumulative effects of exposure over time. There are mathematical models in organic chemistry for equating the results of quantity of exposure to length of exposure--these are absolutely central to the medical argument over the carcinogenic effects of tobacco smoke, for example, which typically take 30 years or more to begin to appear. Correctly modeled intensive doses can speed up this process in the cells of lab animals, allowing projection of long-term results in humans cells. I much prefer early research and warnings to the sort of thing that happened with DDT, which people used with a sort of gay abandon, ignoring what the stuff was doing to fish, birds, etc., until the carcinogenic effects started showing up in humans. 5) "loved the smell of gasoline"--so that's what lies behind some of your far out ideas, Charles--how long have you been sticking your nose in gasoline? I wonder who has been doing research on the cumulative effects of inhaled gasoline. Not good, I suspect. 6) Ron, you're welcome to one of my favorite "too much is not enough" equations. You can die from eating parsley--get too much of it in too short of a time period and oxalic acid deposits will build up in your kidneys until they quit functioning. All you need to do to commit suicide in this manner is eat about 30 pounds of parsley a day for 30 days. 7) Finally, for all the anti-bureaucrats out there (and I'm a bit touchy on this damning of all government agencies with the same tarbrush, since for all my adult life I've been employed only by the federal government, one or another state government, or one of several non-profit organizations), one of my sources about EPA and DHEC noted that the SE regional EPA office, which monitors North Carolina, South Carolina, Georgia, and Florida, has an excellent working relationship with the local agencies in three states, but not in the fourth. Indeed, this latter state not only has problems getting along with the EPA office, but there are nearly as many problems, errors, mistakes, and the like coming out of this agency as in all three of the other state agencies combined. Four guesses as to which state this is, and the first three don't count.
