[autotech]

I often wonder what it will be like in the distant future if/when gasoline becomes a luxury that collectors purchase to operate “antique” ICE automobiles. Will we have little craft refineries brewing single origin artisanal gasoline? What will it cost?

[toomuchtodo]

Ethanol stills and combustion engines modified to run on 100% ethanol. Cost to own and operate is a few thousand dollars (still + engine modifications + feedstock).

https://brewhaus.com/how-to-distill-ethanol-with-a-moonshine...

[Qwertious]

>combustion engines modified

Wouldn't that undercut the point of owning a classic car? If old engines were run on a specific fuel and operate differently when burning ethanol, then you can't get the same experience while running on ethanol.

I'm sure there would be differing opinions on this (and some people might just want the chassis and not even care about the engine), but I'd expect some people to see modifying the engine as heresy. Those people would probably want some sort of synthetic petrol fuel.

[dontlaugh]

Lost of engines don't even need modification. Almost all direct injection petrol engines work well with almost 100% ethanol, for example.

[londons_explore]

Depends what you mean by 'work'.

Ethanol has 30% less energy in the same volume, so you're certainly going to travel 30% fewer miles on a full tank, and you're likely going to have 30% less horsepower too.

[dontlaugh]

Sure, but filling tanks is fast.

And you usually lose less torque than power, so it won't matter much unless your engine is close to underpowered for the car or you're driving on a race track.

[fuzzfactor]

>Is there actually a fair bit of variance that is adjusted for in your vehicle?

The modern computerized fuel-injected ICE automatically adjusts for an incredibly wide variety of octane ratings and component percentages such as alcohol content.

Vintage carburetted engines could require careful mechanical adjustment if they were to be optimized for something other than the prevailing vintage gasoline when issued.

>operate differently when burning ethanol

Not in a very noticeable way when running. The problem is pure ethanol does not have enough vapor pressure to cold-start many engines, depending on how cold. Plus in case of fire during the daytime, the faint blue alcohol flame is virtually undetectable. These problems are overcome with the 15 percent gasoline content normally found in E85. Or with methanol, M85.

>you're certainly going to travel 30% fewer miles on a full tank

That's the big difference. Methanol has even less energy per gallon even though a gallon weighs about the same as a gallon of ethanol. About 5 percent heavier than a gallon of gasoline too.

>and you're likely going to have 30% less horsepower too.

This is not correct. The alcohol will burn with a much better antiknock rating than regular gasoline and if you step on it you can usually extract more horsepower from the same kind of engine, even if you do bring it up to a bit higher RPM, it's smooth as butter and roaring for more.

One reason Indy cars use alcohols.

[bunabhucan]

We will likely still need refineries for all the other products. Refineries can be designed to favor output of in demand products like fuel oil (today.) If in the future we still need (say) asphalt and lubricants from crude oil, tapping out some amount of gasoline would still be possible.

https://www.eia.gov/energyexplained/oil-and-petroleum-produc...

[adrianN]

Hopefully we'll leave the oil in the ground and synthesize what we need from atmospheric carbon.

[buildsjets]

Likely, yes, just as one can buy racing gasoline in various formulations in a 5 gallon pail by special order today, for about $20 per gallon.

Boutique run fuel production for special groups is already done today. Every year, the Reno Air Racing Association orders a batch of 160 octane aviation gas that has not been otherwise available since around the end of the Korean war, for one week of qualifying and racing. It costs “If you have to ask you can’t afford it” per gallon, I assume.