Ethene

• To understand how ethanol can be produced from ethene

Wednesday, April 19, 2023

What do you think the formula for ethanol is? Can you draw it?

A motorcycle magazine editor and a group of students in the United Kingdom have managed to build a Triumph Daytona 675 powered by bio-ethanol fuel sourced from fermented apples, and Triumph Motorcycles says it's investigating the possibilities.

The students, from the Prince William School in Oundle, Northamptonshire, joined Rupert Paul, a contributing editor ofBike magazine, in the effort dubbed "Project Fast Fruit." The Daytona this week reached a speed of 158.7 mph at Bruntingthorpe Proving Ground.

The school spent the past four months fermenting and distilling around 6,000 crushed apples while Bike magazine modified the donated Daytona's engine to run on bio-ethanol. Surprisingly little modification was required — just a remap of the fuel injection system. Monday's high-speed run was completed using commercially available E85 (85% ethanol).

"Although they are still questionable from an environmental point of view, biofuels are here to stay, and this experiment was all about exploring how much power we could extract from them — as well as having some fun," says Paul.

The United Kingdom is setting a target for all petrol and diesel to contain a minimum 5% bio-fuel by 2010.

"At the moment all Triumph motorcycles are designed for optimum performance with non-ethanol fuel but are compatible with E10 (10% ethanol)," says Andrea Friggi, PR & Communications Manager at Triumph Motorcycles. "We're currently investigating making all models compatible with E25 fuel; so while this is a fun experiment, it does have a serious side and we're looking forward to reviewing the results."

Ethanol as a Bio-fuel• Sugar cane or sugar

beet can be fermented to make ethanol

Ethanol made from ethene• Ethanol can also be made from ethene, the

ethene is collected from the cracking of crude oil then reacted with steam.

Ethene + Steam EthanolC2H4 + H2O C2H5OHHigh

pressure

Catalyst

Why is ethanol made this way not known as a bio-fuel?

Ethanol Production

Ethene + SteamSugar from plant

material

Type of raw material Non-renewable Renewable

Type of process Continuous Batch (stop-start)

Labour Minimal Many

Rate of reaction Fast Slow

Conditions neededHigh temperature +

pressureWarm, 1 atmosphere

Purity of product PureImpure, requiring

treatment

Energy needed Lots Minimal

Compare the two methods of making ethanol in terms of sustainability and economic factors.

Fermentation

• Your task: to carry out an experiment using the fermentation of yeast which will convert sugar into carbon dioxide and ethanol

• Do you think changing the amount of sugar used in the reaction will affect how much ethanol is used?

1. Write your prediction (what will happen to the amount of ethanol produced with different quantities of sugar)

2. Design an appropriate results table

3. Then draw a sketch graph of your prediction

Fermentation

• Results table…

Amount Of Sugar Used (g)

Amount Of Ethanol Produce (ml)

1 2 3 Average

0

10

20

30

40

50

Sketch Graph

• You should find that fermentation with no sugar will produce no ethanol

• As sugar is added it would be predicted more ethanol will be produced, until a maximum level is sustained where additional sugar does not result in increased levels of ethanol…

There will come a point where sugar is no longer the limiting factor, and additional quantities will not produce more ethanol (in this prediction that point is around 40g of sugar)