Month: March 2007

Ethanol: If Concentrated Enough Can Be Called an Alternative Fuel

Grain alcohol or ethyl alcohol are other names for ethanol, which is inflammable and contains no color while also being a slightly toxic chemical compound that gives off a very distinct odor that may remind one of a perfume and is also the alcohol content of alcoholic beverages. Some people may also call it alcohol and it has been known to man from prehistoric times, being used for purposes of intoxication in alcoholic beverages.

Ethanol may be made with the help of biological feed stocks of any variety which contain plenty of sugar or materials that can be transformed to sugar that include starch or cellulose. Other examples of feed stocks containing sugar are sugar beets and sugar cane. After grinding the feedstock, the sugar content can be dissolved and then fed to microbes that draw on it for food and produces ethanol as well as carbon dioxide and it should further be refined to get the exact amount of concentration required. There are several advantages to using ethanol such as it is easy to use as well as handle and can be used to reduce consumption of petroleum and is also good for the environment.

Dates Back 9000 Years Ago

Its history may be traced back 9000 years ago when some traces of it were found in pottery items in the northern parts of mainland China which points to use of alcoholic beverages among Neolithic people of ancient times. Its hydroxyl group enables it to take part in hydrogen bonding and it is a versatile solvent that can be used for dissolving medicines, food flavorings and colorings that are not easily dissolved in water.

Ethanol may be produced as a petrochemical via hydration of ethylene and also for fermentation of sugar with yeast. There is also use for ethanol as industrial feedstock but ethanol is used in alcoholic beverages as well as mostly for fuel which is derived by fermentation. It is basically produced through the fermentation as well as distillation of starch crops that are transformed into plain sugar and common feedstock for this fuel is corn, barley as well as wheat.

Ethanol may be made with the help of biological feed stocks of any variety which contain plenty of sugar or materials that can be transformed to sugar that include starch or cellulose. Other examples of feed stocks containing sugar are sugar beets and sugar cane. After grinding the feedstock, the sugar content can be dissolved and then fed to microbes that draw on it for food and produces ethanol as well as carbon dioxide and it should further be refined to get the exact amount of concentration required.

Small Home Appliance Make Great Gift

If you are looking for an inexpensive yet usable gift for just about any occasion, you may consider a small home appliance. They are available to do a multitude of tasks and a variety of prices and are usually welcomed by just about anyone. There is also a dearth of brand names under which they are made as well as a variety of colors to match different interior decorations.

Many small home appliances are designed to make your life easier while others are designed to perform a function that you could probably do on your own. For example, an automatic coffee maker is one small home appliance most coffee drinkers could not do without. Put in water and coffee grounds in the filter, turn it on and let it make perfectly brewed coffee.

Then there is the hot chocolate maker into which you add milk and hot chocolate powder and it slowly mixes it for about 10 minutes until it is ready to drink. You could probably accomplish the same thing by heating milk and stirring in the powder, but many people opt for the small home appliance that will do the stirring for them.

Is Appliance Nice Or Necessary

Another questionable small home appliance is the electric chopper into which you put in just about any food item, turn it on and the blades quickly turn it into very small pieces. Then it may take longer to clean it out than it would take to chop it up by hand, but it is more convenient. Under the guise of convenience, a small home appliance is often used when a hand-operated device can do the same job.

Electric can openers are another small home appliance, which has replaced the perfectly good hand-cranked openers. While they are quicker and easier than turning the little knob by hand some folks believe they are a luxury item rather than a necessary one. One way of determining if a small home appliance is nice or necessary is to spend a day or two without electricity.

That it when the real test comes about for a small home appliance. If there were functions that could not be accomplished without power, then it is probably necessary. If you did not need an appliance without electricity, then it is probably something that is simply nice to have. However, if you find you cannot live without your small home appliance collection, perhaps a generator should be your next purchase.