166 State Horticultural Society. 



Actual experiment has shown that ethyl alcohol as a producer 

 of light has twice the value of kerosene. Denatured alcohol at 25 

 cents a gallon could therefore compete with kerosene as a pro- 

 ducer of light at 121/2 cents a gallon. 



Recent experiments in France have demonstrated that the 



thermal efficiency of ethyl alcohol is sixty-five per cent greater 



than that of gasoline. On this basis, alcohol at 25 cents a gallon 



as a heat producer would be as cheap as gasoline at 15 cents a 



gallon. 



Alcohol as a motor fuel in internal combustion engines has 

 been shown by experiment to be equally as efficient as gasoline. 

 A pound of alcohol produces as much power as a pound of gaso- 

 line. 



But other considerations, aside from cost, make alcohol as a 

 m.otor fuel preferable to gasoline. Gasoline is highly inflammable ; 

 alcohol is not. Many farmers cannot secure insurance with gaso- 

 line stored on their premises; there is no such objection to alcohol. 



Gasoline is also at a disadvantage as a power producer be- 

 cause of the oflFensive exhaust gases ; no disagreeable odors attend 

 the use of alcohol. Alcohol is both safer and more agreeable to 

 use than gasoline. With the price of the two articles only a few 

 cents apart, alcohol ought to displace gasoline to an extent as a 

 power producer. 



Before the discovery of petroleum products, with alcohol tax- 

 free, millions of gallons were used for light and heat. Today in 

 Germany the annual consumption of denatured alcohol in the pro- 

 duction of light, heat and power is over twenty-six million gallons ; 

 but there are no domestic petroleum products in Germany, and a 

 heavy import tax on these products raises the price at which 

 they go to the consumer. Furthermore, there is a bounty on pota- 

 toes, and alcohol is produced largely from potatoes. So that there 

 are special reasons for petroleum products being high and alcohol 

 being cheap in Germany. 



Alcohol is said to go to the consumer at less than the cost of 

 production. But while the cost of alcohol is low in Germany, the 

 cost of denaturants is high, for the reason that they are all im- 

 ported. Both alcohol and the denaturants will be produced in the 

 United States. 



In Louisiana and Hawaii, with cheap molasses,* in Kansas and 

 Nebraska where corn often sells for 30 cents a bushel, and in sec- 

 tions of the northwest, where the soil is specially adapted to the 

 production of potatoes, alcohol can be produced at very low figures. 



