Background > Conclusion

   While the total energy required to produce ethanol, for example, the energy to run the tractors, to produce fertilizers, and to process the ethanol may be greater than the energy derived from burning ethanol, the economic effects of having a high quality energy as ethanol cannot be ignored. When comparing ethanol to fossil fuel, one must take into consideration the clean up costs of soil contamination as a result of gasoline releases to the environment and the medical costs to cure diseases as a result of air pollution resulting from refining and burning of gasoline. We should therefore base our decision on the long term economic and social returns, instead of considering the cost alone. The inclusion of the cost of development of ethanol plants is not a fair comparison since the cost of gasoline does not include the pre-existed refining plant. The decision should therefore be based on the long term economic and social considerations. In the following experiment, we are going to examine the possibility of fermenting ethanol from waste materials, such as orange peel, saw dust and newspaper, with the hope of producing cheap renewable energy and at the same time, solve the problem of increasing bulk of municipal wastes.