The Ethanol Papers - Paperturn manuscript - Flipbook - Page 123
The Irrelevance Of BTU Rating - Big Oil's Gimmick To
Hoodwink The Public
BTU is Big Oil Bunk. It's just a marketing and labeling scam
Originally published October 19, 2015
The majority of passenger vehicles and light trucks on the road today are powered by gasoline internal combustion engines (ICE). The selection of gasoline
as the primary engine fuel was not made because gasoline was the most effective or efficient fuel, but because it was the most economical to use.
Initially, gasoline's economical advantage was a result of high government taxation on alcohol (ethanol) - the other most widely considered engine fuel.
After the Free Alcohol Act was passed in 1906 the cost of denatured alcohol
(aka ethanol fuel) became as inexpensive as gasoline. Because of ethanol's
characteristics that permitted higher compression engines to be used, ethanol
was considered the better fuel. The First World War, as often happens during
a war, spurred the rapid advancement of technology in general and internal
