Got serious about making Ethanol this weekend. Was surprised at the results of the various ways to turn Ethanol into power. Here's a summary:
Code:
GT Steel Boiler --> RC Steam Turbines : 48k EU / bucket
GT Basic Diesel Generators : 100k EU / bucket
Forestry Biofuel Generators : 128k EU / bucket
RC HP (Steel) Boiler --> RC Steam Turbines : TBD, but should be the highest @ 174k EU / bucket*
*According to the RC Boiler Calculator, the RC boiler --> RC Steam Turbine *should*
yield 174k EU / bucket, but I'm still waiting for my steel boiler to heatup to 1000c before I start my test.
For my test setup, I converted everything to IC2 EU and
measured using an MFSU that was empty to begin with. Converting from GT EU to IC2 EU was slightly lossy since I was using 1 EU/meter loss cable from 1 to 2 meters away from the transformer and didn't place the Diesel Generators directly adjacent to the GT Transformer. My setup was made for compactness. A more efficient setup might be 5% more efficient.
Ones that I didn't test that I know are
less efficient than the above are:
- GT Bronze Boiler : less efficient than Steel
- GT Steam Turbines : *much* less efficient than RC Steam Turbines
- GT MV and HV Diesel Generators : less efficient than Basic Diesel Generators
I was surprised at how
inefficient the GT Steel Boiler is compared with its own diesel generator. I thought for sure converting to steam and then using the efficient RC Steam Turbine would be better, but it's not. One thing going for the GT boilers is their extremely short heat-up times and their compactness. A single GT Steel Boiler puts out approximately 1200 mB steam / tick whereas an RC 36 HP puts out 720 mB steam / tick. GT Steel Boilers make for great on-demand/dynamic steam.
Why is this important ? Well, with Forestry HARD mode (the Fermenter is insanely expensive to run : 17MJ/t * 4x = 68 MJ/t = 170 EU/t !) and with the high cost of making biomass and then distilling into biofuel, the
GT Steel Boiler is very much net energy negative, even with the best possible saplings and with golems harvesting the saplings !! By comparison, golems chopping and re-planting trees to make charcoal is very much net energy positive, and it requires a far, far simpler setup : just eIO Alloy Smelter and eIO Generator.
Since I had spent a week in RL getting super saplings to replace charcoal and given how much more infrastructure is required for Ethanol vs. Charcoal, I dialed back the
insane Forestry HARD mode settings from 4x power consumption to 2x power consumption (in comparison, NORMAL is 1x) and restored the Ethanol nerf from 0.5x and HARD mode to 1.0x like NORMAL mode.
Also, the GT Refinery converts biomass to ethanol at a ratio of 10 biomass to 3 ethanol (10:3 = 3.3:1), whereas
the Forestry Still does it slightly less lossy at 3:1. With Forestry set to 2x power consumption, the Forestry Still and the GT Refinery use about the same amount of power (using 5 EU / 2 MJ) to make 1 bucket of Ethanol.
Final verdict is still out.
Still more testing to do.
My desired goal is the same-size tree farm using the best possible saplings with water should yield approximately the same power Ethanol vs. Charcoal. The *total* output of the tree farm, should one continue to convert wood to charcoal,
is thus doubled when compared to charcoal only.
Higher output should be achievable with fruit juice providing a 1.5x boost in the Fermenter. At the least, the squeezers and the Forestry multifarm to harvest the fruit should *not* be net energy negative when compared to water.