Sugar Tax

I thought biofuel had been discredited as it used so much oil to produce, and is only produced because it's subsidised (so the more there's produced, the greater the taxation required).

 

It was discredited because vast areas of rain forest were cleared to grow palm trees for oil for biofuel, and also vast areas of land previously used for grain for food were instead used for the same grain for biofuel, thus reducing food availability (in theory).

Biofuel still has promise, if the rawmaterial can be obtained sustainably. Sugar cane and sugar beet require land to grow. Both can be used for bioethanol, but are currently used for sugar. Lower demand for added sugar, and those crops can go straight off to fermentation plants for ethanol.

I'm not saying that's the hidden agenda. Like I said earlier, it's just a thought that crossed my mind.

 

Checking online, the wholesale sugar price/tonne appears to be about 25p/Kg (at country of origin), so approx. 2Kg [1] @ 25p = 50p would be required to produce 1 Litre of Ethanol excluding production costs, and the current cost per Litre of petrol is only 21.7p/Litre including production costs.

Additionally, Ethanol is only 62% efficient as Petrol [2], which has additional cost/energy usage implications for shipping costs, plus additional reduced mileage from constantly driving around with a greater weight of fuel.

EDIT: Taking everything into account, it would appear as if biofuel from sugar is about 3 to 4 times more expensive than using petrol, so I don't think that diverting sugar to fuel production would be a vote winner.

[1] I believe the conversion of Sucrose to Ethanol by fermentation to be about 51% by weight, but as Ethanol has a Specific Gravity of less than 1.000, it would actually be about 1.25L from 1Kg, so above figures require some adjustment.

[2] Difference in efficiency is per Litre, so no adjustment required due to difference in Specific Gravity between Ethanol 0.787 and Petrol 0.713, but that difference appears to make Ethanol a further 10% wasteful in carrying around an increased weight + volume.

EDIT: Taking everything above into account, it would appear that using biofuel produced from sugar would be something like 3 to 4 times more expensive than using petrol, so I don't think that diverting sugar to biofuel production would prove to be a vote winner.

 

I only understood some of that @Scrungee, but the bit I did understand would explain why the brand new stinky bioethanol plant near me keeps getting mothballed for months at a time.

 

When I read all this it just tends to confirm my assumption that we are over populated and scratching around to survive.
No generation that has come before us has been so uncertain of how they will survive, unless it was wartime of course.
God knows where that leaves us, (not me as I wont be here) in 50yrs time.

That's assuming that nature hasn't found out a way of killing off mankind by then or we haven't all drowned in our own sewage

Sugar!!!!!!
Just thought I should mention it

 

Prices at the pump are completely skewed by tax additions

 

Last week I was diagnosed with diabetes ( and Sod's Law, next day we won the local school raffle - a hamper full of sweet goodies!!). Trying to work out a low sugar diet from packaging info is hellish hard and doubly so in my case as I need to put on weight rather than lose it.
I'm reasonably intelligent and fairly adept with statistics but I reckon I need a crash course in dietics and nutrition to begin to understand the needs/input-output equations.
So, back to sugar tax and very tongue in cheek, as it gives me a low sugar thing to chew on. I'm all in favour of taxation as I'll not be paying and those who do will help pay for my meds.

 

If you are under 60 and taking meds for Diabetes, get a Medical Exemption Certificate and you will be exempt from prescription charges. Eye tests are also free.

 

Now you can get a mobile phone ap to tell you how much sugar food contains, wonderful idea.

It was on the news tonight and a Mum was saying it could be helpful when you are "negotiating" with a 3 year old about what they eat.

 

Negotiating with a 3 year old about what to eat is really simple if done properly. It goes like this:

Tot: I want this!
Parent: No!
(at this point tot creates a scene while parent completely ignores them until tot gives up)

If it's something they are allowed, simply change the above script from a No to a 'say please'.

The problem is its not the kids that's the problem. How can they be expected to know better? The problem is not even always with the parents. Who reads every labelwhen they're stressed out in a busy shop? I for one didn't know until recently that baked beans and tinned soup contain stupid amounts of unnecessarily added sugar.

The app will of course not be an answer in itself, but like any good gardener has many different tools to look after the garden, this app is just one extra tool in the box for those that take an interest in what they're consuming.