Re: Compare the environmental sustainabilit of producing ethanol from these two raw m
Which past paper are you talking about, like what year, I presume the raw materials you are talking about is most likely to be either ethene-through hydration, or cellulose/glucose-through fermentation, well, if you have the past papers book, it should have a sample answer that will give you an ideal indication of how many marks the question is, because how many marks dictates how long you spend, around 1.5 minutes per mark-for the 3 hour final exam, so if this question was a 6/7 marker, you break it down, for example, you start to describe the different process that ethanol is made from these two materials-the conditions, reactants, include balanced chemical equations for fermentation and hydration(don't forget write concentrated sulphuric acid as catalyst), for fermentation one-write yeast.. and then you can compare the environmental sustainability, i.e. one is from a renewable source, another is non-renewable-however, you may have to elaborate, that although say, cellulose-glucose is renewable, but the energy involved in fermentation as well as distillation of ethanol to sufficient purity to be used as a fuel-usually I think it should be more than 96%, incurs significant energy inputs-so the glucose option may not be completely environmentally sustainable if the energy source used in distillation and land clearing and harvesting(using machinery)are non-renewable, you may have to write the combustion equation as well-to support your position, but comparatively, the cellulose/glucose option should be seen as more environmentally sustainable overall-why don't you write a sample answer and I can give you some comments-this will be better than if I were to write it-you will learn more
(You can either post your answer here or pm me)-hope this helps
