There's a heated debate over here about how "environmentally friendly" the etanol is. Apart from the prices on crops rising, it takes quite a lot of fossil fuel to distill the etanol. Especially the sort made from french wine (the EU has a huge surplus of wine, primarily from France which is now turned into fuel...)
On the bright side, car makers starting to build engines that takes advantage of the E85. Saab has new model out which develops 50hp extra when run on E85. Dunno how it works though...
