For fleet managers concerned about OEM warnings over E-15, it looks like the issue has been sorted out for now by the US Environmental Protection Agency. A lot of new vehicles have gas caps with an image showing “E15—E85” with a hash mark crossing it out – meaning that they’re telling you to only gas up with gasoline blended with 10% ethanol, or E-10. On Friday, the EPA capped ethanol in its implementation of the 2007 Renewable Fuel Standard. For 2014, the target was reduced nearly three billion gallons – it’s going to be 15.21 billion gallons of biofuels instead of the original 18.15 billion gallons. The EPA thinks market conditions are different now than when the standard was first adopted – fuel-efficient vehicles and other economic factors have pushed gasoline consumption to a lower level than expected when the standard was passed. “As a result, we are now at the E-10 blend wall,” EPA said in a statement.
The NAFA Fleet Management Association was pleased to see the EPA’s ruling – see coverage of NAFA’s statement.
Automakers haven’t been fighting ethanol producers in Washington like oil company have been, but OEMs have been warning about the potentially corrosive damaging effects of E-15 on engines. The new EPA ruling, released on Friday, doesn’t explicitly speak to the E-10 versus E-15 debate; while the EPA has been arguing about the merits of E-15 and the lack of comprehensive data on its detriments to vehicle lifecycles, the agency appears to be accepting that E-10 is as good as it gets for now.
The 15.21 billion gallon ceiling is also below the 16.55 billion gallon requirement for this year in the renewable fuel standard. Corn-based ethanol makes up the lion’s share of that total – it’s limited to 13 billion of next year’s total and 13.8 billion for this year. Cellulosic ethanol is also seeing cuts in volume for next year with the EPA’s revised ruling. Cellulosic and other next-generation biofuels, made from agricultural waste such as wood chips and corncobs, have not taken off as quickly as Congress had built into the 2007 act. Every single alternative fuel you can think of faces a lot of challenges in being adopted and going mainstream.
