E85 Boondoggle of the Day: How Do You Know You're NOT Buying It?
I'm not sure we're looking at one of those tip of the iceberg deals, but this story from the AP [via the Chicago Tribune] raises the possibility. "State investigators claim a company spiked unleaded gasoline and 10-percent ethanol-blended fuel with cheaper E85 at stations in Sumner and Fairbank… In mid-June, the Weights and Measures Bureau of the state agriculture department found that Pronto Market stations were receiving shipments of E85 from a Jesup distributor, but had neither an E85 fuel tank nor a pump. An investigator checked out the stations and found the unleaded gas and 10-percent ethanol blend each had between 15 and 18 percent ethanol in field tests, said Ivan Hankins of the weights and measures bureau." Given the current ethanol glut, that's only going to get larger, is this a sign of things to come? Meanwhile, this is not the kind of publicity the corn-juice boosters will like to hear. Oh well.
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Why ethanol? It is renewable. It keeps more wealth in the country. At some point gasoline supplies are going to decline due to Peak Oil. If we haven't transitioned at least partially to something else the car industry will be in more trouble than it is now. There are no other currently viable liquid fuel alternative to gasoline except ethanol. It is not ethanol's fault that greedy distributors overprice the stuff. Don't buy it if the price is not low enough to compensate for the reduced mileage. When stupid people overpay for ethanol it just encourages the price ripoffs. Ideally ethanol should be priced low enough to give a savings incentive for its use. But distributors are not satisfied with the blending subsidies and markups and have found that a lot of people are oblivious to the lower mileage. So they are charging what the market will bear and apparently getting away with it. Only buy ethanol when it is appropriately priced which seems to be a lot easier to do in the Midwest than in other parts of the country. Ethanol will still be available long after the gasoline is gone. Get use to it.
Stock `88 Mustang fuel results(calculated from multiple tanks worth): 100% gasoline: 20-21 mpg consistant. Any tank, any week. One of those two numbers always. E10: 18-19mpg. Anytime. E85: 16-17mpg. Terrible cold start performance(won't hardly idle at all) and down on power(what was I expecting, I know, I know.) Have been tempted to rebuild the motor and make it require E85(cheaper.). Have a really high compression motor.... Is it about 40hp per compression point increase? 9:1 now, 14:1 or higher? I'd go as high as I could take it. 105 octane and all... Stuff smells pretty funky too.
All gasoline in the state of California is now E10. Fortuantly, E85 is also extremely rare in the state (only five publicly accessable E85 pumps in the entire state), so I suspect it's all actually E10 as opposed to E27 or whatever.