If you are concerned about ethanol free mogas for your ultralight

Dean,

Since it's been many days since you posted and no one responded... 

I can infer that.... 

1.  People are acting on your post,  

2. They have already heard this theme in other posts, 

3. don't care   

4. this forum is dieing.  

Now that weather has UL flight nearly stopped for most of the nation there could be all kinds of activity on the UL forum. 

Fuel cost/availability could be the tipping point for GA in this country.  Only the wealthy can afford to play.  Middle income gets squeezed out and we all loose. 

Jim -

Interesting response.  This is my take:

1.  Not likely.

2.  Makes no difference, they are down to one year remaining.

3.  Bingo!  I have been working on this for more than two years and I get the feeling that everybody expects that there is someone out there that will make sure fuel is available, even 100LL.  Kinda scary.  Both ethanol free gas and 100LL could disappear almost simultaneously.  People might want to listen to this webinar:  http://www.eaavideo.org/channel.aspx?ch=ch_webinars

4.  Probably, U/L is dieing, I find no interest in it in the two EAA chapters I am in or the two airports I visit regularly.

If you are looking for ethanol free mogas you have probably heard of the web site www.pure-gas.org, which lists locations around the country to find sources.

The owner of the site has started a petition to send to EPA administrator Lisa Jackson, who actually has the authority to make sure ethanol free premium unleaded gasoline is available.  You can sign the petition and add your comment at:  http://www.thepetitionsite.com/1/keep-pure-gas/

Please sign the petition if you need ethanol free mogas for your flying.  If nothing is done by the EPA or state governments in the next year all gasoline in the U.S. will be E10 because of the unintended consequences of the federal RFS mandate in EISA 2007, which ironically is not a mandatory E10 law, but is having that effect.

 

Guys I have some really bad news.  I attended a presentation by AOPAs Vice President for Governmental Affairs yesterday (I may not have her title exactly correct but it is close) and I asked about any efforts to get gasoline without ethanol.  Her reply was "that train has already left the station.  The ethanol/corn/farm lobby is much too sttong to compete with these days and the consumer market for lower octane unleaded nonethanol fuel is so small in comparison to the general overall gasoline usage as to make it uneconomical for the oil companies to produce, store and transport such a small quantity.  The major thrust in fuel interests these days has to be development of a non-lead, high octane fuel for the users of 100LL ie the high preformance piston aircraft of today which accounts for 80% of the avgas used, even if they amount to only 20% of the airplanes flying". 

I couldn't argue her into changing her mind even thought I opined that 90% of the folks I knew prefered non-ethanol gas for their airplanes, cars, lawn mowers, ourboard motors, etc. but just couldn't get it anywhere.

 

 

Jerry -

I would expect nothing less from any spokesperson from AOPA.  They have a mantra "There will be only one aviation fuel, 100LL or whatever replaces it."  They believe that if they say it over and over you will believe it.  Bull Puckey!  This lady doesn't know what she is talking about.  Let me repeat that so I make myself clear.  "THIS LADY DOESN'T KNOW WHAT SHE IS TALKING ABOUT!

"...  the consumer market for lower octane unleaded nonethanol fuel is so small in comparison to the general overall gasoline usage as to make it uneconomical for the oil companies to produce, store and transport such a small quantity."  HA!  ROFL.  Uneconomical?  Auto gasoline is what these guys make, 136+ billion gallons of it a year.  They only make maybe 200 million gallons of 100LL if you want to talk about a boutique gasoline that requires special handling every step of the way to keep it from contaminating the unleaded auto gas supply.  The refinery does NOT make ethanol auto fuel, they make gasoline or BOB and the ethanol is added at the terminal, so all of the infrastructure to distribute it and store it is in place everywhere, unlike 100LL where they actually do have to have a separate tank.

"The major thrust in fuel interests these days has to be development of a non-lead, high octane fuel for the users of 100LL ie the high preformance piston aircraft of today which accounts for 80% of the avgas used, even if they amount to only 20% of the airplanes flying".  I defy her to provide the source of this statistic.  It isn't true.  Nobody knows what the "so-called 20%" of the fleet that uses the most 100LL actually uses, the statistics aren't kept accurately.  I have heard GAMA say that maybe 20% of the fleet uses maybe 50-60% of the 100LL, but NOT 80%. The figures that AOPA used to throw out were the famous 70/30 which they repeated for years without attribution, 30% of the fleet used 70% of the 100LL, so how come now 20% uses 80% of the avgas?  If the big fuel consumers are in decline, which I have no doubt that they are, why would they use more of the total avgas today?  Or is the implication that General Aviation is really tanking.  Is that what they are saying?  I believe that, and the decline in AOPA membership and EAA membership reflect that.  The one fact we know about 100LL consumption is that it is steadily declining, about 7.5 million gallons/yr. from DOE/EIA statistics.

Clearly what AOPA is telling you is to shut up and use 100LL even if you don't need it and support them in finding the 100 octane replacement and they could care less what it is costing you to use a gasoline you don't need and increases your maintenance costs.

There IS NO mandatory federal E10 law in this country!  If a state can force the gasoline producers to make E10, like we did in Oregon, they can pass a law to prohibit the blending of ethanol in premium unleaded gasoline.  The EPA has COMPLETE authority over the federal RFS mandate that is running amok causing E10 to spread everywhere.  It was supposed to spur production and distribution of E85 and entice you to buy a flex-fuel car.  The EPA can prohibit the blending of ethanol in all premium unleaded gasoline in the country with a stroke of the pen.  As I said before, the representative from AOPA doesn't know what she is talking about.

 

Dean, I like what you say but, if AOPA is not willing to support our effort to get clean gas available what weight are we going to be able to carry?   We may be 100% correct, but if we can't get anyone to listen, do we have any chance at all in implementing reality?

 

 

Jerry - If we don't try, I am sure we will accomplish nothing.  With alphabets that don't help, we can vote with our shoes, I dropped my AOPA membership two years ago when President Phil Boyer told me AOPA wouldn't lift a finger to help GA get the fuel they need.  I will probably drop my EAA membership of 40+ years at renewal.  Membership is declining in both organizations and this is one of the reasons, they don't really help the sport pilot that is paying his own way anymore.

Luckily there are millions of boaters, car owners, off road recreational vehicle users and portable tool users that need ethanol free fuel.  We are allying with them.  Read the comments at http://www.thepetitionsite.com/1/keep-pure-gas/ and I think you will see that this is a huge problem.  If we can insure a source of ethanol free unleaded mogas a number of us are partnering with uFuels, a premiere company that makes airport self serve fuel systems and we are prepared to turn around the decline in mogas on airports.  To understand what we are trying to do see our AirVenture 2010 presentation:  http://www.flyunleaded.com/AV2010.pdf

How about a self serve airport fuel truck instead of fixed pump? Perhaps member owned to limit liability. 

This may be complicated, just thought I would toss in the idea for discussion.

 

We have looked into them.  Fuel trucks are an increased liability.  To drive them on the roads to get them filled usually requires a special license.  They are also mechanically more complicated with higher maintenance costs and even if you don't wear them out the tires have to be replaced about every 7 years, and they are not cheap.  One of the EAA chapters I am in was offered a fairly nice fuel truck for mogas at a token price but when they looked into the insurance and liability it was a nightmare.

That is not to say it can't be done.  I know of one fuel truck club on a rural Washington airport that has had their truck for a lot of years.

 

Dean, I signed the petition a couple of days ago.  Is there anything more we can be doing?  This whole issue seems like a 'no brainer' to me.  Why is it so difficult to get the 'powers that be' to see the light?

 

Jerry - Thanks for signing the petition, I appreciate it.

There are only two solutions:

States can pass a law prohibiting the blending of ethanol in premium unleaded in their state.  You can get politically active in your state and try to get this done.

The EPA administrator can prohibit the blending of ethanol in all gasoline distributed in the U.S.

Until people die because boats crap out in bad conditions or public safety equipment fails at an inopertune time, both of which will eventually happen when all of the gasoline is E10, the best bet is to keep badgering the EPA, FAA and aviation alphabets.

"Why is it so difficult to get the 'powers that be' to see the light?"  Because politicians don't want to rock the boat or take up any controversial cause especially if it means leading.  They will wait until there is a catastrophe or obvious economic dislocation.  It is coming next year.  We saw a huge number of gas stations here in the Northwest change to E10 last month as the summer / winter blend changeover occurred and people are really beginning to notice.  We could always just wait until the end of next year when the whole RFS mandate implodes and the politicians have ethanol all over their faces, but it would be nice to keep the 100 or so airports that have mogas service open.  We are losing two to three of them a month due to the economy or loss of supply.  We also have investors and supply companies that are interested in expanding mogas service on airports to support LSA and sport aviation, we proved that at our fuels forum at AirVenture last summer, but there is no use proceeding unless a supply of ethanol free fuel is guaranteed.

Dean,

I listened to Kent on the Ultraflight Radio talk show.

He said the base fuel, called "BOB" is now much lower octane. The ethanol increases the octane.

If the base fuel is low octane, then how can you supply your private airport tank?

Bill - We can't, that's the whole point of our movement!  That is why we are asking you to write the FAA and EPA and sign the EPA petition at http://www.thepetitionsite.com/1/keep-pure-gas/

As BOB spreads everywhere for E10 production, premium unleaded gasoline production will completely cease.  It has already happened at some refineries.  That is why we are appealing to the EPA to prohibit blending of ethanol in all premium unleaded gasoline so the refineries make premium and not sub-octane premium BOB.

We have about a year.  If we don't get the EPA's attention or get states to pass laws to protect their gasoline supply there will be no premium unleaded gasoline made anywhere in the U.S.  This is why I don't understand EAA's silence on this matter.  Why haven't they added this to the agenda of the aviation fuels coalition they joined with all of the other aviation alphabets and the FAA and EPA?

If the EPA bans ethanol in premium as you support, then how will the fuel distributor make and supply premium from a low octane base fuel?

This would require a separate high octane base fuel, I think. Would the distributor just end premium production altogether?

Today, I was just talking to a friend at the RC field. He said ethanol has cost him $400 for two new fuel pumps on his older vehicle.

This effects all older cars as well.

p.s. sorry if these questions have been covered already, this is a bit complicated.

The refinery will produce regular BOB which is about 84 AKI, and 91+ AKI premium unleaded and deliver it to the terminal, no different than they do in many places today.  They were doing this for months here in Oregon during the changeover to our mandatory E10 law, which meant that for a period we were getting about 94 AKI E10.  The terminal will add the ethanol to the regular BOB and distribute 87 AKI E10, and the 91+ AKI premium E0 to the station.  The three button pump will deliver 87 AKI E10, 89 AKI E5 and 91+ AKI premium E0.

I signed the petition.

good luck

Bill

Jim wrote:

Fuel cost/availability could be the tipping point for GA in this country.  Only the wealthy can afford to play.  Middle income gets squeezed out and we all loose. 

 This has been an excellent thread.  Fuel costs are high for GA because of how much they use.  Don't let anybody tell you they quit flying ultralights (or light planes) due to fuel costs.  That is an excuse (or a cop out).  Even at $4.00 per gallon for Avgas most of us don't burn more than $15.00 per hour for fuel.  The total cost of flying an ultralight including ownership is probably $40-60 per hour.  $15.00 hour for fuel seems to pretty cheap for the fun you can have.

Yes we have big problems and they want to go to E15 and thank goodness folks are taking action.  Lucky for most ultralights we can burn E-10 or whatever Avgas they make now or hopefully in future.

Response From The FAA 11/12/2010

I received an answer to my letter to FAA Administrator Babbitt from an assistant named Dorenda D. Baker, Director, Aircraft Certification.

The crux of the letter is don't worry, be happy, the FAA and EPA are working on it:

"The FAA has been coordinating very closely with the EPA on this and other issues relating to aviation fuel. We have advised EPA of our concerns with the use of ethanol as a fuel or fuel additives in aircraft. We will continue this dialogue with the EPA, along with aviation advocacy groups such as the Experimental Aircraft Association and the Aircraft Owners and Pilots Association, regarding the use of ethanol in autogas."

Draw your own conclusions. (My conclusion, we are screwed, they are doing nothing ... but they are "concerned".)

 

In reality E15 was DOA, for a whole host of reasons, but the main problem confronting aviation is that it will not delay the "blending wall" next year or early 2012 when all of the gasoline produced in the U.S. will have to be E10.  (For more information about E15 see our fuels blog on General Aviation News:  http://www.generalaviationnews.com/?cat=525 where there are several articles about E15.)

I feel that there are a number of problems with using E10 in ultralights, the main one is that your gas tank has to be made of the proper material.  E10 has already destroyed a number of ultralights that had fiberglass fuel tanks.  Another problem is why would you want to use a fuel with less energy in an ultralight?  Finally, be advised, there is no guarantee that E10 is only 10% ethanol.  As I have stated on a number of threads here, there are no federal or state statutes that require testing of the ethanol blending ratio in gasoline.  Even though it is illegal to sell any gasoline higher than E10 to a non flex-fuel car, that doesn't precluded blending errors or unscrupulous vendors who have put more ethanol in gasoline which happened quite a bit back when ethanol was much cheaper than gasoline.  That probably isn't happening today because ethanol is actually more expensive than gasoline, again.  But the point is that state Dept. of Weights & Measures do not insure blending limits, not even in my state of Oregon which is a mandatory E10 state.  They still only check AKI and VP and that the meter is accurate so that when it says you bought a gallon of gas, you got a gallon of gas.  They will only check the ethanol blending ratio if a garage notifies them that they believe that a non flex-fuel car was damaged by high ethanol content and that is done by sending a sample to a lab, the DWM does not have equipment to check the ethanol content, at least in Oregon.  The point is, buyer beware, check E10 carefully if you are going to use it in your ultralight.  Better yet help us insure that ethanol free premium unleaded is available everywhere by asking the EPA or your state legislature to prohibit the blending of ethanol in all premium unleaded.