Automakers Say Tests Show 15-Percent Ethanol Blends Will Damage Cars

Yes. BMW started blaming customers for having higher than allowable (10%) ethanol in their tank and refusing to pay for their flailing HPFP (high pressure fuel pumps). The part was a dog anyways, but BMW took a really bad customer service move by trying to blame the customers, who in turn had to blame the gas stations for selling them over 10% ethanol. Bad move, BMW.

attention government: GET THAT DAMNED ETHANOL OUT OF MY GAS!!!! it does nothing but screw up older cars that SOME of us may still chose to own. Unless your going to make it so that our old cars run fine on the stuff OR you buy us all new cars, at least provide us with a pump that has lower ethanol content, or just get rid of it all together.

Kiss your classic cars goodbye :-(

Drop the ethanol content to 5% nationwide and call it a day.

There isn't enough cropland in the entire US to supply corn-produced ethanol for everyone...so now you're talking about making 15% of what most people use ethanol (which is almost entirely corn-derived at this point)...why? There's barely any benefit to this from corn-on-the-stalk-to-pump versus gasoline anyway...I sense lobbying by growers in the cornbelt states more than anything. Ugh.

But Ford keeps harping on how some of their engines are E20-capable, so which is which? Does this mean they're way ahead of everyone else in the Alliance?

"Allowing oil companies to increase the ethanol content"

The article fell apart before the first sentence was complete. Why would the oil companies want to increase the amount of ethanol?

Btw: We have E20 in our state. I've spent plenty of time in the repair shops of major manufacturers (American, Japanese, and Korean). I honestly don't recall a single ethanol related complaint.

This article is fear mongering. 20% isn't damaging cars, why would 15% damage cars?

Antiques may be another story.

Valero, the largest petroleum refiner in the country has its own ethanol division, they would really appreciate seeing an increase in the blend.

Corn based ethanol is a scam. And it has been shown to damage some cars' fuel systems, particularly when it gets above 10% due to imcomplete blending at the fuel stations.

So, considering that auto manufacturers are going to be held responsible for vehicle warranties and will be the scapegoat for whatever could happen with ethanol concentrations that are too high for how they've designed the cars' engines and fuel systems, it's ony reasonable that they're going to oppose higher ethanol percentages. And why should anyone be forced to prematurely replace their car's engine, or to buy a new car sooner than they would otherwise want to, in order to get a compatible fuel system that can handle the ethanol mandates?

And it's important to understand that those members in the U.S. Congress who are truly responsible for these problems *Do *Not *Care. They don't care whether a lot of consumers' cars are damaged by ethanol, nor do they care that it costs everyone more money and artificially shifts some of the demand for corn as food to fuel, which has already caused hardships and higher prices for food items made from corn. They want the votes of the corn producers, who don't realize (or maybe they do and don't care either) that they're causing a whole lot more problems than are supposedly being solved by ethanol. This has been another overreach of the federal government, which is acting more like a national government than a federal one. It's the 101st reason that november can't come soon enough.

I wish the government would get the hell out of the car business altogether...

@ brn: The EPA would *allow* the oil companies to increase ethanol content so that they can meet the EPA's own renewable fuels quotas. -- Erin Riches

I think it is important to clarify a couple of things about ethanol.

First, if produced from the right stuff (say, sugarcane ala Brazil) it is a lot more environmentally friendly. Blame the Ag Lobby and Congress for excessive limits and tariffs on imported ethanol (that said, corn ethanol production still leaves plenty of material left over to use as livestock feed). Eventually, we'll probably see cellulosic ethanol which will use waste product.

Second, the purported damage from ethanol comes from the cars not being calibrated for the differing mixtures of ethanol. As long as you run the right mixture, ethanol and its combustion products are not dangerous to engines at all. In fact, engines usually end up cleaner on ethanol, both in emissions as well as the actual deposits on parts. Some ethanol compliant vehicles from GM and Ford have used fuel line ethanol sensors to determine the ethanol content of the gas. From there it is very simple to interpolate between fuel and timing maps ranging from 100% gas to 100% ethanol. You can even buy aftermarket kits these days that provide the same sensors with a analog voltage output to show ethanol percentage.

It is possible for older cars to have other issues with ethanol (fuel lines, etc.), but virtually every modern car made since the late 1990's handles tolerates E85 or higher if you tune for it.

Finally, ethanol kicks ass for performance. E85 is around 105 octane, E100 is 113 octane. Even E50 is about 99 octane. This allows more compression (better thermodynamic efficiency), optimized ignition timing and for turbo cars, more boost. Because you have to run more ethanol by weight, you also end up liberating more energy per pound of air (about 6-7%). This is a real boon for future engines designed to take advantage of these properties. If you would normally use a 3 liter NA petrol engine (say, 260 hp, 220 lbs-ft) you could downsize to a 2.7 liter engine with more compression and get the same power. Or, you could run a 1.5 liter turbo engine at about 1.5 bar of boost and exceed the output of the 3 liter by quite a bit.

I think ethanol is an awesome future fuel if done right. Yes, you'd have to retrofit older cars to make it work for them (fuel lines, corrosion, mixture compensation, etc.), but I fully agree that people should still be able to buy ethanol free gasoline, so retrofits would not be mandatory. Ethanol is cheaper anyways (and should get cheaper still relative to petroleum). As the price differential increases, more people will switch to ethanol tolerant cars and those that don't will be willing to pay for gasoline for their classics.