Real Gasoline, not Ethanol

Sometime ago, driving cross country, I noticed that the gas was E0, no ethanol. I asked the station owner why they didn't have E10, which is mandated in my area. His reply: " I sell to farmers, and they know what ethanol is. They won't buy any gas that has ethanol in it." . . . He explained about storage tank issues, use in older farm equipment that was designed for E0; and the fact that the farmers drove 40-60 miles round trip to get to his station.
.

Thanks for the E0 gas station web sites and the app. I'll look for those stations when traveling.

 

Good luck Eastside!
But if you get out to I-81 Winchester or Front Royal or especially down to Staunton you can find E0.
Use PureGas,org to find stations. The NoVA reformulated gasoline zone ends somewhere probably just out beyond Manassas, but the E0 is further out for some reason. Note that Congress/EPA is mandating increasing quotas of E10+ so it is harder and harder for major gasoline brands to offer E0. I am thinking Congress lets small oil companies off the hook for ethanol mandates, so you gotta get to those types of places. No fuel choice fun here in NoVA.

 

Here is update on USA ethanol.
EPA is ramping up ethanol quotas so average US gaso is now 9.9% ethanol. 95% drivers using E10.
Due to reporting complexities, it is not possible to directly calculate E0 sales, but they think that E0 sales volumes are declining since most retailers have to sell E10 to meet their quotas.


EIA: Ethanol-free Gasoline Sales Slide - Gasbuddy Gas Prices

 

What was the point of ethanol again? To reduce dependence on foreign oil?

It seems like income tax: brought is as a temporary financing method, about 100 years back.

 

Don't get me started.
Clean Air Act Ammendments of 1990 mandated ethanol in reformulated gasoline to allow gasoline to burn more cleanly, however, by 1990 new data was already showing for newer cars ethanol did not contribute to reduced emissions. Eventually the rationale was shifted to reducing oil imports, and expanded to include all gasoline sold in the USA. Bush admin expanded ethanol because peak oil was a serious concern during his admin, and problems with Venuzuela and Middle east seemed intractable.

Since Bush admin we have the USA energy boomlet and ethanol mandate looks less justified for some because we have USA fracking and Canada oils sands and other global oil players have reduced dependence on the "bad" guys.

 

Not to mention CAFE has increased significantly.

 

...argh...my lawn mower pooped out again yesterday ...yet again had to drain all the fuel and carburetor and refill fresh fuel due to separtion. I am getting faster at it though

 

I only use ethanol-free gasoline in small engines, but there are several additives that claim to negate ethanol damage.

Of course, all my small engines are two-cycle, so the mix oil I use also has additives designed to negate ethanol issues....

 

Have you considered some of these 80V lawnmowers?

 

Or, if you're not mowing acres, a corded mower.

 

I got smallish but wooded and hilly lot sort of heavy duty self propelled territory with falling sticks and heavy Fall leaves. So it would have to be really good EV mower.

Funny we were in Yosemite a few weeks back, and a worker had a gaso leaf blower smoking up the whole place, I thought it was hillarious but missed getting photo. They should be using those green lawn tools, but National Park Service is too poor.

 

My dad did our (for our standards) considerable lawn twice a week with an EV mower in the 70's. Storebought carbattery mower. Worked a charm.


Haven't read the whole thread but I am trying to learn what is fact and what is fiction about a local gasoline "Blue One".
It started out as E15 but some stupid legislation says you can only have less than 10% or more than 30% (iirc) ethanol in gasoline (which idiot earning at least twice what I make, makes such a rule and why?????), so they had to reduce it to 10%.

The clue is that the ethanol is not the 'dry' version used in normal E10, but a wetter variant where they don't go to extremes (read: use huge amounts of energy) to reduce the water content.
Somehow this should lead to a lower combustion temperature and it should be equally fuel efficient as normal E0*. And it should not have the drawbacks in attacking seals and rubber that regular 'dry' E10 has.
Toyota said in 2011 or 2013 not to use it until they had an official stance on it. They were supposedly testing the effect on engines back then. Never heard a conclusion though...


* in the considerable amount of postings about the stuff, it is suggested by emails from the manufacturer that the RON number might be slightly higher than 95. Some concluded that this might lead to better fuel economy in especially turbocharged engines. Most claim equal or better fuel economy but the differences are so small this can imho easily be contributed to weather, season, self-fulfilling-prophecy, etc

 

Have not heard about that. Part of the reason ethanol is questionable eco-merit is the energy needed for the azeotropic distillation to get all the water out. If you left some trace water in the ethanol, I assume they are saying trace amount that will remain dissolved in the gasoline. But one would think that blend would be more sensitive to water separation upon further exposure to moisture condensation etc.

 

Now they have us where they want us.....paying for water to put in our tanks....

 

Here is some interesting data.

• Pure hydrocarbon E0 gasoline only holds 150 ppm dissolved water
• E10 gas can hold up 6000-7000 ppm dissolved water (that's 0.6 to 0.7 wt%)
• So you can sell water...not sure what we do in USA (anhydrous ethanol I assume)

Gasoline Expiration - Ethanol Blend Fuels Have a Short Shelf Life

 

Super interesting. Thanks for posting. I also read through the link on the expiration dates. My small engine "guy," mowers, blowers, weedeaters and chainsaws, has always said, even with the zero ethanol that I use, to never store it for more than a month. Even with stabilizers. When a month hits, he says to dump into the car fuel tank.

 

(Edit: I still had this page opened, so I did not see the last two replies above this one when writing this)

From what I can find, normal gasoline ("95 RON") can have 5% max. anhydrous ethanol (max. 1%water). The Blue One has hydrous water of up to 5% water (instead of under 1% within the ethanol part of the mixture). But some sites claim they have reverted to anhydrous ethanol with the mandatory switch from 15% to 10% ethanol content...

Also from what I understand is that the anhydrous ethanol *wants* to absorb water and this may be the reason it dries out rubber and seals.

Which makes no sense to me at all. Why would high levels of energy be used to remove water if leaving it in is better for your seals and raises fuel efficiency (and has no mentioned ill-effects provided the car is from after 2001, which in turn is a randomly picked year to make sure every car since then can run E10...)

The internet made information much more readily available, but the trustworthyness declined at almost the same rate...

 

wjtracy...... I think you (or someone) said you had hard times finding E0 in your area. I think the E0 stations in Virginia, as listed in pure-gas.org have doubled or tripled in the last decade+(?). Have you been able to find E0 more readily? In my Washington state, E0 stations have doubled in the last decade+. But I still am NOT near E0 sources.

 

Northern Virginia is EPA RFG area, where E0 is generally not allowed. If you get outside the RFG areas, then E0 can be found, probably about an hour from where I live. You can see from the map below, Ca. and Federal RFG areas.

https://www.api.org/~/media/Files/Policy/Fuels-and-Renewables/2016-Oct-RFS/US-Fuel-Requirements/US-Gasoline-Requirements-Map.pdf

 

Australian Prius owner’s manual recommends 95RON or higher.

Pretty sure 95 is equivalent to the US premium (approx) though we have up to 98RON. 91 is our standard ethanol free grade.

given Prius is 13:1 compression ratio it makes sense it would be optimised for a higher octane fuel (and I guess why it’s happy running an ethanol blend too).