The Ethanol Papers - Paperturn manuscript - Flipbook - Page 132
Auto Channel’s Bob Gordon confirmed that Stanton supports the use of ethanol
and that members of his group have implored Congress and the Administration
to provide a definitive guideline on alternative fuel selection. Stanton feels that
“we” must get away from gasoline.
However, as if to prove my charge that Shepardson’s preposterous story will
have a lasting detrimental effect on efforts to replace gasoline as the country’s
primary engine fuel, Stanton and Kim Custer (AIAM’s Director, Communications) cited an incident included in the Shepardson story about the Baltimore
Police Department’s patrol cars being disabled because the proportion of ethanol used in the fuel they were supplied with was too high (more than 10%).
Coupled with Shepardson’s repeated unsubstantiated remarks that “increased
ethanol blends could corrode engines,” Stanton and Custer, along with any casual reader were left with the impression that ethanol (alcohol) does indeed damage engines.
In fact, as I learned from phone conversations with spokespersons for the City
of Baltimore and the city’s fuel vendor, IsoBunker, the fuel did not have a higher
proportion of ethanol than previously used; there was NO damage done to the
vehicle’s engines; only a specific make and model year of the city’s vehicles
were affected (other vehicles were unaffected); and that after the fuel was
pumped out and replaced with new fuel using the same formulation, the vehicles operated without problem. Moreover, the cause originally suspected by the
city’s mechanics was not inflated ethanol levels, but that diesel had somehow
gotten into the gasoline blend. According to IsoBunker, it now seems that the
most likely reason for the malfunction was that because the fuel was the first
“winter-blend” used this year that the vaporization level of the fuel was not
properly recognized by the 2006-7 model year Chevrolet Impalas that were involved.
Ethanol played no part in the malfunction of the Baltimore patrol cars. Ethanol
did not corrode their engines or cause any damage.
Shepardson goes on to report that “automakers” (although he doesn’t identify
which ones) and some politicians want more study, more testing, more millions
of dollars to be spent on research… as if there has not already been far too
much money spent, and way too much testing already done to prove what the
world has known for more than one hundred years:
• Engines can run efficiently on ethanol (alcohol).
• Alcohol can be produced simply and cheaply and locally.
