Arco to Introduce Low-Emission Gas to Replace Leaded Regular on Sept. 1
Atlantic Richfield Co. on Tuesday unveiled a low-emission unleaded gasoline to replace leaded regular, which the company has said it would drop from more than 700 Southern California stations on Sept. 1.
The newly formulated gasoline--designed for use only by the area’s 1.2 million vehicles without catalytic converters--is being introduced in part to bolster the oil company’s argument that gasoline, not methanol, should be the main vehicle fuel under any clean-air plans.
“We’re making this heavy investment because we believe the dominant fuel of the future will be gasoline, rather than the alternatives you’ve been hearing about,” said Arco Chairman Lodwrick M. Cook, who was joined by officials from the California Air Resources Board and the South Coast Air Quality Management District.
Arco’s announcement at an El Monte gas station coincided with a nearby meeting of the Air Resources Board, which unanimously approved a clean air plan to be administered by the AQMD. That plan has drawn heat from some business interests.
Promotional Campaign
Cook said emissions from older vehicles would fall 20% if all pre-1975 cars, pre-1980 trucks and other non-catalyst vehicles switched from leaded regular to the new gasoline, called EC-1.
The new gasoline will be sold to Arco dealers for the same price as leaded regular, though it will cost Arco more to make than leaded regular, Cook said.
It will be sold through pumps with larger nozzles used by older cars to prevent its use in cars with catalytic converters. Arco stations outside Southern California will continue to sell leaded regular.
The company spent more than $20 million to develop and test the new gasoline, said Arco spokesman Al Greenstein. A $10-million advertising and promotional campaign will introduce EC-1 Sept. 3 as “the first emission control gasoline,” said Edward G. Reilly, Arco’s senior vice president for marketing.
Cook estimated that almost a third of Arco’s Southern California customers now buy leaded gasoline, about 23 million gallons per month.
Introduction of EC-1 may be the first effort by an oil company to demonstrate that gasoline can lead to cleaner air as well as methanol or other alternative fuels that would be phased in under the Bush Administration’s clean air plan.
On Tuesday, air pollution officials applauded Arco’s effort to develop cleaner-burning fuels, but disagreed with Cook’s argument about gasoline.
“There is no single simple solution to Southern California’s air quality problem,” said Jananne Sharpless, chairwoman of the Air Resources Board.
“We’ve still got to go further than this,” added James M. Lents, executive officer of the South Coast Air Quality Management District. “We believe . . . that methanol and natural gas, electricity and those kinds of fuels are the kinds that are needed. We’re skeptical that gasoline can ever be as clean as some of these fuels, but we think they deserve the chance and our support” to come up with cleaner-burning gasoline.
Methanol Use Questioned
Arco is currently testing an 85% methanol-15% gasoline mixture at 10 service stations in California, and plans to increase that number to 25 by early next year, Cook said. Chevron is also testing methanol in conjunction with the state energy commission, and is working on developing its own new lower-emission gasoline.
The oil industry has questioned widespread use of methanol, arguing that it would raise costs and create health and safety risks.
A change to the fuel would require redesigned vehicles and wholesale and expensive revamping of the industry’s refineries, an industry group has argued.
Arco’s new gasoline will contain a methanol-derived additive called methyl tertiary butyl ether, or MTBE, which will result in an octane of 88--comparable with leaded regular.
The gasoline will also be formulated to reduce volatility, to cut the amounts of benzene and sulfur and to diminish resulting ozone and carbon monoxide emissions.
