Davis Seeks EPA Waiver for Gas Conversion

Gov. Gray Davis called on federal environmental regulators Monday to grant California’s request for a waiver from federal Clean Air Act requirements, so the state can speed efforts to remove the additive MTBE from gasoline.

Davis issued an executive order earlier this year directing that oil companies remove MTBE by 2002. On Monday, Davis appeared at a news conference with Tosco Corp. Chairman Thomas O’Malley, and lauded a statement by the company that it can remove MTBE from gasoline produced at its Benicia refinery by next December, but only if the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency grants California’s waiver.

In a move supported by the oil industry, Davis requested that the EPA permit California refineries to produce gasoline without MTBE, a so-called oxygenate, which help make gasoline burn more completely.

Oil companies began adding MTBE to gasoline in the early 1990s in an effort to comply with state and federal clean air requirements that they produce less-polluting gasoline. While MTBE has resulted in cleaner air, the substance has caused water pollution problems. MTBE has been shown to cause cancer in animals.

Davis predicted that the oil industry can remove MTBE without adding to the cost of gasoline.

“It will be cost-neutral at worst,” the governor said.

O’Malley said Tosco, which supplies Union 76 stations, plans to replace MTBE with ethanol, an oxygenate manufactured primarily in the Midwest from corn and other farm products. He predicted that Tosco’s decision to drop MTBE will prod other oil companies to act more quickly to remove MTBE.

O’Malley said the cost of retooling Tosco refineries to add ethanol will be no more than $20 million--significantly less than the billions of dollar that oil companies spent to modify refineries to add MTBE. He also said the new gasoline would meet state and federal emission standards.