95 RON standardized as new high octane?

[F-BIRD'88]

The next big lie is that electric cars will be cheap to operate or own... Not once they get beyond fringe status and the car or the electricity or the miles driven on streets and highways gets "road taxed"... Gasoline may be used less, maybe a lot less but the fleet "ROAD TAX" will not decrease.

2. Once electric cars are popular enough to start to even displace IC engine cars sales the price of batteries raw materials (Lithium, Colbalt, etc) will skyrocket.

But your government is going to give rich people your money (EV subsidies) to buy a nice new EV.

[4vpc]

A car buddy and I were talking last night about the future of gasoline and that prompted me to visit the American Fuel and Petrochemical Manufacturers website and I saw something I’ve never seen before, a pitch to effectively raise the octane rating on our fuel so vehicles could raise compression and gain a 3% efficiency bump. This new fuel would be the standard and eliminate 87, 89, 91 and 93. The pitch goes on to say that if done, emissions cuts would be the equivalent of putting 750,000 Electric cars on the road.

I personally don’t mind this idea but I don’t know all there is. Anyone know anything more about this not expressed in this article?

https://www.afpm.org/sites/default/file ... timony.pdf

AFAIK your fuel already is a min of 95 Ron?
87 Mon is equal to 95 Ron, no?

[David Redszus]

Fuel with ethanol in it INCREASES FUEL CONSUMPTION.
you have to buy MORE OF IT.

Yes, the addition of any oxygenate will lower the stoich value and will require more fuel for
a given air/fuel ratio.

Vehicles that operate on 91 octane gas are no more fuel efficient than 87 octane fuel cars,
If the 91 octane has ethanol in it, the fuel consumption per mile is HIGHER. That means you buy more.

An engine designed for a higher octane fuel can improve thermal efficiency; at the price of increased fuel
consumption. Starting with a fuel with a stoich value of 14.66, the addition of 10% ethanol will lower the
stoich value to 14.14, a drop of 3.5%. If the thermal efficiency due to higher compression is greater than 3.5%,
it will result in a net improvement. If not, the octane and the increased cost are wasted.

"performance" has nothing to do with it. You burn more stuff per mile you pay more per mile.

Performance has a lot to do with it. Higher performance engines using turbos would not be possible
without an octane increase. But I fail to see howa mere one point octane increase can result in an acceptable
trade-off. Clearly, it is not merely the addition of 5% more ethanol that matters. Refineries would like to
use alternate components that are now restricted.

The price of pp gas is based on market demand not producer costs efficiency,

The price of gas is based on producer cost efficiency, crude oil price, taxes and market demand.

A engine in a personal car that has 1 ratio or 2 cr ratios higher compression is not more fuel efficient
(mpg) And certainly not if it is ethanol blended fuel.

The increased compression is beneficial. Ethanol has
never been a good blending additive. It is costly, not just to produce but also due to the price impact on other agricultural products. The mandated substitution of MTBE with alcohols was and is a very bad decision.

The increased octane is wasted 98% of the whole time the engine is running.

Yes, for most applications that is true. Even very high powered engines spend most of their time at low rpm, low throttle.

But the CORN farmers love it.

But other farmers hate it. Ethanol production from corn has increased the cost of fertilizer, weed killers, pesticides, transportation (can't use pipelines), and driven up the cost of your Porterhouse steak.

Actually, I don't think oil companies are asking to use more oxygenates; they are asking for a regulation change
that allows more manufacturing latitude without requiring massive investment in production facilities.

[rebelrouser]

Fuel with ethanol in it INCREASES FUEL CONSUMPTION.
you have to buy MORE OF IT.

Vehicles that operate on 91 octane gas are no more fuel efficient than 87 octane fuel cars,
If the 91 octane has ethanol in it, the fuel consumption per mile is HIGHER. That means you buy more.

"performance" has nothing to do with it.
You burn more stuff per mile you pay more per mile.
The price of pp gas is based on market demand not producer costs
efficientcy, A engine in a personal car that has 1 ratio or 2 cr ratios higher compression is not more fuel efficient
(mpg) And certainly not if it is ethanol blended fuel.
MPG goes way down the more % of ethanol.
You burn more of it. You $$ buy more of it $$.
The increased octane is wasted 98% of the whole time the engine is running.

Its not a WOT race. And fuel with ethanol in it is NOT CHEAPER @the pump. $$

But the CORN farmers love it.

It depends on what engine and fuel management strategy the ECM has. If you look, many vehicles have a low octane and high octane timing maps. I have an HP tuner, and gain performance all the time by making the ECM use the premium fuel map only. All flex fuel vehicles have sensors in the tanks, to tell the computer what level of ethanol is present and adjusts timing and mixture to compensate.
One of my personal cars is a 2010 Dodge Challenger with the high output V-6, in the owners manual it should be run on 91 octane. I run it around town on 87, it has knock sensors so no big deal. On long trips I put 91 in it, gets 2 MPG better on the premium, ECM must advance the timing more is what I suspect.
I am all for the 95 octane fuel, as long as they don't use it as an excuse to jack up fuel prices. My other worry would be if the ethanol level goes up to 15% what is that going to do for proper operation of older cars with carbs? I wonder if you could simply re-jet to compensate for 15%? Or would it require a lot more work?

[David Redszus]

My sense is that all fuel prices will increase due to our current government's attitude toward
hydrocarbon fuels.

With regard to increased ethanol, the amount of ethanol (or other oxygenate) does not really matter.
What matters is the fuel stoich value of the final blend.

One rarely mentioned reason for poor fuel economy using alcohol based fuels is the
water content of the alcohol.

[Rob-bb]

In all the rush to Electric it seems a not a lot of people are aware of E-Fuel. E-Fuel can do more for the environment that any other viable solution. Take a clean source of electricity, so hydro, wind, solar, tides etc, build Direct Air Capture machines and remove carbon directly from the atmosphere, then using the electricity extract hydrogen from water adn combine with carbon to make new hydrocarbon fuels. The fuels are identical to petrol, every existing vehicle in the world can run on them. Store and sell them in normal petrol stations, no changes are required to existing vehicles.

Overnight all cars and tucks adn boats and planes become carbon neutral. The do not add any extra carbon to the air. Dirty adn pollution oil drilling and fracking can stop, that makes the existing vehicle fleet cleaner so total population actually decreases. No dirty pollution by lithium mining for batteries, so cleaner again.

It is win win, we could even extract more carbon from the air than we need for fuel and start to undo the climate damage, and we get to make noise

more info here https://www.caranddriver.com/news/a3557 ... s-testing/

[David Redszus]

In all the rush to Electric it seems a not a lot of people are aware of E-Fuel. E-Fuel can do more for the environment that any other viable solution. Take a clean source of electricity, so hydro, wind, solar, tides etc, build Direct Air Capture machines and remove carbon directly from the atmosphere, then using the electricity extract hydrogen from water adn combine with carbon to make new hydrocarbon fuels. The fuels are identical to petrol, every existing vehicle in the world can run on them. Store and sell them in normal petrol stations, no changes are required to existing vehicles.

Overnight all cars and tucks adn boats and planes become carbon neutral. The do not add any extra carbon to the air. Dirty adn pollution oil drilling and fracking can stop, that makes the existing vehicle fleet cleaner so total population actually decreases. No dirty pollution by lithium mining for batteries, so cleaner again.

It is win win, we could even extract more carbon from the air than we need for fuel and start to undo the climate damage, and we get to make noise

more info here https://www.caranddriver.com/news/a3557 ... s-testing/

You're kidding right? Sounds like something from Dr. Greta Thunberg.

Carbon dioxide is NOT harmful and there is no reason to try to become carbon neutral.
Hydrocarbon fuels are cheap and plentiful. Alternative fuels are neither.
Gasoline has a very high specific energy and is the most efficient fuel for transportation purposes.
Nuclear is the best for the production of electricity.

Global warming, protecting the enviornment, carbon neutral, social justice, are questionable
at best and should be resolved by the marketplace, not by ignorant government boffos.

[Rob-bb]

You're kidding right? Sounds like something from Dr. Greta Thunberg.

Carbon dioxide is NOT harmful and there is no reason to try to become carbon neutral.
Hydrocarbon fuels are cheap and plentiful. Alternative fuels are neither.
Gasoline has a very high specific energy and is the most efficient fuel for transportation purposes.
Nuclear is the best for the production of electricity.

Global warming, protecting the enviornment, carbon neutral, social justice, are questionable
at best and should be resolved by the marketplace, not by ignorant government boffos.

No I am not kidding. Science is real

Seriously do some research and learn about it. This is not an alternative fuel, it is normal petrol (gasoline), the product is a hydrocarbon fuel with the same chemical structure as the hydrocarbons drilled from the ground. But the carbon comes from the air, and hydrogen from water, combined to make hydro-carbons, hydrogen and carbon. It means we can have our cake and eat it to, noisy loud racing cars instead of something that sounds like vacuum cleaner. What it means is nothing needs to change, drive your car to a petrol station and fill it up. All vehicles will be carbon neutral without needing to do anything to them, same performance, same sound.

But, if we don't back this technology and convince governments there is more than one way to meet pollution targets (and this will smash it out of the park) then they will outlaw combustion engines. Countries are already talking about making new ICE vehicles illegal by the mid 2030s

[F-BIRD'88]

It takes more energy input to do this than you end up with in the eFuel.

[Rob-bb]

It takes more energy input to do this than you end up with in the eFuel.

Yes, nothing is free, which is why the need to use celan forms of renewable energy, like hydroelectric, wind, solar and so on to manufacture it. But like everything as time goes on techniques and technology improve and costs will reduce. I imagine one day we will be using e-fuel and 98% of the population won't even know it.

At least I hope so, because I don't think I would trust a 12 hour flight on an electric plane no matter how long they say the batteries last

[F-BIRD'88]

They said Why do we need IC cars? Whats wrong with a good old horse?

The days of personal car ownership are numbered.
Cars as you know them will go the way of the Buggy Whip.

[Rob-bb]

They said Why do we need IC cars? Whats wrong with a good old horse?

The days of personal car ownership are numbered.
Cars as you know them will go the way of the Buggy Whip.

yea, they will. There will of course be a few rich people who continue to own cars the way rich people today own thoroughbred race horses, but yea, I doubt my grandkids will own a car

[David Redszus]

When I was very young, (perhaps about 40), we learned that electricity could be used to reduce water to oxygen
and hydrogen gas, which could then be burned as a fuel. But the cost of production far exceeded existing energy
sources and was totally impractical.

The same is true today when we attempt to use alternative energy sources to reformulate molecules into fuels.
Alternative fuels are very poor sources of energy; costly, unreliable, high maintenance, and require massive
government subsidies in order to exist. And the energy must be used as produced and cannot be stored for
later use, nor can the spigot be turned up to meet increased temporary demand.

The concept of carbon neutral is sheer nonsense. The planet needs CO2 for vegetation growth (food production)
and is not harmful in any way. The period of global warming is being replaced with global cooling resulting from
reduced solar activity.

Private transportation, in the form of IC cars, is a very long way from extinction. Cars are too cheap, too
versatile and too reliable to be replaced by some questionable alternative transportation. Mass transit has
been advocated by uninformed politicians many times and has failed every time. Mass transit systems do a
very poor job and are suitable only for a few specific applications.

Cars will be around long after my grandkids die of old age. The global automotive fleet will grow as third
world countries are able to afford them. It is really only in overcrowded cities that issues of pollution and
traffic are in evidence; the result of very poor planning and incompetence.

[chimpvalet]

When I was very young, (perhaps about 40), we learned that electricity could be used to reduce water to oxygen
and hydrogen gas, which could then be burned as a fuel. But the cost of production far exceeded existing energy
sources and was totally impractical.

The same is true today when we attempt to use alternative energy sources to reformulate molecules into fuels.
Alternative fuels are very poor sources of energy; costly, unreliable, high maintenance, and require massive
government subsidies in order to exist. And the energy must be used as produced and cannot be stored for
later use, nor can the spigot be turned up to meet increased temporary demand.

The concept of carbon neutral is sheer nonsense. The planet needs CO2 for vegetation growth (food production)
and is not harmful in any way. The period of global warming is being replaced with global cooling resulting from
reduced solar activity.

Private transportation, in the form of IC cars, is a very long way from extinction. Cars are too cheap, too
versatile and too reliable to be replaced by some questionable alternative transportation. Mass transit has
been advocated by uninformed politicians many times and has failed every time. Mass transit systems do a
very poor job and are suitable only for a few specific applications.

Cars will be around long after my grandkids die of old age. The global automotive fleet will grow as third
world countries are able to afford them. It is really only in overcrowded cities that issues of pollution and
traffic are in evidence; the result of very poor planning and incompetence.

Bravo! Sums up the future of the automobile rather well, correctly identifies how poor planning compounds our troubles. Mass transit is grossly limited in terms of usurping the car, as the legions of folks who must travel to varying destinations in the course of work will testify. Meanwhile, as people continue to multiply, particularly in developing regions, the powers that be will use expanding population to counter inherent systemic defects. Easier to kick the can further down the road than it is to build solutions.

We still discussing octane?

[Rob-bb]

The same is true today when we attempt to use alternative energy sources to reformulate molecules into fuels.
Alternative fuels are very poor sources of energy; costly, unreliable, high maintenance, and require massive
government subsidies in order to exist. And the energy must be used as produced and cannot be stored for
later use, nor can the spigot be turned up to meet increased temporary demand.

Yes e fuel is more expensive to create currently. But everything else you said there is wrong. This is not hydrogen powered cars, it is petrol, diesel, and any other fuel that is hydrocarbon chains. You need to understand this is the same stuff that is in your fuel tank today. What Porsche and Siemens are making is exactly the same. It will be transported the same, stored the same. The 'maintenance' is the same, the reliability is the same. The performance is the same. There are no government subsidies because the fuel storage, transport, wholesale and retail infrastructure already exist. It is stored in tanks for later use.

In a world where the governments are trying to remove ICE because of global warming a carbon neutral fuel source making all ICE cars cleaner than electric cars whether the owners believe the science or not, is a good thing. It means the people who don't believe or don't care can still have their toys and not be forced to visit them in museums. To use e fuel nothing needs to be done to the cars and trucks, even shipping and planes can run on e fuel, the transport system, the storage system, the retail systems all remain as they are today.

So as car people we can either support the initiative that will save our cars and racing, or give in to the government's desire to destroy ICE cars and go buy an electric scooter