Relaxing the deadline or allowing suppliers to mix the summer and winter blends in their storage tanks would solve the short-term supply problems that crop up around May 1. But it wouldn't simplify the supply nightmare created by more than a dozen blends, industry representatives say. Federal standards require RFG to contain 2 percent oxygen, which cuts emissions by boosting gasoline's combustion efficiency. But different areas use different additives to reach that mark. For example, the reformulated gasoline blends used in Dallas and Houston use methyl tertiary butyl ether, or MTBE, as an oxygenate.
Midwestern states use ethanol, made from corn, as their oxygenate.
California lawmakers, fearing that noxious MTBE will contaminate groundwater, are pushing the federal government to repeal the oxygenate requirement. If we had the flexibility to create our own blends that would still meet clean-air requirements, it would alleviate some of the supply issues. Representatives from government, industry and environmental groups support repealing the oxygenate requirement. That would probably mean an amendment to the Clean Air Act and an argument from Midwestern politicians hoping to protect profits of ethanol-producing Corn Belt farmers that air quality could suffer. Dan Greenbaum, president of the Health Effects Institute and chairman of a blue ribbon panel that wrote a 1997 report on oxygenates, says that's unlikely, though.