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Op-Ed: High-octane solutions to the new
energy crisis
By C. Boyden Gray | RealClearWire
Russia’s invasion of
Ukraine and soaring energy prices are a bracing wake up call to the West
to abandon our anemic energy policies, which have pretended to be green
but in reality have only shifted the dirtiest parts of our energy supply
chains to bad actors like Russia and China. Western energy dependence on
hostile powers limits our ability to preserve peace, to reduce our
supply vulnerability, and to find the most cost-effective climate change
solutions. |
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 Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and soaring energy prices are a bracing wake up
call to the West to abandon our anemic energy policies, which have pretended to
be green but in reality have only shifted the dirtiest parts of our energy
supply chains to bad actors like Russia and China. Western energy dependence on
hostile powers limits our ability to preserve peace, to reduce our supply
vulnerability, and to find the most cost-effective climate change solutions.
President Joe Biden has acknowledged some of these problems, conceding that
gasoline prices are too high and promising to do “everything in my power to
limit the pain the American people are feeling at the gas pump.” But gas prices
continue to rise, up by 10% in the last week.
One option President Biden has not yet explored is working with Congress to fix
our incoherent domestic fuel policy to improve fuel efficiency across the board
and reduce the amount Americans pay for gasoline. Currently, the EPA regulates
fuels and automobiles separately, instead of as a single system. Automakers have
the technological know-how to make much more efficient car engines, but
regulatory barriers prevent them from doing so because they do not permit the
use of cleaner fuels that would reduce carbon emissions and enhance performance.
The Next Generation Fuels Act – a bipartisan bill sponsored by U.S. Rep. Cheri
Bustos of Illinois – would eliminate these barriers and bring American fuel
policy into the 21st century. It works by raising minimum octane ratings – which
Mercedes-Benz has noted is “the single most important property of gasoline when
determining engine design” – to levels that both automakers and fuel
manufacturers agree are technologically and economically feasible.
High-octane fuel works like this: The higher the compression ratio in an
engine’s cylinders, the greater its fuel efficiency. But you can’t increase the
compression ratio indefinitely – at some point, the heat created by
pressurization alone will prematurely ignite the fuel and air mix, a phenomenon
known as “knock.” Knock limits efficiency and damages the engine. A fuel’s
octane rating is the measure of how much a fuel can be compressed before
knocking.
Automakers and researchers have long known that using higher-octane fuels would
improve fuel efficiency in existing cars and would enable automakers to make new
cars even more efficient. Indeed, American automakers already sell these more
efficient, high-octane vehicles in Europe.
The Next Generation Fuels Act also requires tomorrow’s gasoline to be cleaner.
Unlike traditional high-octane blends, which rely on toxic, high-polluting, and
carbon-intensive aromatic chemicals like benzene to increase octane, the blends
authorized by the Next Generation Fuels Act must meet stringent life-cycle
limits on carbon emissions.
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The bill enables this by authorizing the use of higher blends of ethanol, the
cheapest, cleanest, and lowest carbon source of octane. New research from the
University of Illinois at Chicago has shown that the carbon reductions
attainable with high-octane ethanol blends would at least equal those that the
EPA has said can be achieved through its plans for forced electrification.
The EPA has long known about the benefits of using ethanol as an octane source
but has not moved to eliminate the regulatory barriers that stand in the way. As
automakers reach the efficiency limits of low-octane fuels, the EPA has focused
on reducing emissions almost entirely by pushing electrification. The Next
Generation Fuels Act levels the playing field, allowing traditional automakers
to compete with electric cars through innovation to find the most cost-effective
ways to reduce carbon emissions – a win for consumers and the environment.
The Next Generation Fuels Act is a natural fit with President Biden’s climate
and national security priorities. Even with sales of electric vehicles doubling
in 2021, they still accounted for less than 4% of new vehicles sold and 1% of
vehicles on the road. Raising octane levels would improve the efficiency of the
other 99% of existing cars immediately, sometimes by as much as 5%. The benefits
for new cars would be even greater, as much as a 10% fuel efficiency
improvement.
And because ethanol is typically less expensive than both gasoline and aromatic
additives, increased use of ethanol will also lower the price you pay at the
pump per gallon. Indeed, widespread use of low-level blends of ethanol as an
aromatic replacement has saved American drivers on average 68 cents per gallon
of gasoline over the last decade. These savings are likely to improve over time
with the introduction of mid- and high-level blends, especially because
ethanol’s high octane rating will allow for greater use of domestic shale oil,
which has considerably less natural octane than traditional crude.
In the coming months, the Biden administration and both parties in Congress
should work to build a fairer, stronger, and more independent American energy
policy. The first step they should take is passing the bipartisan Next
Generation Fuels Act to allow competition in the race to find the lowest
cost-per-ton carbon reductions, as well as expanding our energy independence.
C. Boyden Gray served as White House counsel to President George
H.W. Bush and as Ambassador to the European Union and Special Envoy for Eurasian
Energy under President George W. Bush. Mr. Gray’s law and strategy firm, Boyden
Gray & Associates, represents multiple corn growers associations and other
clients interested in fuels policy.
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