Fears that California would experience gasoline price hikes and
shortages following the phasing out of the additive methyl
tertiary-butyl ether are yet to be realized, according to the
California Energy Commission.
Officials have attributed the lack of any marked reaction to
good planning by the state government and gasoline stations making
the switch to substitute ethanol ahead of the official Dec. 31,
2003, deadline.
Rob Schlichting, a spokesman for the CEC, said it costs
approximately six cents per gallon to produce finished gasoline
when using ethanol instead of MTBE.
“The added cost has trickled down to consumers, but most
of the effects would have been felt some time before the deadline
when the switch was made,” he said.
MTBE is an oxygenate initially added to gas because it
facilitates a more complete combustion process and generally
reduces the amount of pollutants released into the air, said UCLA
chemical engineering Professor Yoram Cohen.
But studies showed the toxic and carcinogenic substance had
permeated into groundwater, potentially contaminating drinking
water in certain areas of California, including Santa Monica, Cohen
said.
“MTBE is highly soluble and also corrosive,” he
said. “These qualities mean it can leak through storage tanks
and migrate relatively quickly.”
MTBE is now being replaced with ethanol, Cohen said, which is
cleaner and can be considered a “renewable” form of
energy.
Ethanol is an alcohol most commonly derived from corn crops in
the Midwest states, he said.
Using ethanol poses problems of its own kind, Schlichting said,
as the alcohol is much harder to transport than MTBE.
MTBE was usually mixed with gasoline and transported down
pipelines to locations throughout the state.
Due to the highly corrosive nature of ethanol, Schlichting said
it must be shipped separately to gas producers and mixed at the
last moment.
“This amounts to a different and lengthier shipping
process,” he added. “Our gas ultimately costs more per
gallon than gas in other states.”
But Cohen suggested ethanol might be cheaper in the long run, as
it can be produced from biomass.
Schlichting said rumors of potential gas shortages in spring due
to the MTBE phaseout are not likely to be true, although he
conceded that spring is a critical time in the production of
gasoline.
Springtime sees a switch in the type of gasoline prepared from a
winter blend to a summer blend.
He said the summer blend of gasoline contains more ingredients,
is more complicated to produce, and evaporates less readily.
This reduces gas producers’ ability to supply finished
gasoline by 1 to 2 percent, Schlichting said.