E85 (ethanol 85%) fuel now available at P39.75/Ltr

[dlreyes]

The race for cheaper alternative fuel is on...

Bouyed by the E10 marketing hype that Shell and Petron have been doing recently which Sea Oil had been some 3 years already without much hoopla, Sea Oil once again had jumped the gun by commercially introducing E85 - an 85% ethanol blend with gasoline to provide fuel for our vehicles.

Presently priced at Php 39.75 per liter, Sea Oil hopes that the consumer would take the bite at this cheaper alternative than regular gasoline priced presently at around Php 57 (E10) to Php 60 per liter.

Does it really come out cheaper? We shall see...

Unless your car is manufactured to run on E85 (AFAIK, none of the cars being sold in the Philippines are) your engine needs to be modified. Cost of modification is between Php 24,000 (4 cyl) to around Php 44,000 (8 cyl) which is less than having your engine modified to use for LPG.

But wait...

Though E10's effect on overall fuel consumption is negligible, such is not the case with 80% ethanol and more so with 85%... Ethanol, regardless of the price you pay for it, contains less energy than gasoline. This means that your car won't go as far on a liter of E85, and your fuel economy will decrease by 20-30 percent. This is bad news for consumers because even if the price of E85 at the pump is cheaper than gasoline, using ethanol may not be less expensive in the end.

In my computation alone based on the present prices, I would be saving between Php 0.06 to a maximum of Php 0.30 per liter if I use E85 considering the 20 to 30% increase in fuel consumption. If I factor in the cost of modification then not even the junk shop would benefit from my investment!

So what's there to gain by using E85?

Ethanol is a renewable fuel that comes from agricultural feedstocks, and therefore it can be produced domestically. Using ethanol (particularly E85) also results in less pollution, reducing smog-forming emissions by as much as 50 percent relative to gasoline.

So if you are a staunch environmentalist with lots of money and believes in everything that Al Gore says, then go make the switch.

Despite what I mentioned above and the pros and cons that can be easily be googled and you STILL want to be convinced to use E85, the perfect person to contact is the official accredited engine modifier of Sea Oil:

Mr. Mario C. Nara
'J' Brothers Motor Service
42 H. Javier St. (Street of ULTRA), Oranbo, Pasig City
6715313, 6715284, 0919.2098199, 0917.8038930

His modified his Honda (don't remember model) only 2 months ago and when I asked him about fuel consumption he claims it's the same with regular gasoline... yet he admits that there were times he would put E85 and times he would put regular gasoline or a mixture of both and with only 2 months, how can one validate the claim? He admits that even Migs Zubiri (who is the prime advocate of ethanol usage and owns... nevermind...) had problems with fuel consumption but he claims that it had been corrected (how I don't know).

[glennmich]

ayos yan para makatipid naman.

[isprakenHAYT]

Here's a different viewpoint:

despite the lower mileage per kilometer (increased gas consumption) on e85, it still ends up cheaper considering that the cost is almost half. So in the end, you may end up with 8 km per liter pero cost mo naman is half of what you usually spend, mas mura pa din lalabas si e85.

Correct me na lang if I'm wrong here

[dlreyes]

I was hoping that E85's selling price here would be half the price (like your assumption) in which case the parameters would be different and it may be that the cost of modification in my case could be spread in around 4 to 5 years to break even but as I mentioned above, the selling price is closer to Php 40/liter and gasoline around Php 60/liter (and projected to go down in the coming days).

It is only 30% cheaper, not half... then factor 25% to 30% MORE fuel consumption would leave us with negligable savings! Factor in the cost of modification which will translate into a net loss over the life of the vehicle.

In other words, Sea Oil must sell it at around Php 30/liter NOW not Php 40/liter to make it attractive for us to take the plunge.

[isprakenHAYT]

*BUT* if you factor in the "brownie point" of knowing that you are relying less on fossil fuels (which is a dwindling resource) and giving the proverbial finger on the money grubbing OPEC members, this proposition more than outweigh the negligible savings that e85 deliver. Too bad its no longer practical to convert my current car (it is already 10+ years old) but I'll surely have my next one converted for flex-fuel usage.

[ice]

the use of a bio fuel is really more on the "environmental side" than the power and savings!

[edtf]

I'm sure you can run th E85 efficiently and effectively BUT when you do all the mods you might not be able to run ordinary fuel. So, all or nothing yan. What they are doing now is half and half na muna. Yes you can ruin on E85 but not to its full potential.

BTW, as a trivia - do you know that the octane rating of E85 is something like 100+ just the same as racing fuel

[dlreyes]

The modification is for Flex fuel (flexible fuel) so the engine may run on pure gasoline, pure ethanol or a blend of ethanol and gasoline.

Regarding Octane level... precisely why we need modifications to our engine if we are to use ethanol or for that matter, a higher octane fuel which could not be accomodated by our engine. Remember that a high octane fuel is meant for high compression engines and not ordinary day to day engines like we have and what our gas companies would like us to think and buy. Of course, 95 to 96 octane are still tolerated by our engines without modifications but are actually useless as we just pay more for them.