Common Sense

It’s all about the summer blend, baby.

We’re talking consumer education today. HEB will begin pumping E-85 fuel at the pumps in front of the Bellmead store on the very busy I-35 to help promote alternative fuels.

E-85 is cheaper than 87 octane gasoline, but the trade off is that many cars cannot run on it, and those that have been modified or configured to run on alternative fuels will experience lower efficiency. Even flex-fuel vehicles will see a reduction in efficiency because ethanol is less powerful than straight gasoline.

H-E-B spokeswoman Leslie Lockett said the company has long considered selling the fuel, but recent high gas prices prompted chain officials to take the leap into alternative fuel.

“Because of a federal rebate program, we are going to be able to sell E-85 for about 30 cents less per gallon than the price of unleaded gasoline,” she said.

Unleaded gas in Texas cost an average of about $2.76 a gallon Wednesday, about 12 cents less than in April but about 76 cents more than this date last year, according to the American Automobile Association.

In Waco, prices ranged from $2.59 to $2.65 a gallon Wednesday, a drop of about 10 cents since the beginning of the month, said Eddie Gummelt, a local gasoline distributor. Gummelt said the decrease was due in part to a drop in demand in late spring.

However, he added, the market remains volatile, and prices could rise as the summer vacation season gets under way.

But, by varying the air-to-fuel mixture and the compression ratio inside th ecylinder, E-85 can be a more powerful fuel. And the cost is significantly less than straight gasoline thanks to elimination of gas taxes and government subsidies for ethanol production making it a decent tradeoff for a lot of people. If one were to purchase a new car that mixed technologies, say a hybrid car that was configured for flex-fuel running, you could easily overcome any efficiency problems.

So, kudos to HEB for trying to get us all on the ‘no fossil fuel in the future’ bandwagon.