#Gasolinegate: EPA's Role in Fair Gasoline Emissions Testing Draws Fire

November 13, 2018

Print This Article Share it With Friends

by Jim Lane (Biofuels Digest) In Washington, researchers for a report published by the Urban Air Initiative contend that “technical data that shows the nation has been exposed to decades of flawed test fuels and flawed driving tests, which in turn means flawed emissions results and mileage claims”. The complete Beyond a Reasonable Doubt series from UAI is available here.

Further, EPA emails obtained under the Freedom of Information Act reveal that, according to a report from Boyden Grey & Associates, the Agency appears to have directly solicited financial contributions and technical input, “especially on the fuel matrix,” from an oil industry controlled research organization.

...

Of the testing, Adam Gustafson of Boyden Grey & Associates wrote:

EPA relied heavily on the oil industry to design the matrix of test fuels used in an influential and deeply flawed fuel effects study known as the EPAct study. EPA invited this involvement from oil industry employees and from the Coordinating Research Council (“CRC”), a group funded by the oil industry. In exchange, EPA sought and received valuable in-kind support from the oil industry.

This new evidence of collusion between EPA and Chevron, BP, and CRC is important, because EPA used the results of the EPAct study to update its vehicular emissions model, MOVES2014, which States must use when they develop policies to comply with EPA’s air quality standards. As a result of the oil industry’s influence, the model reports that ethanol increases emissions of many pollutants, even though other studies have demonstrated the opposite. UAI and scientists from Ford, GM, and other organizations have shown the EPAct study and MOVES2014 model to be inaccurate and biased against ethanol. The documents UAI has obtained reveal the source of that bias—the petroleum industry’s direct influence on the design of the EPAct study’s test fuels.

Were the tests rigged to produce results?

Gustafson writes:

“EPA and its oil industry collaborators expected their test fuels to produce bad results for ethanol. When preliminary testing showed that higher ethanol fuels lowered emissions of nitrogen oxide and other pollutants, EPA considered “chang[ing] the program midstream” to obtain different results “[i]f we continue seeing no NOX effect.” In the end, EPA decided to exclude the relevant test fuels from the program, and otherwise altered its slate of test fuels to “emphasiz[e] ethanol effects.”

Decreased test robustness is allenged

After reviewing documentary evidence from EPA emails, Gustafson wrote:

“As a result of EPA’s changes to the design of its test fuels, to accommodate the oil industry, the statistical robustness of the experimental design decreased from a “G-efficiency” of 83.6% to a G-efficiency of 51.6%. Although EPA at first considered that only a design with G-efficiency above 60% would be satisfactory, the Agency lowered its minimum standard to 50% in response to the deteriorating quality of its design.”

#Dieselgate vs #Gasolinegate

In the #Dieselgate scandal, a defeat device was installed by employees of the Volkswagen Group in diesel-based vehicles to provide inaccurate emissions data for standard EPA-supervised road testing. The VW Group was fined more than $10 billion and diesel passenger vehicles sales have collapsed around the world.

In what we call “#Gasolinegate”, the defeat device is the fuel itself — special formulations of gasoline for which the Urban Air Initiative says that documentary evidence shows:

The EPA is relying on science that routinely and knowingly discounts the value of biofuels. Extensive research has shown that regulations are being implemented based on vehicle testing that use fake test fuels. But even if unbiased science was allowed to play out in these tests, the regulations that the EPA creates are prohibitive for any alternative to petroleum based fuel products.

How did it happen?

...

Random fuel samples collected from the Kansas City area in 2016, and sent out for testing by Urban Air Initiative (UAI), revealed benzene volumes as high as 2.1% and that does not account for benzene emissions that are formed by other aromatics compounds as they exit the tailpipe. This is nearly twice the legal limit.

This goes to show that Congressional intent is still not being followed and the general public is being exposed to even higher levels of toxic aromatics than allowed by law.

...

What is benzene?

The Center for Disease Control writes:

“There is no safe exposure level to benzene; even tiny amounts can cause harm. The US Department of Health and Human Services (DHHS) classifies benzene as a human carcinogen.

...

Aromatics are additives to gasoline to raise its “octane” rating. Most gasoline stations carry three octane grades (87 Regular, 89 Mid-grade), 91-93 Premium). The most common aromatics include benzene, toluene methylbenzene, ethylbenzene, and xylene dimethylbenzene (often referred to as BTEX)

Octane is not only an expensive part of gasoline. To the extent “octane” is derived from crude oil, it is also can be most toxic and carbon-intensive. The use of higher octane fuels can enable auto makers to sell higher compression ratios, turbocharging, and downsizing/down speeding — all of which enable increases vehicle efficiency (miles per gallon) and lowers greenhouse gases through decreased petroleum consumption. For 100 years, auto manufacturers have searched for affordable, effective, and environmentally safe octane-boosting compounds, but there are only two commercially viable and legal contenders – aromatics and ethanol.

...

EPA’s role

The UAI team wrote in its report:

Emails between the EPA and the oil industry show that EPA asked oil industry employees what test fuels they would “prefer to see tested” and then revised the test fuels in response to their input. The EPA also threw out three test fuels after preliminary results showed that ethanol lowered emissions of nitrogen oxides and other pollutants and otherwise altered its slate of test fuels to downplay ethanol’s positive effects.

...

Simply adding ethanol to gasoline improves gasoline in every way. It lowers carbon, reduces common air pollutants for smog formation, lessens CO2 emissions, reduces sulfur content, and provides clean octane as a replacement for toxic aromatics. This was the exact intent of the Clean Air Act octane amendments.

Peer-reviewed confirmation on flawed testing

In the peer-reviewed journal article “Issues with T50 and T90 as Match Criteria for Ethanol-Gasoline Blends” James Anderson and Timothy Wallington of Ford Motor Company, Robert Stein of AVL Powertrain Engineering Inc., and William Studzinski of General Motors took issue with the EPA test methodology. They took particular issue with the use of a practice called “match-blending”, which they found creates the appearance of emissions attributed to ethanol which should be attributed to aromatics.

...

EPA’s secret consultation with a group of oil company employees about the test fuel parameters violated the requirement of the Federal Advisory Committee Act and EPA’s Scientific Integrity Policy that such committees be balanced, that they be publicly announced and that their meetings be open to the public.

...

One gallon of ethanol can replace up to two gallons of aromatics, which are the most carbon intensive and toxic of the 450+ chemicals in gasoline.

...

The 9-part series, Beyond a Reasonable Doubt, from the Urban Air Initiative, has links to all the cited sources. READ MORE

Full PDF of document.

Part 1: Executive Summary.

Part 2: The Problem.

Part 3: The Threat.

Part 4: What’s Been Done.

Part 5: Why it’s Not Working.

Part 6: Flawed Fuel Testing.

Part 7: What We Can Do.