E20: Ethanol Blending in Petrol

[Deleted member 87056]

As per the latest directive from the govt to blend 20% ethanol in petrol as standard across India, I was worried for my car's long term health since it is not E20 Compliant. Out of curiosity, I dropped an email to shell asking the exact % of ethanol blending in the latest batch.
I got to know that they are doing 15-20% blending as per "local" guidelines. I was surprised to see that the blending varies from state to state, for example here in MH, they have 15% blending.

I have decided to shift to shell fuel now as it would cause less long term damage to my car.
Surprisingly I have not noticed any drop in fuel efficiency yet even after filling petrol from HP and indian oil, maybe they have not implemented 20% blending here in Pune i suppose.

 

[Lolita_Magnum]

I am not a petrolhead.
Can someone help me understand the reason for blending, what it does to a car and why the government is pushing for it?

I understood that it is to reduce gasoline imports, but can the car be able to maintain the same efficiency with such blending?

 

[Deleted member 87056]

Ethanol blending is being done in order to reduce the pollution, atleast that's what the govt is claiming, reduced emissions. E20 means 20% ethanol blending in petrol, i.e. 1L of petrol would only have 800ml of pure petrol and 200 mL of ethanol.
Cars which are not E20 compliant, i.e. manufactured before 2023 are not designed to run on E20 fuel. This causes issues in parts like fuel injectors, spark plugs, hose pipes and rusting in fuel tank.
This has also taken a major hit on fuel efficiency to which the govt has acknowledged that the fuel eff drop is just 2-3% where as in real life it is more than 20-30% for non E20 compliant cars.
The govt is not acknowledging the damage which ethanol does in long term to the car's health which I mentioned above. They said that they have done thorough testing before the announcement.

 

[Navjot Singh]

Also with 20% blending petrol prices should go down but they didn't. So we are paying same prices for diluted petrol which also damages your cars.

Also the real reason for this? Gadkari's family members own 17 ethanol plants.

And last but not the least ethanol production wastes tonnes of water which is great for environment I guess. Lol

 

[Deleted member 87056]

With this kind of fear mongering, common man would be forced to either switch to EV or else damage their cars with E20 fuel and get it repaired again and again, in both cases, more tax to the govt.
I bought my car in nov 2022 and it just became obsolete in less than 3 years of time with this stupid E20 blending thing.

 

[Deleted member 87056]

Source

 

[Hitori_Abhito7]

Since govt. portals on SocMed are saying nothing bad will happen to pre '23 engines, are we to assume that trust in the state will diminish? Also, the big dog stated he's going to blend biofuel in diesel....

 

[Deleted member 87056]

Yeah isobutanol blending in diesel, does that mean diesel cars will continue to sell inspite of the sentiment that diesel is going to be banned in the future?

 

[Kaiju404]

Good news PIL has been filed regarding this ethanol fiasco hope we get results.

Plea In Supreme Court Challenges Centre's E20 Petrol Policy; Seeks Ethanol-Free Fuel Option For Consumers

 

[Sushubh]

Zero chance, courts are going to do anything about this.