E10 Fuel
E10 Petrol?
You have probably saw a load of things in the news about E10 petrol, ranging from anxiety about the usage of it to conspiracy theory’s about the introduction of it and panic buying for fuel. For many people you have the basic choice of standard or premium fuel, so calling something E10 just sounds a bit technical.
Thankfully here at The Driving Academy we’ve been following E10 (and both electric and hydrogen cars) so we should be able to shed a little light on what E10 is and if you can use it in your car (or when you buy a car after passing your driving test)
What is E10 and why does it matter?
So most people think petrol is just petrol, but as long as there have been cars there have been specific types of fuel, in 1920 the world was introduced to leaded petrol, then in the 1970’s unleaded fuel was introduced with leaded fuel being phased out and eventually banned in 2000. Unleaded has been the standard fuel ever since, but sometime in the 2000’s Unleaded started using 5% Ethanol in the mix, but it had little effect on cars. The new E10 fuel is essentially the same old fuel but instead of 5% Ethanol, it will now be 10%, So think of the fuel as Ethanol 10.
So whats the hype?
With E10 fuel, some older cars are unable to run on the fuel mixture. Back in the 1970’s, it wasn’t really an issue as most car’s where lucky to last 10 years, but in 2021 it’s not rare to see a 20-30 year old car still driving. Thankfully the .gov.uk website actually has a check tool for you to check if your are can be used with E10 fuel. You can check it out here. The amount of cars affected really is small (95% of cars will be fine), if you look at Ford cars for example there is only 1 Ford sold since 1992 that cannot run on E10, which is the Ford Mondeo 1.8 SCI from 2003 to 2007.
Why is fuel being mixed with Ethanol?
Renewable ethanol can help to reduce carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions associated with petrol vehicles and tackle climate change, so increasing the percentage from 5% to 10% is better for our health. It’s been done for years it’s just the percentage that has changed.
Why don’t cars just run on 100% ethanol?
They can, and they do, but there are some major drawbacks. Ethanol is essentially alcohol, but some cars have been designed to run on it. Some race cars and modified cars are designed to run on 100% alcohol (Ethanol) to good use, you can see some good performance gains but the car needs to be set up for the new fuel and getting ethanol can be an issue. Here in the UK 100% ethanol isn’t a great idea due to it’s very poor cold startability, essentially think of Ethanol as good for stopping things from freezing, but hard to ignite. When you need to start a car on 100% Ethanol, the ethanol needs to be a minimum temperature for it to work as fuel in the engine.
My car runs funny on E10 petrol
Most car’s should be fine, but some (the 5%) will be facing some issues. First, check your car on the .gov.uk list, if it should be ok get a garage to check it, it may be coincidence. If your car is listed as problematic for E10 then there are some solutions. There are a range of E10 Fuel Additive which are state-of-the-art, fuel additives for improving combustion specially developed to compensate loss of performance from E10 fuel and improves the vehicle acceleration and smoothness.
Ultimately, E10 is better for everyone, it improves the air we breath and allows petrol to stick around a little longer!