- Also New bird flu find, fewer foreign visitors
Renewable Fuels Assn expects your pump choices will look like this in the near future
You may have to wait a little longer to fill up with E15 ethanol/ gasoline blend at your local gas station.It is now approaching the fifth month after California Governor Gavin Newsom signed a bill Oct 2 allowing “immediate” sale of higher blends of ethanol in gasoline sold in the state – up to E15 (15% ethanol & 85% gasoline) instead of E10. Legislation was signed as an “urgency statute,” meaning retailers could sell E15 immediately after Newsom signed the bill. At the time ethanol industry advocates celebrated the news after a decade of seemingly futile attempts to convince CARB, the California Air Resource Board, to allow the option but then suddenly getting what looked like a green light to launch a new 650-million-gallon market for ethanol.
Midwest corn growers are excited about the potential here with 40% of U.S. corn production directed toward ethanol. California is the nation’s largest fuel market and E15 is allowed everywhere else.
‘Right now it is down to just one hiccup” says Renewable Fuels Assn representative Robert White.That last step is approval by the fire marshall that the vapor recovery mechanism in the fuel pumps works as certified by the manufacturer. Only Underwriters Lab can do this according to the regulations although White is requesting help from the governor to cut what he considers to be red tape blocking the rollout of the fuel across the state.”CARB was accepting what the manufacturer promised.”
Once this issue is resolved, sales can move forward “very quickly” , suggests White, with no need to dig up underground tanks or change the dispensers to offer E15. At retail, all stations need are new labels.
The blending of ethanol by percentage happens at dozens of locations across the state including two terminals in the Central Valley in Fresno in Stockton and the move to a higher blend is a simple computer program.No holdup here.
In our reading area, the company Calgren, based in Pixley supplies ethanol to the regional market.
At the gas station, Renewable Fuels Assn believes motorists will see the familiar three choices that vary by octane level and price. Most will choose the budget friendly E15 blend with 87 octane level although E15- octane 89- and E10 octane 91- will be available as well (see pic).
In approving the new blend, Newsom has said the availability of E15 could help bring down the cost of gasoline in California. A study conducted by the University of California, Berkeley and the United States Naval Academy, showed E15 could lower gasoline prices by up to $0.20 per gallon and save Californians as much as $2.7 billion annually. Another study at the University of California, Riverside found that increasing ethanol blending in gasoline would not affect NOx emissions and would reduce particulate emissions.
Besides offering a cheaper option for motorists, the approval of E15 could also benefit the state’s fuel supply that will be expanded, even as refiners in California are making less gasoline, notes White.
One refinery in the Bay Area has closed and one in Wilmington (LA) owned by Phillips 66 just announced it would layoff 277 employees as it winds down operations and is slated to be closed later in the year.
Critics of California policies say the state is making it too tough for businesses including refiners and as a result of the closures, gas prices will skyrocket.
Part of the reason California gas prices are high is that the market is isolated with no connecting pipelines to the east. It looks like that will change with the competitive race to complete a petroleum pipeline that will connect the Midwest and Texas over the Rockies to California and Arizona.Phillips 66 who is closing a refinery here, is one of the pipeline builders.
But skeptics of E15 make several arguments downplaying its significance.I it’s worth remembering that the oil industry has always opposed more blending of corn ethanol in America’s fuel supply for the simple reason that they don’t make the product. It is worth remembering that the oil industry has always opposed more blending of ethanol into our fuel supply because they don’t make it.
Oil company manufactured MTBE was phased out because, although the octane booster was added in the 1990s to help fuel burn cleaner, it was found to be a possible carcinogen and contaminated groundwater.
Some skeptics
Some say E15 won’t be widely adopted,noting that it is not that popular in the rest of the nation. Fears continue that it could harm some older engnes.Others note that the mileage filling up with E15 could fall.
Adoption of the new standard- a three-option pump choice by major gas retailers like Costco (140 warehouses in the state), the big truck stops- Love’s,TA and Pilot and the 37 tribal stations could bring the rest of the retail sector with them if motorists vote with their credit cards lured by a 20-25 cent break at the pumps. Still, 80% of all gasoline purchased in the U.S. is sold at convenience stores and here is where we should watch what happens.
One political note: This February President Donald Trump called for allowing the year-round sale of E15 petroleum.
New bird flu find in Sonoma County
USDA reports that highly pathogenic avian influenza (HPAI) was confirmed on February 9 in a commercial broiler flock in Sonoma California. The bird flu find required the destruction of 84,000 birds. Commercial poultry were decimated in California in 2024/2025. This is the first commercial flock impacted in 2026 although a game bird flock in Butte County was hit in January with 36,000 birds.USDA says 53 flocks in the past 30 days across the nation have been been impacted by bird flu .
Fewer foreign visitors
There was a 6 percent drop in foreign visitors to the US last year, according to industry body the World Travel & Tourism Council, amid tensions between the Trump administration and other countries, including Mexico and Canada.