10 reasons why E10 is the fuel for today

Zemo Partnership EventZemo Partnership News

Fri 27 August 2021 View all news

With all the talk around future ‘electrification’ and the sale of new petrol and diesel cars ending in just over 9 years, it is easy to forget that there are currently over 20 million petrol powered, cars, motorcycles and vans on our roads. Understandably, replacing all these with zero emission alternatives is going to take significant time – and effort.

But time, as far as the environment is concerned, is not on our side. We must do everything we can to reduce the greenhouse gas emissions from the millions of petrol vehicles we use daily today. E10 petrol is the country’s next step in achieving this and becomes our standard petrol from 1 September.

Until now, our standard petrol contained up to 5% bioethanol; E10 petrol doubles this to up to 10%. That’s good news for both us and our planet:

10 benefits of E10 petrol

  1. E10 petrol reduces the overall CO2 emissions from our road transport, by replacing a larger proportion of our traditional fossil fuels with bioethanol, which is produced from sustainable crops such as wheat, corn or sugar beet, or from biogenic wastes.
  2. E10 petrol could cut UK transport CO2 emissions by 750,000 tonnes per year…
  3. That’s the equivalent of taking 350,000 cars off the road – or all the cars in North Yorkshire.
  4. Unlike ‘going electric’, adopting E10 requires no changes in vehicle or driver behaviour – other than selecting the E10 nozzle at the pumps, which is easy as this is our ‘standard’ petrol from 1 September.
  5. Every petrol car up to 10 year old was designed to run on E10 fuel, with many older vehicles also able to do so.
  6. Almost all (95%) of the petrol vehicles on our roads are compatible with E10 petrol, but some motorbikes and older cars may not be. These drivers should check whether their vehicle is approved to use E10 petrol using the official DfT E10 vehicle checker, which covers cars, motorcycles and mopeds: www.gov.uk/E10checker 

    Alternatively, anyone having trouble identifying their older vehicle can simply enter their registration number into the Zemo E10 checker to find out.

  7.  E10 petrol is already successfully used around the world, including across Europe, the US and Australia without issue.

  8. Any effect on a vehicle’s fuel economy is unlikely to be noticeable in the real world: driving enthusiastically or with incorrectly inflated tyres has a far bigger impact than switching from E5 to E10 petrol.
  9. E10 petrol supports UK agriculture and the wider bioeconomy, as the feedstock for bioethanol is locally grown and refined in the UK. The animal feed by-product of this process means less soy based imports too.
  10. The introduction of E10 will boost job opportunities in the North East as biofuel plant reopens and production increases – securing up to 100 jobs as we build back better and greener.

Andy Eastlake, Zemo Partnership CEO, commented:

 

“At Zemo, we are working towards zero emission transport on all fronts, whilst driving down greenhouse gas emissions as fast as possible along the way. One of the biggest GHG savings available today is from using compatible renewable fuels in the millions of combustion vehicles currently on our roads. We are delighted to see E10 petrol finally launched today after many years of hard work by our members.”

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