The US Environmental Protection Agency has issued a temporary waiver to restrictions under the Clean Air Act, allowing for a richer blend of ethanol in gasoline, it said on Thursday, a measure aimed at increasing gasoline supply in a year when fuel prices have surged since the outbreak of the US-Iran war.
It said this action renews a waiver extension issued on Aug. 9 and raises the ethanol blending limit to 15% up from 10%.
It also waives federal low volatility gasoline standards in two phases, the first extending an existing volatility waiver until Aug. 31 and the second, waiving all volatility standards from Sept. 1, bringing forward the application of wintertime volatility limits.
An article on the Arizona news website Cronkite which cites an environmental expert, said that an issue with a richer ethanol blend in gasoline outside of winter months is that it evaporates more easily and can produce health-harming ground-level ozone.
In a separate measure also announced on Thursday, the EPA renewed a temporary waiver to increase diesel supplies above the Arctic Circle in Alaska, allowing use of higher sulfur diesel in some older vehicles and non-road vehicles and equipment.
The measure will last through Sept. 14, the EPA said, and it may extend it beyond that date if deemed necessary.
A Bloomberg news report on the measures said they would result in an increase in gasoline supply of hundreds of thousands of barrels each day, potentially resulting in lower prices at the pump, which it said have risen about $1 per gallon since the start of the US-Iran war to about $4 a gallon.