If a federal class-action lawsuit filed earlier this week eventually succeeds, Big Oil will pay big bucks for what the plaintiffs claim is deliberate misinformation regarding ethanol.
The suit seeks to represent boat owners who have fiberglass fuel tanks and who filled them with ethanol-blended gasoline from a California retailer. The suit also seeks to represent all California residents who own boats with a fiberglass fuel tank that had to be replaced because of damage caused by ethanol-blended gasoline bought from a California retailer.
Kabateck Brown Kellner, the lead firm on the case, claims that when Methyl tert-butyl ether (MTBE) was banned in many states in 2004 because of environmental concerns, ExxonMobil, Chevron, and other oil companies selected ethanol as an octane-booster replacement. However, the lawsuit further states, consumers weren't educated about the differences between MTBE and ethanol-mixed gasoline, nor were they informed about "the disastrous effects ethanol has on fiberglass marine fuel tanks." Ethanol dissolves the resin and therefore the tank, and eventually the boat's engine and other systems are affected, since the dissolved resin enters the fuel system.
The lawsuit also states that ethanol-blended gasoline harms the environment due to phase separation, in which water attracted by ethanol remains in the bottom of the fuel tank while the gasoline floats to the top. "The environment pays the price for Exxon and Chevron's deception each time a damaged fuel tank leaks gasoline into the water," says Brian Kabateck, managing partner of Kabateck Brown Kellner.
BP, Shell, Valero, Tesoro, ConocoPhillips, Tower Energy, PetroDiamond, and Big West were also named in the lawsuit.
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I have an 1993 Nissan Altima and the 10% in the gas causes my car to stall at the point it will not stay running long stall even on the highway speeds ,runs so bad at times that my check engine light come on had a knock sensor code, there was black exhaust from tail pipe, so I took off my injectors and looked in the hole were the ports are, they were black with soot an inch thick.
I hate ethanol gas sucksssss. even more so cause I cant drive far only a short distance since no other stations has good gas.
before I put the non-ethanol gas in my car I replaced the fuel filters.
now I found and use non-ethanol gas in my car now and now it runs good no problems no service light on dash. no stalling. runs good.
I now get 36 highway miles from the 29 I got with ethanol.
I would like to have a lawsuit against gas companies with ethanol in there gas cause it damages my car, maybe we can have a choice for the fuels to use in our cars.
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