Ethanol blending in diesel fails flash-point test, says govt

• Ethanol-blended diesel failed to meet required safety specifications because the addition of ethanol sharply lowered the fuel’s flash point, Minister of State for Petroleum and Natural Gas Suresh Gopi said in the Parliament.

• A flash point is the lowest temperature at which a liquid fuel gives off enough vapour to form a mix with air that can spark and briefly ignite near its surface.

• Scientific evaluations on blending of ethanol with diesel have been undertaken by Public Sector Oil Marketing Companies (OMCs) through their respective R&D centres in collaboration with accredited laboratories and automobile manufacturers. 

• It was observed that ethanol blended diesel was not meeting diesel flash point as its flash point lowered drastically due to the presence of ethanol.

• The finding comes as India seeks to expand the use of ethanol as a transport fuel and explore new outlets for rising domestic production. 

• The government has so far focused its ethanol blending programme on petrol and has set a target of 20 per cent blending.

Govt explores ethanol as potential cooking fuel 

• The government is also examining ethanol as a potential cooking fuel, which could help reduce India's dependence on imported liquefied petroleum gas while making use of surplus domestic ethanol production capacity.

• The use of ethanol as a cooking fuel may emerge as the potential biofuel alternative to fossil fuel based cooking solution which may help in reduction of LPG import dependence and provide clean cooking solution. 

• This may also enable effective utilisation of surplus ethanol production capacity in the country.

• The initiative is aligned with the government’s broader objective of promoting cleaner and alternative cooking fuel options.

• The LPG Equipment Research Centre, a joint venture of Indian Oil Corp, Hindustan Petroleum Corp and Bharat Petroleum Corp, along with public-sector oil marketing companies, is working on developing ethanol-based clean cooking alternatives.