Vice-president of the Jamaica Gasoline Retailers Association (JGRA), Trevor Heaven, says that while the ethanol blend of gasoline is here to stay the method recently used by Petrojam in mixing the fuel is cause for concern.

According to Heaven, who was speaking at a Rotary luncheon on Monday, the splash method used to mix the fuel could lead to contamination problems.

He explained that the 10 pert cent mix of ethanol and gasoline was done in the tankers transporting the fuel instead of in holding tanks at the Petrojam refinery.

“The tankers are filled with 900 gallons of regular gasoline then moved to the ethanol tank where the 100 gallons is added,” Heaven said

“This could be the reason for some of the complains,” he commented.

Since the roll out of E10 on November 1 some motorists have complained that their engine performance has deteriorated after using the fuel.

“What I am contending is that the method is very crude and can contribute to the impurity of the product,” Heaven told Auto yesterday.

He said that while Petrojam is fully automated and able to use safer mixing methods, current demand resulted in them resorting to the splash method.

“We fear that is will become the norm,” Heaven remarked.

Regarding contamination of fuel Heaven reiterated the information given by other professionals in the field that ethanol had detergent properties and would remove impurities from the gasoline and deposit it in the filter.

He also advocated the change of gas filter after first using the gasoline.

Making it clear that the E10 mix had a higher octane than gasoline and offered more engine power Heaven however said that the fuel gave about three per cent less miles to the gallon.

Efforts to contact Winston Watson, general manager at Petrojam for a comment were unsuccessful.