Octane Booster Is Facing Tough Road

May 27, 1996|By Casey Bukro, Tribune Staff Writer.

Pumping gas into his car at a downtown filling station, Matt Miller ponders the latest flap over gasoline. And it isn't the pump price.

U.S. automakers say a manganese-based fuel additive used as an octane booster by some refiners might gum up spark plugs, emission-control systems and onboard diagnostic sensors.

Warnings will appear in owners' manuals for 1997 models coming out this summer. Evidence from Canada indicates the additive can be damaging.

For now, the major oil refiners, including Amoco, Mobil and Shell, which dominate the Chicago market, do not use the additive. But they could choose to use the compound in the future.

And that would pose a problem for motorists such as Miller, a Chicagoan and recent graduate from Northwestern University's law school, because there are no labeling requirements to disclose the chemical contents of gasoline.

The additive is called MMT, short for methylcyclopentadienyl manganese tricarbonyl, an organic manganese compound.

"Unless it's advertised, I wouldn't know," said Miller, closing the gas cap on his car. He could ask if gasoline contained manganese, but a service station attendant probably wouldn't know, either.

It's bad enough that the summer motoring season shifts into high gear with a five-year peak in fuel prices. Now come concerns over the additive, which also is considered a possible health hazard.

"We remain very, very concerned because we consider it to be very highly toxic, like lead," said Martha Casey, a spokeswoman for the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency.

Since the 1920s, lead had been used widely as a fuel octane booster until research showed it contaminated the air and led to high blood-lead levels in urban children, threatening them with brain damage.

The EPA in 1973 ordered a gradual phaseout of lead in gasoline, which ended early this year. As a result, said the agency, blood-lead levels in children have dropped 70 percent nationally--considered one of the most significant public health achievements of the last quarter century.

But now the Environmental Defense Fund in Washington said the new octane booster may be hazardous, too.

The group noted that high doses of manganese, a heavy metal like lead, are known to be dangerous and causes nerve damage similar to Parkinson's disease. The group contends that the health consequences of low doses over a long time are unknown.

"People shouldn't be used as guinea pigs, so MMT should not be marketed until and unless it is shown to be safe for both cars and people," said Karen Florini, an attorney with the environmental group.

She also pointed to what she called an "irony . . . painful to the point of being almost overwhelming": that the company that produced lead for gasoline also is producing MMT.

Ethyl Corp. of Richmond, Va., discovered MMT in the 1950s and markets it as HiTEC 3000. Roughly a drop of the clear, straw-colored liquid is added per gallon of gasoline at refineries.

Ethyl has sold 70 million pounds of MMT since 1976 for use in leaded gasoline, but the EPA in 1978 blocked MMT sales for use in unleaded gasoline. In April 1995, a U.S. Court of Appeals lifted that ban, and the company resumed shipping the compound to domestic refiners for use in unleaded gasoline last December.

John Graham, an Ethyl spokesman, said MMT is mainly used by independent refiners in far Western states, excluding California, which doesn't allow metal-based additives in fuel.

"It's up to the refiners when they want to start using it," Graham said. "It varies from refinery to refinery, but that depends on whether they are long or short on octane."

Graham would not identify refineries using MMT.

But according to the Environmental Defense Fund, virtually all of the major oil companies--including Amoco Corp., Atlantic Richfield Co., BP America Inc., Chevron Corp., Conoco Inc., Exxon Corp., USX-Marathon Group, Mobil Corp., Phillips Petroleum Co., Shell Oil Co. and Texaco Inc.--do not use MMT.

Chicago-based Amoco said it can boost octane without using MMT.

While the American Lung Association also expressed concerns, Ethyl insists that MMT has been used since 1978 without ill effect in Canada. Graham asserts that the amount of manganese in Canada's air is negligible and "it's been found to pose no risk to public health."

Florini retorts that Ethyl was "dead wrong in 1924" about the safety of lead in gasoline and "we think they are equally wrong in 1996" about MMT.

EDF also said that Canada has conducted no research on the health risks of MMT.

Perhaps the deciding factor will be what effect MMT has on the reliability or durability of cars.

"The big issue is with the automakers," contends Graham, adding that "automakers are in a battle with the refinery industry over who has control over gasoline, and what goes into it."

Both sides have pledged $10 million toward research to determine exactly what MMT does to cars.

American automakers already have decided they don't like it.