'Tell It Like It Is' Panelists See Clean-Diesel Deadline Problem

Diesel Fuel News, Nov 13, 2000 by Jack Peckham

Common standards may be adopted for home heating oil and off-road diesel, and refiners may have to produce just one off-highway No. 2 distillate "for logistics reasons," Moos said. On the other hand, EPA eventually might adopt common sulfur specifications for on- and off-highway diesel, if not heating oil.

"We do not control home heating oil, but some Northeast states since the 1980s have set sulfur limits on heating oil," Oge pointed out. "We don't disagree that it's critical for refiners to understand [EPA's upcoming] off-road standard. I wish I had the answer today. But there are air quality issues, technology issues, the type of fuel that enables those technologies... We've not had the opportunity to evaluate off-road yet....

"We have a small team of staff working on that, and we hope next year to propose off-road standards and fuel sulfur limits."

Yet another problem looming on the horizon is whether the refinery engineering & construction industry can handle an avalanche of gasoline and diesel desulfurization projects along with MTBE phase-out and "renewable" fuels mandates.

"We're going to lose refining capacity as a result of all of this," Hart/IRI's Economides said. "The amplitude and frequency of price spikes are going to be more frequent, as in California. How are you prepared to deal with a refinery going down?"

"I agree completely," Chevron's Hall said. "My refining colleagues are spending more and more time on environmental regulations, yet refining profits are down [during the past decade] and we're in a vicious circle where there aren't enough people left to run these refineries. What are we trying to do to our economy? Do we really have to get there by 2006? Of course there's a desire to protect public health. But if we don't use common sense then we'll irritate the hell out of the American public, and this will backfire on EPA.

"We're not saying, 'don't do this.' We want to be environmentally responsible. But if you're not cautious, if you go ahead before the technology is ready, then you're going to have all these problems."