A new study by Harris Interactive indicates two-thirds of consumers surveyed are familiar with flexible fuel vehicles (vehicles can run on bio-fuels, including E85), and more than one-half are interested in purchasing such a vehicle. Though awareness levels are lower among younger consumers (ages 18 to 34) (59%), they are the group most likely to consider purchasing such a vehicle.
The study was conducted online between May 15 and June 2, 2006 among 12,857 U.S. adults ages 18 and over who own or lease a vehicle, have a valid driver’s license, have at least one household vehicle and own a listed U.S. model dated 2001 or newer.
“While hybrid electric vehicles have received a significant amount of attention and interest over the past few years, recent actions and announcements from some vehicle manufacturers suggests that flexible fuel vehicles may be the viable solution to decreasing the demand for petroleum-based energy,” states Bryan Krulikowski, Senior Director of Harris Interactive’s Automotive & Transportation (ATR) Research Practice.
Reasons why consumers may consider flexible fuel vehicles
Among consumers interested in purchasing flexible fuel vehicles, most (88%) cite a reduced dependency on petroleum as the leading reason for consideration. To illustrate this point further, Harris Interactive finds that more than half of all those surveyed (53%) indicate that they are willing to pay more money for a vehicle that relies less on petroleum-based fuel.
Some confusion as to the actual benefits of flexible fuel vehicles
Consumers indicate they would choose a flexible fuel vehicle because of the improved fuel economy that will be realized (69%). However, ethanol-fueled vehicles will likely produce a slight decrease in fuel economy, though vehicle performance will be slightly enhanced given ethanol’s higher octane rating.
“Consumers are assuming that a non-petroleum based fuel will result in better fuel economy, but that is not necessarily the case with ethanol,” states Krulikowski. “Still, beyond fuel economy, consumers are interested in flexible fuel vehicles for the impact they will have on the environment and that is certainly a benefit that this type of fuel can provide.”
About half are interested in flexible fuel vehicles, but what about the rest?
The study shows that about half of consumers are less enthusiastic about the alternative fuel. The vast majority (85%) of these adults indicate a limited availability of fueling stations as a key reason for their lack of interest.
Krulikowski adds, “With approximately 800 E85 pumps available nationwide, concerns of availability will have to be addressed before flexible fuel vehicles can have a meaningful impact toward reducing the nation’s dependency on petroleum. As legislators and auto manufacturers continue to support increased production of flexible fuels, we should see a rapid increase in the number of fueling stations available. This will likely lead to increased consideration of these types of vehicles by those who are currently hesitant to consider this technology.”
Methodology
Harris Interactive conducted this survey online in the United States between May 15 and June 2, 2006 among a total of 12,857 adults aged 18 and over. Qualified respondents had to own or lease a vehicle, have a valid driver’s license, have at least one household vehicle and own a listed U.S. model dated 2001 or newer. Figures for age, gender, race/ethnicity, education, income and region were weighted where necessary to align with population proportions. Propensity score weighting was also applied to adjust for respondents’ propensity to be online.
All surveys are subject to several sources of error. These include: sampling error (because only a sample of a population is interviewed); measurement error due to question wording and/or question order, deliberately or unintentionally inaccurate responses, nonresponse (including refusals), interviewer effects (when live interviewers are used) and weighting.
With one exception (sampling error) the magnitude of the errors that result cannot be estimated. There is, therefore, no way to calculate a finite “margin of error” for any survey and the use of these words should be avoided.
With pure probability samples, with 100 percent response rates, it is possible to calculate the probability that the sampling error (but not other sources of error) is not greater than some number. With a pure probability sample of 12,857 vehicle-owning adults one could say with a 95 percent probability that the overall results have a sampling error of +/- 1 percentage point. However that does not take other sources of error into account. This online survey is not based on a probability sample and therefore no theoretical sampling error can be calculated.
07/27, 2:11 PM
posted by:
pj
who cares
07/27, 2:34 PM
posted by:
Peter
You’re probably in that younger age group, PJ, like me.
I don’t care much either.
07/27, 2:34 PM
posted by:
Bush
There isn’t enough land to grow enough corn to make significant change anyway.
07/27, 2:42 PM
posted by:
Mike
the younger generation is wise enough to know that ethanol and gas-electric hybrid are just band-aids.
Bio is the key.
07/27, 3:14 PM
posted by:
Karl
That’s all fine and good about 1/2 want it half don’t but there’s one big problem with E85.
It costs slightly less than regular 87 octane, but the gas mileage is 25% or so less, the end result, you’re paying 17% more.
Is it worth it to stick it to OPEC?
What needs to happen is there needs to be a serious demand for reasonably efficient vehicles from the manufacturers. Then when cars are getting a minimum 40 mpg at the absolute worst, we can make a dent using E85 and bio other biofuels. As far as I know, Biodiesel is actually very similar in mpg regular diesel.
What I don’t understand, the few places where biodiesel is available, is if some guy can home brew the stuff for $0.50 per gallon, why does it cost $3.00 at the pump? (aside from profit, which I don’t have a problem with reasonable profit. Taxes on the other hand…)
I hope by November or so, I’ll have my greasel vehicle all set for it’s experimental run. Greasel isn’t a new idea or anything, but I want to try it out and for me, it’ll only take nine months to show a return on my investment, give or take a few weeks, unless of course, fuel gets significantly more expensive.
07/27, 3:31 PM
posted by:
NotGMrules
Live green, go yellow baby! Another winning formula by General Motors. Consumers should be flooding the GM dealers to get their hands on a fine GM vehicle that runs on E85.
07/27, 3:34 PM
posted by:
ooodaddy
ethanol is hocus pocus it is subsidized by the federal
govt. to the tune of 4.00 dollars a gallon the fiscally prudent republicans use it as welfare to get the farm vote you see the farmers are on welfare too.
07/27, 3:59 PM
posted by:
Mike
the same farmers that are being paid NOT to use all their useable land?
07/27, 4:04 PM
posted by:
1234
Very few people have ever used it but plenty of people have heard of E-85 cause GM and the big Ag companies (who stand to make a mint off that stuff in gov subsidies) spend millions of dollars for ad campaigns and pay off clueless Dubya to endorse it. E-85 is a very red herring that only a politician with money in his/her pocket from ADM could love.
#5 – your on the money about the decreased efficiency of E-85 and the promise of biodiesel – which can be made from a huge variety of feedstocks and will power diesel engines which are vastly more efficient than gasoline/E-85 to begin with. Once again Europe is way ahead of the shortsighted US and are building biodiesel plants like mad.
I guess bad ideas like E-85 are what we can expect to have our tax dollars spent on when government decisions are completely dictated by whoever can pony up the most money to the bought and paid for US politicians…
07/27, 4:07 PM
posted by:
JW
I’m in the younger group too, and I am aware, and I hope my next vehicle has Flex-Fuel compatabilities. BUT where the heck do you buy E85?
07/27, 4:39 PM
posted by:
ooodaddy
Most of these stars-n-stripes T-shirt types don’t know that if EVERY inch of tillable land was converted into only corn – and no cheating! NO Corn Flakes! – for E85, we’d have about 15% of the fuel we’d need to fill up all those new Chargers and Camaros they want. It’s the same slight-of-hand when Bozo said; “Weapons of Mass Distruction!”
#10 proves my point.
j i m
07/27, 4:41 PM
posted by:
Bryan Detty
Right now E-85 is mainly in the Mid West. I know Krogers is going to start selling E-85 at all of it’s gas stations starting in Columbus, OH.
Ethanol comes out of anything that is vegitation like Surgar Cane, Corn, Wheat, Soy. It is easy to get it out of Surgar Cane. But Corn is a viable source for America. Give it time it will become cheaper. Do you think Millionares are just going to throw money away? Bill Gates invested $84 Million into Pacific Ethanol.
They just started to make Ethanol in bulk for fuel. Give it a year or two and they will make it cheaper.
07/27, 5:19 PM
posted by:
pj
all i know is from what i hear in the 70s they said fuel would run out by the year 2000 in the 80s they said fuel wont run out for at least 10,000 years at the rate of increase of drivers now their telling us it will run out again they do this hocus pocus to raise prices and have less complaining
07/27, 6:49 PM
posted by:
The Stig
Judging by the number of DUIs issued in this country, I’d support the premise that most consumers are aware of ethanol and its effects.
07/27, 9:59 PM
posted by:
Goose
If it wasn`t for the damn Chinese & Indians we could keep driving without all these hassles….gotta blame someone.
07/27, 10:20 PM
posted by:
Downtown Outline Point
E-85 is a waste of time. Yeah, good for environment but its way too expensive. PLUS…. the MPG is even WORSE than gasoline car’s MPG.
I.E.> A gas-only Chevy Silverardo has like 16/19 mpg. With E-85, its 11/15 mpg. How does that help us? Thats more trips to the stations in a week than with gasoline.
They’ve got a looooong way to improve it.
07/27, 10:51 PM
posted by:
Bryan Detty
I would rather them use E-85 for something like the Solstice GXP because E-85 is 105+ octane and would work really good on a boosted car. Atleast I think that it would. I could be wrong.
07/27, 11:02 PM
posted by:
Downtown Outline Point
I know whats E-85 means, but that “85″ part to me means 85% reduction in fuel economy of the vehicle.
07/28, 7:02 AM
posted by:
What Ever
Anyone who knows anything knows that diesel is the right direction once the particulates have been reduced significantly or eliminated. E85 is misdirection, attempting to take the spotlight off the oil companies by making them look greener and to pacify the consumer at the pump.
07/28, 8:14 AM
posted by:
Renton
I am fully aware that E85 sucks!
Hey US gov’t, roll back diesel regs and let us have some proven high mileage tech here.
BMW Turbodiesels — drool………
07/28, 11:44 AM
posted by:
Jae
Gosh, there are a lot of morons posting comments.
E85 is a real solution. I’m going to buy an E85 car when a suitable one (9-3) becomes available.
Everyone has an agenda. I’m not sure what the agenda is for the anti-E85 types.
The biggest problem with E85 is that there are no cool cars that burn it!
07/28, 1:22 PM
posted by:
Renton
#24 –Jae– If you are into performance then you are not into E85.
If you are into 9-3s then you are not into performance.
You will be fine.
Dead Dinosaur is where it be at.
07/28, 2:16 PM
posted by:
Doug
I think a lot of people out there are taking a very narrow view of this issue. E85 is an alternative, not replacement, to gasoline that will help decrease our dependence on imports. The government currently pays farmers NOT to grow corn on millions of acres every year – and has been doing so for years. So the tax money that has been being spent on having farmers not grow corn can now be used to subsidize the cost of ethanol production until the price can come down as efficinecies of scale come into play.
Ethanol has the added benefits of being a cleaner burning fule as well as being a renewable fuel source that can currently be made from corn or sugar cane, and with more research we will probably be able to make it economically from many other types of plant matter – much of which is useless to us now: grass clippings, corn stalks, etc.
Obviously it cannot replace gasoline overnight, and for that matter it probably never will – but neither will diesel or its variants. Diesel still has a lot of emissions problems to work out, and besides, 99% of diesel fuel is petroleum-based. Now, for all you greasel fans out there bear in mind that there is no way the current vegatable oil supply can support very many vehicles burning it. But that too makes another viable alternative for some.
We need to move in the direction where there will be several types of propulsion systems used in personal vehicles – electric, hybrid, gas, ethanol, diesel, and fuel cells (as that technology becomes feasible). No one technology is going to satisfy all vehicle demands, so let’s use as many as we can develop.
E85 vehicles are available now, and the fuel is available at hundreds of stations, with more locations becoming available almost daily. We have land sitting vacant that could be used to grow corn, so let’s do it and begin to chip away at our oil imports before we find ourselves paying $5/gallon for gas. Then that $3/gallon E85 with it’s 20% reduction in mileage will be looking pretty good to those of you that think E85 is a mistake.
07/28, 5:31 PM
posted by:
The Stig
E85: pay less, get less. Simple as that.
But what Doug (#26) said is correct, to a point:
“We need to move in the direction where there will be several types of propulsion systems used in personal vehicles – electric, hybrid, gas, ethanol, diesel, and fuel cells (as that technology becomes feasible). No one technology is going to satisfy all vehicle demands, so let’s use as many as we can develop.”
Let’s use as many as we can economically develop and prove ecologically as well as politically sensible.