The Clean Air Act says gasoline must contain additives to help it burn more cleanly. But the common additive MTBE is a proven environmental threat. And a new study says the alternatives could be just as dangerous. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Corbin Sullivan reports:
Transcript
The Clean Air Act says gasoline must contain additives to help it burn more cleanly. But the
common additive MTBE is a proven environmental threat. And a new study says the alternatives
could be just as dangerous. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Corbin Sullivan reports:
Underground storage tanks at gas stations can leak. Fuel
additives like MTBE leak faster than the gas and can
cause groundwater pollution.
For that reason, seventeen states, including New York,
Michigan and Illinois have restricted or will restrict the use
of MTBE in gasoline.
That means other fuel additives intended to reduce air
pollution will have to be used instead.
Mel Suffet co-authored a new study published in the
journal Environmental Science and Technology.
He says some of the alternatives to MTBE can cause the
same problems.
They can be toxic and can make groundwater
undrinkable. Suffet says to solve the problem, leaks need
to be prevented.
“The first thing you have to do is develop a design of
underground fuel storage tanks to emphasize containment
leak detection and repair.”
Suffet says even modern tanks are prone to leaks. So he
says designers need to go back to the drawing board to
create a leak free tank.
For the Great Lakes Radio Consortium, I’m Corbin
Sullivan.