Several items to report today. First, I've had to remove another gas station from the Ethanol Free Gas Station List today. That one is DV Express - Valero in Gramercy. Since Marathon discontinued selling ethanol free gas from their Garyville Refinery on June 21st, I've now had to remove 59 stations from the website list to date. Here is a breakdown of locations these stations were that were forced to switch to ethanol gas because their distributor could no longer supply them with ethanol free gas:
Ouachita Parish (Monroe/West Monroe area) - 18 stations
Caddo Parish (Shreveport area) - 6 stations
Bossier Parish (Bossier City area) - 5 stations
Livingston Parish (Denham Springs) - 4 stations
St Tammany (Mandeville/Covington) - 4 stations
Lafayette Parish (Lafayette) - 3 stations
Winnfield Parish (Winnfield) - 3 stations
Twelve other Parishes had 1 - 2 stations removed.
Marathon was the largest remaining refinery selling ethanol free gas to south and north Louisiana. As you can see, the northern Parishes were the most affected. THANKS Marathon, for abandoning your ethanol free gas customers. To the best of my knowledge, we now have only four (4) refineries still selling ethanol free gas in the State: the Murphy Oil Refinery in Chalmette, the Chalmette Refining refinery also in Chalmette (used to be the Exxon/Mobil Refinery - they entered into a 50/50 partnership with Citgo several years ago and changed the name), the Placid Refinery in Port Allen and the Krotz Springs Refinery in Krotz Springs. Citgo also supplies some ethanol free gas through an exchange agreement with the Conoco/Phillips refinery in Westlake. They supply most of this to north Louisiana's Teppco Terminal I am told. Although I haven't been able to confirm, I believe the Conoco/Phillips refinery in Westlake is supplying some ethanol free gas to the Lake Charles area.
I have to depend on you, our readers to let me know when you learn of a station on our Ethanol Free Gas Station List has switched to ethanol gas. Please continue to e-mail me to let me know at www.way2gopete@yahoo.com Likewise let me know if you learn of a station that is selling ethanol free gas that is not on my list.
Next item: I participated in a phone interview with Mr. Bob Marshall, writer for the Times Picayune newspaper this morning. I had asked him if he could write an article on the upcoming concern with the new 15% ethanol. He and I discussed many issues for preparing his article. He told me it will run in this upcoming Sunday's (September 4th) issue of The Times Picayune. He writes in the "Sports Section", often the back of the last page in the sports section.
I have sent an article I drafted on the upcoming issue with 15% ethanol gasoline to over 45 newspapers throughout the State. I've sent it to all the major papers in Shreveport, Monroe, Alexandria, Lake Charles, Lafayette, Baton Rouge, New Orleans and at least 35 or more Parish or City papers throughout the State. Most have told me they will run the article. Look for it in your home town newspaper soon. Please e-mail me to let me know when you see it in your hometown paper - please let me know the name of the paper and the date the article was published.
I encourage you to read this article about the major issues with the upcoming new 15% ethanol gas on PeteLandrysRealGas.com website under the "Ethanol Articles" page on the toolbar. It's the first article on that page. I'll write more about 15% ethanol gasoline in another blog.
Have a great day!
"Pete" Landry
