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Informist, Friday, Jun. 5, 2026

NEW DELHI – The government is likely to gradually raise ethanol blending in petrol to 25% from 20%, followed by expanding infrastructure for dispensing E85 or E100 that can be used in flex fuel vehicles, Tarun Kapoor, advisor to the Prime Minister, said.

"We are at E20 now, and we have not gone beyond E20 because we want this whole thing to stabilise a bit. Ultimately, I think we should go to E25, then put a good stop and then move towards flex fuel and then simultaneously separately make available E85 or E100," Kapoor said at the Society of Indian Automobile Manufacturers' conference on accelerating India's transition to a low-carbon future. 

India has been implementing the ethanol blending programme in petrol to reduce crude oil import dependency, save foreign exchange, and promote green mobility. 

The next phase of higher ethanol blending will be backed by extensive testing before any wider rollout, said Reji Mathai, director, The Automotive Research Association of India. "As we look ahead, currently we look at E25 and then beyond will be flex fuel scenarios," the official said. 

He also acknowledged that higher ethanol blends could affect fuel efficiency. "The government has put into place a testing mechanism, detailed evaluations on older vehicles, on newer vehicles, how they are going to impact the performance, the durability, the material compatibility, so that we will see the scaling up to be done if the results are falling in line," he said.

To support the transition towards flex-fuel vehicles, oil marketing companies are preparing to launch E85 petrol dispensing units. "I am also happy to share that the three oil marketing companies – Indian Oil, Bharat Petroleum and Hindustan Petroleum – are launching E85 gasoline across 50 stations in Delhi, Pune, and Nagpur," Bharat Petroleum Corp. Ltd. Director (marketing) Subhankar Sen, said. 

Kapoor also said that ethanol would remain India's primary biofuel for blending in petrol, ruling out any major shift to alternative fields such as methanol. 

"We will probably not do any other type of blending in petrol. There were thoughts of methanol and some others...but then we will keep it stable with ethanol only. So, the petrol story is with flex fuel vehicles and ethanol," he said. 
 
For diesel, the government is exploring isobutanol blending in diesel, as ethanol does not bind with diesel. For isobutanol, the feedstock is the same as ethanol and from the same ethanol plants with a few infrastructure additions, he said. 

For heavy vehicles, Kapoor said that the government has identified around 60 highways for developing charging infrastructure for electric trucks. 

Experts on the panel said India's green energy transition would remain multi-fuel and multi-technology, with ethanol, electric mobility, compressed biogas, hydrogen and other clean fuels advancing simultaneously.  End

Reported by Afra Abubacker

Edited by Avishek Dutta

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