State pushes for gas savings

"MN Agencies"

10/03/2005

Pat Doyle,
Star Tribune
October 3, 2005

Faced with paying millions of dollars more to run government cars, vans and trucks, state officials are encouraging employees to rely more heavily on carpooling, communications technology and ethanol-fueled vehicles to save money.

The cost of fueling state government vehicles is expected to increase this year by 26 percent, or $4.2 million, if average gas and diesel prices over the past few months prevail.

“I’ve worked for the state for 17 years, and this is the first time that we’ve seen this kind of impact on fuel pricing,” said Tim Morse, director of travel management for the Minnesota Department of Administration. State agencies pay for fuel out of their own budgets, and “when the cost of transportation goes up, it doesn’t leave as much to go to their critical missions.”

Short-term solutions for cutting costs include putting more park rangers from the Department of Natural Resources on bicycles and having State Patrol officers turn off their engines during traffic stops or spend more time conducting stationary speed traps.

Another solution—using more ethanol—may not cut much from travel costs and could even add to them. Ethanol is priced less than gasoline, but ethanol used in state vehicles typically gets 15 percent fewer miles per gallon than gas, Morse said.

Minnesota requires state fleets to purchase alternative fuels and vehicles that run on them whenever possible. Whether ethanol saves or costs the state money depends largely on when and where employees fill up.

If regular gas is priced at $2.69 a gallon, ethanol would need to be at least 40 cents a gallon cheaper to make up for its disadvantage in mileage. E85, the fuel made from as much as 85 percent ethanol, in recent weeks has been selling for only 20 to 30 cents less than gasoline at some Twin Cities locations.

But the market is volatile. At a Super America at Milton Street and Grand Avenue in St. Paul on Friday, ethanol was 71 cents cheaper.

Through August of this year, the average prices of gas and ethanol tracked by the state Department of Commerce were close enough to make gas, with its mileage advantage, slightly more economical.

Supporters of ethanol argue that its price is likely to drop as supplies increase. And they justify using the fuel to reduce pollution and reliance on imported oil as well as to support corn farmers who help produce the alternative fuel.

“It may or may not be pennies per gallon a win for you, but looking at a bigger picture, it’s really important that we invest in better ways of doing things,” said Tim Gerlach, director of the outdoor air program run by the American Lung Association.

Trying bikes, carts

Agencies are looking for ways to trim fuel costs wherever they can in fear that continued high prices will cut into their budgets. The state fleet consists of about 8,000 light-, medium- and heavy-duty vehicles.

“We’re worrying,” said Dave Schiller, fleet manager for the DNR.

He said that park rangers have been able to ride bicycles for years but that “there is certainly more interest now in the last couple of months.”

Another fuel-efficient substitute for a car is a neighborhood electric vehicle—“a glorified golf cart,” Schiller said. The DNR recently put one in Itasca State Park, and “we’re going to be looking at more of those.”

As for DNR cars and trucks, “there are a lot of underinflated tires out there,” he said. “We figure it will save us 40,000 to 50,000 gallons a year by watching that.”

Other short-term remedies are limited.

Carpooling for work assignments isn’t practical unless the employees are going to be working in the same area for about the same time, and there is no system for coordinating carpools for employees from different agencies.