Technical background to the media reports of 6th of March

Note: This press release is a 1:1 copy of the original issued by BMW headquarters in Germany. No adaptations have been made to cater for the UK market.

Technical background to the media reports of 6th of March

BMW supports the introduction of E10 Super fuel in Germany and Europe.

This is also in accordance with the decision that was made with the involvement of the entire automotive industry during the legislative procedure.

There have been no changes to the technical assessments made for Europe and Germany at the time:

E10 fuels can safely be used in all BMW passenger cars from all model years. However, irrespective of ethanol content, the minimum octane rating as specified in the user manual must be observed as before, since some BMW models require Super Plus RON 98 to reduce knock.

Regrettably, in the Welt am Sonntag report of 6th of  March, insufficient attention was paid to the crucial statement which clearly refers to E10:

“The use of E10 fuels in our petrol engines is fundamentally safe.”

The aforementioned report links the use of E10 and condensation water getting into the engine oil.

In this connection, we would like to make the following clear:

1. The condensation effect is a side effect of the normal combustion process – independently of the use of E10 – and therefore does not pose a problem.
2. The oil-change intervals defined by BMW are not affected and therefore remain unchanged.
3. The report’s falsely claimed link between the use of E10 fuel and “more rapid engine wear” does not exist.

All aspects concerning E10 were assessed as part of the cross-manufacturer associative work well in advance of the introduction of E10. This gave rise to an information sheet by DAT Deutsche Automobil Treuhand GmbH (German automobile trust), which takes a clear stand on the compatibility of E10 on a manufacturer-wide basis and clarifies the issue for customers (available on the internet at www.dat.de/e10).