Publication date: 04-April-2004
Source:By Ron Wiggins, Palm Beach Post Staff Columnist

The oil nations held the whip hand over our economic future. It was clear that we had to find another way to make our cars go, or one day find ourselves on our knees with a pump nozzle held to our heads.

According to R. Jack Alexander Jr., a retired member of that coalition of visionaries, it took a task force of auto industry spokespeople about five seconds to come up with a replacement fuel that is clean, cheap, renewable and compatible with the way we build cars and distribute fuel to consumers.

"Methanol," he said.

Methanol (alcohol) was the fuel Henry Ford burned in his first car. It is the fuel that propels race cars and can be distilled from natural gas, coal, corn stalks and lawn clippings. Methanol was almost on the menu of every car and truck made after 1990, according to Alexander, now 75 and retired in Palm Beach from his family auto parts distribution company in Atlanta. Methanol, he noted, is already produced in huge quantities for the paint and solvent industries.

Alexander, who in 1971 was CEO of Atlanta-based Alexander-Seewald Co., saw my recent column begging our national leaders to commit to a 10-year oil independence plan, and called me. He said if I wanted such an energy independence plan, I would find it on the shelf in Washington, gathering cobwebs. He added that if I was interested, we could meet and he would tell me half the story of how methanol almost replaced 80 percent of the oil we burn in our gas tanks.

Half the story?

"I can't tell you the whole story," he said. "But I can tell you some of it. I was at the meeting that killed methanol. I can't prove what I know, and I don't want to be sued. If you are interested in what I am comfortable telling you, we can discuss it over lunch."

At the Sailfish Club on Thursday, Alexander began by saying that methanol as a fuel would have been stop-gap. Hydrogen extracted directly from water will one day power our cars, he believes.

And with that, he began his story, much compressed here.

"Most of my information is 11 to 16 years old," he said. "I retired in 1990."

The first oil shortage, Alexander said, was a severe jolt to the auto industry. "We saw prices jump from 35 cents to 75 cents and $1.35 a gallon. There was no way of predicting prices. The hunt was on for alternative fuels."

By 1976, meetings among auto industry interests, including his Alexander-Seewald auto parts distribution company, had "cranked up," Alexander said.

"I was on the board of the American Warehouse Distributors and their spokesman. Our mission was to bring all elements of the auto industry together and find a way to stabilize fuel prices."

Since the United States had no control over the oil it imported, the obvious solution was to replace that oil in the fuel tanks of cars and trucks. The choice almost didn't require discussion. With an 80 percent methanol and 20 percent gasoline fuel mixture to replace medium-grade gasoline, new cars with inexpensive modifications could burn the new fuel or gasoline without so much as a hiccup.

Old cars could continue burning regular or high test.

"It looked like a no-brainer," said Alexander. "There were some skeptics in the oil industry, but our coalition included two major oil companies that understood they would still be selling gasoline in the methanol blend along with providing distribution for the new fuel."

'Light-years ahead'

Indeed, informal proposals to switch to methanol already had a model: Bank of America in California had adapted all company vehicles to burn the 80-20 methanol blend. Bank of America was adopted by the methanol coalition as a poster company.

"They were light-years ahead of us. It was our great good fortune to be joined by Leland Stanford Prussia, then chairman of Bank of America, and give testimony before a transportation committee hearing led by Rep. Henry Waxman (D-CA) in the House, and Sen. John Danforth (R-MO) in the Senate.

"We thought it was a slam dunk," Alexander said. He thought legislation stating industry standards for fuel mix, environmental considerations and manufacturing and delivery regulations was imminent.

To Alexander's recollection, the year was 1981 when the methanol option seemed to have friends everywhere the planners looked. Even San Diego, taking a page from Bank of America, had converted its buses and municipal vehicles to methanol.

But methanol never happened, and Alexander isn't saying why.

Still, we can guess. Although two oil companies were on board with the coalition, other oil companies had a lot to lose. Switching the country to an 80-20 methanol-gas mix would mean giving up substantial portions of their businesses.

Also, Alexander hints that ethanol and the farm interests that produce it out of surplus corn were a factor. Ethanol, the first cousin to methanol, was already being made with the help of hefty subsidies from taxpayers. Ethanol had a constituency that was not charmed by a competing alcohol that could be produced at almost one-third of the cost -- with no subsidies. Methanol, Alexander recalls, could be produced for about 75 cents a gallon.

The irony of the methanol debacle is that it seems to have failed because it didn't need subsidies, lobbyists or even start-up grants. Why hire lobbyists for a slam dunk? The methanol coalition remained lower case because it didn't play politics or buy influence.

"Here," Alexander said, "we had a proven product that did not require subsidies."

In 1986, Alexander attended a high-level meeting in Washington. Afterward, he says, the methanol coalition was "dead in the water." By then, cheap imported oil was continuing to flow, the seismic shocks forgotten. Auto makers lost interest in retooling carburetors and fuel injectors to take the new fuel -- especially if there wasn't going to be any.

Today you can buy cars and trucks from Ford, General Motors and Chrysler that are modified to burn Ethanol blend -- the 15 percent alcohol -- 85 percent gasooline available only in the Midwest and the Carolinas.

"I was there in Washington at the meeting when methanol was killed," Alexander stated, "and that's all I'll say."

And, the retiree notes, if all our vehicles are powered by hydrogen before the next oil crisis, no worries.

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