What is to be done about Jakarta's air?

What is to be done about Jakarta's air?

By Gary Gentry

JAKARTA (JP): Jakarta's air quality has declined drastically
in the past few years. Some recent studies by world health
organizations rate Jakarta's air the third muggiest in the world.
Jakarta suffers terribly from air pollution, without doubt, and
residents don't need such studies to realize that. All they need
to do is go for a short walk along Jalan Thamrin any week-day
morning. Choking clouds of fumes cause eyes to water and throats
to burn.

As a result, there have been calls recently for Indonesia to
eliminate leaded gasoline. Letters to The Jakarta Post have
welcomed the calls, agreeing that Jakarta's air is so badly
polluted that something must be done.

Something must be done about the problem, all right, but
unleaded gasoline would be a misguided and very expensive effort
that would end up costing the nation huge amounts of money
without solving the problem without further measures.

Gasoline is a mixture of compounds, some separated directly
from crude oil, others manufactured by chemical reactions.
Gasoline quality is measured in terms of "octane rating", with a
higher rating indicating higher quality. Perversely, the gasoline
compounds naturally occurring in crude oil are too low in octane
for modern automobiles. However, a refiner can improve the octane
rating of those stocks by adding a lead compound, which is cheap
to do.

The refiner can also improve his "natural gasoline" by
installing expensive equipment to turn it into high octane. These
reactions create some by-products, so the total gasoline
production from a given quantity of crude oil goes down. This
means that in order to produce the same volume of unleaded
gasoline, a refiner must install expensive equipment and also
refine more crude oil. The result is expensive gasoline and
probably more air pollution at the refinery.

"Yes, but if it reduces smog, isn't it worth it?" the general
public may ask. The answer, unfortunately, is that simply taking
lead out of gasoline does not reduce smog.

Smog is created when unburned fuel -- hydrocarbon -- from auto
exhausts reacts with sunlight. Lead does not contribute to smog.
Furthermore, unleaded gasoline does not burn any more efficiently
than leaded gasoline.

In the 1970's, the United States mandated unleaded gasoline,
but the regulation had nothing to do with lead pollution. In an
effort to reduce hydrocarbon emissions to the atmosphere the U.S.
government required all new cars to have a device in their
exhaust system called a catalytic converter which completes the
combustion of hydrocarbons.

Unfortunately, lead compounds in gasoline poison the
catalysts, causing the converters to foul up. In order to prevent
fouling up the catalytic converters, the U.S. government mandated
unleaded gasoline. Reducing lead pollution was merely a nice side
benefit.

Therefore, simply changing to unleaded gasoline will do
nothing for Jakarta's air quality unless all gasoline engines are
fitted with expensive catalytic converters -- another enormous
cost attributable to unleaded gasoline.

Some countries, including Brazil and the United States, have
used alcohol as a substitute for lead to enhance the octane
rating of gasoline. While some success is claimed, there are
several arguments against it.

First, a few drops of lead in a tankful of gasoline are enough
to sufficiently improve the octane rating, while several liters
of alcohol are needed to achieve the same improvement. Producing
alcohol in the quantities required for motor fuel would require
building large, expensive manufacturing plants and blending
facilities. Furthermore, alcohol yield from most raw material is
too low for economical production. While grain crops give
reasonable yields, the cost of production -- fertilizers, fuel
for farm machinery, and others -- makes this approach
uneconomical without government subsidies. Then there is the
moral issue of using food as motor fuel.

However, the real problem with unleaded gasoline for Jakarta
is that a huge portion of the city's worst offending vehicles
would be completely unaffected by the change. Jakarta's thousands
of diesel buses do not burn gasoline, leaded or otherwise. These
fuming behemoths would continue to spew out black, choking smoke
screens even if leaded gasoline were to disappear entirely.

Jakarta's tens of thousands of motorcycles also would not be
affected by changing to unleaded gasoline. Motorcycles are
virtually all equipped with two-stroke engines, which means
lubricating oil must be mixed with the gasoline, whether leaded
or unleaded. Lubricating oil does not burn completely in the
engine, producing smoke which contributes significantly to
pollution.

So are Jakarta residents doomed to breathe ever thicker smog
for the rest of their pollution-shortened lives? No if the owners
of vehicles keep their engines well maintained.

First, there is an economic incentive, a well maintained
engine burns less fuel than a poorly tuned one. That reduces fuel
costs for individuals. Bus and taxi owners and operators will
understand that if they are educated about it. A public awareness
campaign on TV and in print media could handle the job.

In addition to the individual savings, reducing fuel
consumption would also help the nation. Most experts predict that
Indonesia will become a net importer of crude oil early in the
next decade. If every vehicle in Jakarta reduced its fuel
consumption by 10 percent, the reduction in oil consumption would
amount to over one million tons per year!

Government can enhance the economic incentive to improve fuel
efficiency in many ways such as raising the price of fuel and by
enforcing emissions standards. Impossible, I hear you say?
Jakarta police can't even enforce traffic laws, how can they
enforce auto maintenance?

In the U.S. city of Phoenix, Arizona, to take an example,
traffic police built drive-through testing stations for exhaust
emissions. Drivers enter the station, attendants connect their
vehicles to analyzers which automatically test for exhaust
pollutants and print out the results.

The whole process takes about five minutes. A single four-bay
station can handle at least 150,000 cars per year. Twenty such
stations, located strategically around Jakarta could test the
Jakarta's million cars annually. No car would get a vehicle
license without a certificate from the testing station.

The cost of the twenty stations would be a fraction of the
cost to convert a single refinery to produce unleaded gasoline.
And the analyzers can check diesel as well as gasoline engines.
Two-stroke motorcycles are another story, but if the other
vehicles stop polluting, the remaining problem would be small.

An addition benefit for Jakarta would be the huge increase in
work for auto mechanics, keeping the cars tuned so they can pass
the emissions test. Unemployment would be down and air quality
would be up.

Only one thing could keep it from working: corrupt officials
who can be bribed to issue licenses without the test certificate.
Come to think of it, maybe it has no chance of working here.

Window: Simply changing to unleaded gasoline will do nothing for
Jakarta's air quality unless all gasoline engines are fitted with
expensive catalytic converters.