For all the talk about electric vehicles and the forecourt transformation, the United States remains, largely, a nation of combustion engines and fossil fuels. That message echoed resolutely during a 2023 NACS Show education session titled “Thriving in a Shifting Fuel Market.”
“Governments won’t be able to [legislate] their way in the emissions reductions they want to see,” said Katie Kline, ExxonMobil’s U.S. South sales manager, based in Spring, Texas. “There is no outlook out there into 2050 that doesn’t include oil and gas.”
Kline was joined by moderator Denton Cinquegrana, Rockville, Maryland-based OPIS’s chief fuel analyst, and Ankeny, Iowa-based Casey’s General Stores’ Fuels Vice President Nathaniel Doddridge.
As improvements in fuel-efficient cars and other factors like hybrid models have sparked gradual declines in gasoline consumption, a question centered around whether electric vehicles will accelerate rapidly, resulting in the demise of the internal combustion engine.
Kline, employed by a global Big Oil power that has largely avoided investing in EV charging, said governmental policy alone will not effectively drive customer change.
Looking into forecasts through 2050, she said ExxonMobil sees renewables growing significantly, diesel increasing and fuel efficiency more than doubling to potentially 60 miles per gallon over the next few decades.
Cinquegrana mused, “By the time fossil fuels will go away, I’ll probably be a fossil.”
On other topics:
- Ethanol.Doddridge noted that the state of Iowa has started mandating E15, but that it’s too early to determine consumer’s support of it. He said E15 is more sustainable and usually sells at least several cents cheaper per gallon than regular gasoline.
- Hydrogen vehicle batteries. Kline did not envision hydrogen being a viable alternative for light-duty vehicles but said it could be a player for heavy-duty trucks.