China will widely use motor unleaded gasoline with sulfur content only 150ppm from December 31 of 2009. Compared with the existing widely used unleaded gasoline with the 500ppm sulfur content, the implementation of new unleaded gasoline standard will bring great environmental benefit. Recently, SEPA and EPA co-sponsored the "Second International Workshop on Vehicle Emission Control" in Beijing. The Deputy Director of Pollution Department of SEPA Xinmin-Li said in the workshop that since 2000 China had successfully eliminated the leaded gasoline. In July 2005 SEPA and EPA jointly boosted the program on lowering the sulfur content in diesel. So far this program has got great progress, and the revised standard of "In-Use Unleaded Gasoline" will be issued soon. The new standard not only reduced the sulfur content but also strengthened controlling the RVP, which greatly reduced the possibility of occurring the actinochemistry smoke. The International Council on Clean Transportation (ICCT) considered that "Sulfur" is the "Lead" of the new century. The Board Chairman of ICCT, famous international consultant on vehicle emission, Mr. Michael P. Walsh said that reducing fuel sulfur content in gasoline and diesel is crucial to any serious effort to reduce air pollution from existing and new vehicles; reducing sulfur in all transportation fuels (including non-road machines) provides immediate air quality and public health benefits. Benefits include reduced PM emissions from all vehicles as well as reduced acidification. For vehicles equipped with any type of catalyst technology, sulfur reductions also reduce emissions of CO, HC, NOx, and secondary PM. Furthermore, near-zero sulfur fuels (10 ppm or less) are required for advanced vehicle technologies. The Director of Vehicle Emission Control Center of SEPA Mr. Dagang-Tang said that the sulfur content in unleaded gasoline had been 800-1000ppm in 2000 in China, and reduced to 500ppm on July 1st of 2005. In order to implement the National Phase III emission standard in advance Beijing government decided to reduce the limit from 500ppm to 150ppm from July 1st of 2005. The new National Standard on Chinese Motor Fuel (GB17930-2006) will be issued by General Administration of Quality Supervision, Inspection and Quarantine of People's Republic of China (AQSIQ) by the end of this year. China will entirely eliminate the gasoline with 500ppm sulfur content by the end of 2009. Mr. Dagang-Tang viewed that the mostly important thing in China was to make the National Phase IV Standard for motor gasoline, and provide enough time for the petrifaction departments to prepare. He suggested to implement the <50ppm sulfur of gasoline from July 1st of 2008, and stop to use 150ppm sulfur of gasoline and gasohol in the whole country on July 1st of 2011. Otherwise, the new standard had stringent limit for the Summer RVP, and it should be lower in making the Phase IV standard. He also proposed that the fuel detergent and additive management regulation are till lack now, and the SEPA should take this responsibility. The fuel economy is related to GHG emission, so the government should develop the policies for highering fuel economy to control the GHG emission from vehicles. Market gasoline and gasohol quality control and management should be improved and he suggested the government to develop a special technical supervision system for motor gasoline and diesel fuels and invest more in them. Cleaner motor fuel need the lower sulfur content, but the sulfur content in the processed crude oil is increasing now, so the cleaner fuels must be a great challenge to the poor-quality crude oil process. Xuhui from the Technology Development Department of SINOPEC said that due to shortage of domestic crude oil resources, dependence in imported oil has been increased. But the crude oil available to be provided worldwide is mostly high-sulfur and heavy oil, the quality of crude oil is now getting worse. Such as in 1999 China had totally imported 34.13 million tons crude oil, and the average sulfur content was only 0.17%; but in 2005, China totally imported 10.5 billion tons crude oil and the sulfur content had been up to 1%; ten months of this year imported 91.63 million tons and the sulfur content reached 1.11%. Xuhui said that confronted with the pressures of low sulfur content of motor fuel and high sulfur content of feedstock, SINOPEC will make full use of scientific innovation and adopt new technologies to conduct technical revamp, so as to upgrade the quality of motor fuel at a low cost. Therefore, to improve the activity and stability of ECC feedstock pre-hydrotreating catalysts, increase the adaptability to feedstock, and extend the operating period of the units; FCC gasoline hydrotreating technology aims to improve the selectivity and desulfurization activity of catalysts, increase the liquid yields, and reduce the loss of octane number; integrate FCC feedstock pre-hydrotreating process, technology of FCC gasoline desulfurization and olefin reduction, and FCC gasoline hydrotreating process, so as to upgrade the gasoline quality in a most economical way. ◆Related Reports◆ Get Ready to Implement the National Phase III Emission Standard There Are 4405 Vehicle Types Are Compliant with the National III Standard Journalists got the information from the recently “Second International Workshop on Vehicle Emission Control” that China had already issued 4405 new vehicle types that compliant with the Phase III (Equal to the Euro III) emission standard so far, among which there were 663 vehicle types with OBD. The issuance of these new vehicle types means that China has got ready to implement the Phase III emission standard for light-duty vehicles since July 1st of 2007. Deputy Director of Pollution Control Department of SEPA said that from July 1st of 2007 vehicles equipped compression ignition and gas fuelled positive ignition engines would be implemented in the whole country as well as the Phase III vehicle emission standard, meanwhile the production-conformity inspection on environmental protection would also be initiated. For the light-duty vehicles, from next July 1st, China will implement the Phase III emission limit among the whole country and initiate the production-conformity inspection and compliance inspection on in-use vehicles at five years or 80,000 miles. Otherwise, from January 1st of 2007 Beijing will begin to implement the Phase IV emission standard for light-duty diesel vehicles. VECC Translated