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Probably some missing nuance. That said, it seems pretty indefensible that it’s taken the FAA more than a decade to reach a decision on an unleaded avgas altern

Probably some missing nuance. That said, it seems pretty indefensible that it’s taken the FAA more than a decade to reach a decision on an unleaded avgas alternative.

rbinv 5y ago
Nuance like what? He's spot on imo.
bombcar 5y ago
The nuance is it's lose-lose for the FAA bureaucrats if they approve an unleaded gas and something later happens. There is NO risk to the bureaucrats if they keep stalling on unleaded and let everyone run 100LL for all eternity.
- JumpCrisscross 5y ago
  > There is NO risk to the bureaucrats if they keep stalling on unleaded and let everyone run 100LL for all eternity This is oversimplifying. Yes, there is a bureaucratic bias towards inaction. But stonewalling is an action. The GAO audit the author posits could very well endgame key decision makers' careers.
  - londons_explore 5y ago
    Nobody in government gets fired for inaction...
    - bombcar 5y ago
      Politicians can, but it is VERY rare, and NEVER over something that affects a very small portion of the population.
  - EricE 5y ago
    If you have an example of anyone getting a career ended because of a GAO audit, I'd love to see it!
bluGill 5y ago
Yeah, there is no excuse for not having an unleaded avgas by now. Just approve one already, octane can be raised by many other means, and aviation engines are rebuilt all the time (every 200 hours you need to xray the crankshaft to ensure there are no cracks), so if parts need to be replaced it would have been done already anyway. Sure sometimes airplane owners skip some of that (the odds of a cracked crankshaft are low enough and the rule only applies to specific uses which you can not do), but even still it is safe to say if they had the fuel approved 10 years ago most airports wouldn't even have 100ll anymore because the demand would be so low.
- refurb 5y ago
  If it's like most things, it's a matter of prioritization. Trying to maximize positive impact with a limited set of resources forces you to prioritize. Sure it would be great to get rid of unleaded aviation gas, but ensuring we don't get a repeat of the 737-MAX issue might take priority.
- Justin_K 5y ago
  Where did you here that crankshafts need to be x-rayed every 200 hours? That would mean completely tearing an engine down... I'm fairly certain this almost never happens.
  - sidewndr46 5y ago
    I'm assuming he is referring to the manufacturer's recommendations and not what is required to keep the engine airworthy. You can write in basically anything as a manufacturer, doesn't mean it is binding unless it is an official communication. For example, I have a dirt bike that states to replace the piston every 10 hours of operation.
    - p_l 5y ago
      Not even fighter jet engines have such requirements, and those consider 300 hours overhauls to be short.
  - 5y ago
thaumasiotes 5y ago
> That said, it seems pretty indefensible that it’s taken the FAA more than a decade to reach a decision on an unleaded avgas alternative. But that's fast. Compare the FDA's decision on whether to continue mandating the exact ingredients in a "French dressing", which took 24 years despite being unopposed: https://reason.com/2022/01/12/the-fda-finally-liberates-french-dressing-from-72-year-old-ingredient-mandates/ https://reason.com/2022/01/12/the-fda-finally-liberates-fren...
- Stevvo 5y ago
  As someone who lives in France that's an interesting article; I've never heard of or seen this condiment before. Wine and Cheese are highly regulated in France under the AOC system in order to preserve French culture. Is the same thing going on the US? The FDA is protecting the American culinary culture of 'french dressing'?
  - thaumasiotes 5y ago
    > Is the same thing going on the US? The FDA is protecting the American culinary culture of 'french dressing'? That's not what's going on. French dressing is not a significant part of American culture; I'd be willing to believe a majority of Americans have no idea what it is. (I cannot recall ever seeing or hearing of it either, though it's probably visible as an option on restaurant menus.) Salad dressing in general is very common, but French dressing isn't. The wording of the decision implies that the rule was justified on basically "truth in advertising" premises - the worry was that customers might rely on the label "French dressing" and be fooled into purchasing something they didn't want: > After a comment and evaluation period, the FDA determined "that the standard of identity for French dressing no longer promotes honesty and fair dealing in the interest of consumers [...]" There's no real way to know what the motivation actually was. A very neurotic regulator may have genuinely been worried about innovation in French dressing. Or something else might have been going on. A somewhat similar issue that I also learned about from coverage in Reason is that the FDA imposes some "nutritional" requirements on products that are labeled "pasta", notably a minimum iron content. "Noodles", by contrast, are unregulated. (The words are synonymous.) In that case, the legislative history is apparently fairly clear that the motivation for regulation was protecting "pasta" manufacturers against economic competition from Asian imports. But the official justification is that these are nutritional standards on which customers rely. (Obviously false; the number of people in the US who are even aware that the definition of "pasta" is regulated is nearly zero.)
Stevvo 5y ago
Here is your missing nuance; AOPA spent much of that decade and the one prior lobbying against unleaded avgas. AOPA will claim in principle to support unleaded AvGas, but in reality GA pilots and their lobbyists have been opposed; each proposal was always considered too cumbersome or expensive to pilots...

Probably some missing nuance. That said, it seems pretty indefensible that it’s taken the FAA more than a decade to reach a decision on an unleaded avgas alternative.

rbinv 5y ago

Nuance like what? He's spot on imo.

bombcar 5y ago

The nuance is it's lose-lose for the FAA bureaucrats if they approve an unleaded gas and something later happens. There is NO risk to the bureaucrats if they keep stalling on unleaded and let everyone run 100LL for all eternity.

JumpCrisscross 5y ago
> There is NO risk to the bureaucrats if they keep stalling on unleaded and let everyone run 100LL for all eternity This is oversimplifying. Yes, there is a bureaucratic bias towards inaction. But stonewalling is an action. The GAO audit the author posits could very well endgame key decision makers' careers.
- londons_explore 5y ago
  Nobody in government gets fired for inaction...
  - bombcar 5y ago
    Politicians can, but it is VERY rare, and NEVER over something that affects a very small portion of the population.
- EricE 5y ago
  If you have an example of anyone getting a career ended because of a GAO audit, I'd love to see it!

bluGill 5y ago

Yeah, there is no excuse for not having an unleaded avgas by now. Just approve one already, octane can be raised by many other means, and aviation engines are rebuilt all the time (every 200 hours you need to xray the crankshaft to ensure there are no cracks), so if parts need to be replaced it would have been done already anyway. Sure sometimes airplane owners skip some of that (the odds of a cracked crankshaft are low enough and the rule only applies to specific uses which you can not do), but even still it is safe to say if they had the fuel approved 10 years ago most airports wouldn't even have 100ll anymore because the demand would be so low.

refurb 5y ago
If it's like most things, it's a matter of prioritization. Trying to maximize positive impact with a limited set of resources forces you to prioritize. Sure it would be great to get rid of unleaded aviation gas, but ensuring we don't get a repeat of the 737-MAX issue might take priority.
Justin_K 5y ago
Where did you here that crankshafts need to be x-rayed every 200 hours? That would mean completely tearing an engine down... I'm fairly certain this almost never happens.
- sidewndr46 5y ago
  I'm assuming he is referring to the manufacturer's recommendations and not what is required to keep the engine airworthy. You can write in basically anything as a manufacturer, doesn't mean it is binding unless it is an official communication. For example, I have a dirt bike that states to replace the piston every 10 hours of operation.
  - p_l 5y ago
    Not even fighter jet engines have such requirements, and those consider 300 hours overhauls to be short.
- 5y ago

thaumasiotes 5y ago

> That said, it seems pretty indefensible that it’s taken the FAA more than a decade to reach a decision on an unleaded avgas alternative. But that's fast. Compare the FDA's decision on whether to continue mandating the exact ingredients in a "French dressing", which took 24 years despite being unopposed: https://reason.com/2022/01/12/the-fda-finally-liberates-french-dressing-from-72-year-old-ingredient-mandates/ https://reason.com/2022/01/12/the-fda-finally-liberates-fren...

Stevvo 5y ago
As someone who lives in France that's an interesting article; I've never heard of or seen this condiment before. Wine and Cheese are highly regulated in France under the AOC system in order to preserve French culture. Is the same thing going on the US? The FDA is protecting the American culinary culture of 'french dressing'?
- thaumasiotes 5y ago
  > Is the same thing going on the US? The FDA is protecting the American culinary culture of 'french dressing'? That's not what's going on. French dressing is not a significant part of American culture; I'd be willing to believe a majority of Americans have no idea what it is. (I cannot recall ever seeing or hearing of it either, though it's probably visible as an option on restaurant menus.) Salad dressing in general is very common, but French dressing isn't. The wording of the decision implies that the rule was justified on basically "truth in advertising" premises - the worry was that customers might rely on the label "French dressing" and be fooled into purchasing something they didn't want: > After a comment and evaluation period, the FDA determined "that the standard of identity for French dressing no longer promotes honesty and fair dealing in the interest of consumers [...]" There's no real way to know what the motivation actually was. A very neurotic regulator may have genuinely been worried about innovation in French dressing. Or something else might have been going on. A somewhat similar issue that I also learned about from coverage in Reason is that the FDA imposes some "nutritional" requirements on products that are labeled "pasta", notably a minimum iron content. "Noodles", by contrast, are unregulated. (The words are synonymous.) In that case, the legislative history is apparently fairly clear that the motivation for regulation was protecting "pasta" manufacturers against economic competition from Asian imports. But the official justification is that these are nutritional standards on which customers rely. (Obviously false; the number of people in the US who are even aware that the definition of "pasta" is regulated is nearly zero.)

Stevvo 5y ago

Here is your missing nuance; AOPA spent much of that decade and the one prior lobbying against unleaded avgas. AOPA will claim in principle to support unleaded AvGas, but in reality GA pilots and their lobbyists have been opposed; each proposal was always considered too cumbersome or expensive to pilots...