India’s clean fuel journey is stepping up a gear, with state-run oil firms gearing up to roll out E85 petrol at a discounted price across the country. State-run oil marketing companies will offer E85 fuel at a discount of Rs 20 per litre compared with E20 petrol to make up for the biofuel’s lower energy content, petroleum and natural gas minister Hardeep Singh Puri said after inaugurating an E85 dispensing facility at a petrol pump in Delhi. E85 is a fuel blend containing 85% ethanol and 15% petrol. Ethanol has around one-third lower energy content than petrol, and the discount has been introduced to compensate users for that difference. The existing E20 blend, which contains 20% ethanol and 80% petrol, will continue to be available at all fuel stations as most vehicles on Indian roads are compatible with blends of up to 20% ethanol.The government plans to expand the availability of ethanol blended fuel in phases. According to Puri, the rollout will begin with around 50 to 100 ethanol dispensing stations in Delhi-NCR, Pune, Mumbai and Nagpur. The network is expected to grow to 500 stations by the end of 2026 and further to 5,000 stations across the country by the end of 2027.“I think we are starting with about 50 to 100 (ethanol) dispensing stations in Delhi-NCR region, Pune, Mumbai, and Nagpur, etc. This 50-100 (ethanol) dispensing stations will hopefully go up to 500 towards the end of 2026,” Puri said.The expansion of ethanol dispensing infrastructure comes alongside efforts to increase the number of vehicles capable of using higher ethanol blends. In recent days, Maruti Suzuki and Hero MotoCorp have each introduced a vehicle model that can run on E85 fuel.Puri said the simultaneous introduction of compatible vehicles and fuel stations would support wider adoption of E85 fuel. The minister also linked greater ethanol use to reduced dependence on imported fossil fuels, noting that India’s fossil fuel import bill stands at around $120 billion.He said making Euro VI vehicles compatible with E100 fuel, which is pure ethanol without any petrol blend, would help reduce that import burden. Indian Oil already operates around 400 fuel stations capable of dispensing E100 fuel across Delhi, Uttar Pradesh, Maharashtra, Karnataka and Tamil Nadu.Highlighting the potential economic impact of flex-fuel vehicles, Puri said that if half of all newly manufactured two-wheelers and four-wheelers in the country become flex fuel-compliant, it could create additional ethanol demand of 311.8 crore litres and generate Rs 12,403 crore in additional income for farmers.The minister said India has already achieved 20% ethanol blending with petrol, compared with 1.5% in 2014. According to him, the programme has resulted in foreign exchange savings of Rs 1.84 lakh crore by replacing 302 lakh metric tonnes of crude oil.