According to SGGP Newspaper, most of the filling stations owned by private petroleum enterprises in Ho Chi Minh City have no longer had E5 pumps meanwhile some facilities of state-owned enterprises such as Comeco, Petrolimex have gradually reduced or removed these pumps due to sharply dropped sales of the ethanol gasoline blend.
At a Comeco gas station in Phan Huy Ich Street in Go Vap District, only two out of nine pumps have been selling E5 RON 92 bio-gasoline. However, very few of drivers have opted for this.
An employee of the station said that in the past, the store had sold more than 1,000 liters per day; however, for more than a year, the purchasing power has been low with only about 300 - 400 liters per day. He revealed that buyers are mainly those who use old motorbikes and are familiar with E5 fuel.
Some existing stations in the inner city are seen still selling E5 fuel whereas almost no stores have sold the bio-gasoline in the suburbs. The Petrolimex filling station in the National Highway 1A in An Phu Dong Ward in District 12 with dozens of pumps has removed some E5 cylinders to make space for RON 95 because of low purchasing power.
According to employee Nguyen Van Quoc Dung, the station used to have two E5 RON 92 bio-gasoline pumps but just a few liters of E5 had been sold to motorbike taxi drivers and tricycle drivers per day. Meanwhile, the station must have a separate pump to mix and sell E5 gasoline, which is costly. As a result, store managers decided to convert the E5 gasoline pumps into oil pumps.
A representative of the city Petroleum Company Limited (Saigon Petro) said that the consumption of E5 gasoline has been declining, especially since the beginning of 2019. The E5 consumption proportion in Saigon Petro was 30.06 percent and 22.65 percent in 2018 and 2019 respectively. In 2020, it was just slightly over 10 percent.
In reality, there have been inadequacies in the Government's promotion program to boost consumption of E5 fuel. According to a study of relevant agencies, E5 fuel consumers are facing difficulties in finding a station selling the blend. In addition, the price difference between E5 and RON 95 gasoline is not much. Specifically, the retail price gap between E5 and RON 95 gasoline was VND1,552 and VND1,200 per liter in 2018 and 2019 respectively whereas the gap between the two kinds was VND1,000 a liter from 2020.
In a bid to encourage people to use E5 gasoline, Deputy Chairman of the Vietnam Energy Association (VEA) Nguyen Van Vy said that Vietnam should remove barriers in production, distribution and consumption of the blend.
Moreover, wholesale companies should receive more support including mixture pumps, tariff incentives especially environment protection taxes to create a big gap in the prices between the two kinds.
Last but not least, the government and agencies should increase the information of environmentally-friendly benefits to lure more people to use the ethanol gasoline blend.
