New Delhi: Union road transport and highways minister Nitin Gadkari said he has approved the implementation of rules that will govern the use of E100, i.e. nearly pure ethanol, as fuel in automobiles.Gadkari on Saturday (June 13) said he granted his approval to the rules the previous night and that the move would help India reduce energy imports and pollution.“Yesterday at 8:30 pm I signed the file that lays out a legal process [to implement] rules governing the use of 100% ethanol” as fuel in automobiles in India, he said at a press conference in Nagpur on Saturday.Gadkari’s announcement comes days after he and Union petroleum minister Hardeep Singh Puri launched a version of Maruti Suzuki’s Wagon-R car that in theory can run on E100, making it India’s first flex-fuel passenger vehicle. Such vehicles are configured to run on fuels comprising a range of ethanol-petrol blends including E20 and E100.A few days prior they had also launched flex-fuel bikes manufactured by Hero that can run on ethanol-petrol blends of up to E85.In April Gadkari’s ministry issued a draft notification proposing to recognise E100 as an approved automotive fuel.Other carmakers including Mahindra, Hyundai and Toyota will soon roll out flex-fuel vehicles, Gadkari said on Saturday.“People criticised me a lot and said ‘he speaks rubbish’ and ‘this won’t be possible, vehicles can’t run on 100% ethanol’. Disinformation was spread, I was also targeted and there was a paid campaign where it was said that cars get spoiled due to the use of ethanol[-blended fuel],” the minister said.Drivers had resisted the government’s E20 rollout across India last year, saying the new fuel is less efficient and that older vehicles would not be compatible with it.When anxiety surrounding E20 had peaked last year the petroleum ministry had clarified that ethanol “results in a marginal decrease in mileage, estimated at 1-2% for four-wheelers designed for E10 and calibrated for E20, and around 3-6% in others”.Unlike E20, the E85 and E100 grades require the use of flex-fuel engines. The government plans to roll out E85 at close to 500 retail outlets by December and around 5,000 pumps by end-2027.Last week the Financial Express had reported that fuel station operators are concerned over the E85 rollout due to insufficient space at pumps and a lack of demand for the high-ethanol blend.“There is virtually no consumer demand for E85 today. Yet operators are being asked to dedicate infrastructure and valuable space for it. Initial sales of flex-fuel vehicles are expected to be limited, largely in the two-wheeler segment. Until vehicle volumes reach meaningful scale, much of this infrastructure could remain underutilised,” one dealer told the newspaper’s Nitin Kumar.