Unfortunate turn of events for German automakers

Amid rising fuel prices and anxiety as to whether the higher blend level could be run in German car engines, the country's Environment Minister Sigmar Gabriel said Friday that plans to raise the ethanol level from 5% to 10% had been utterly cancelled.
        The government had previously warned the 10% blend level plan would be abandoned if more than one million vehicles could not run the fuel. He said that the government was now estimating that, in fact, the engines of 3.3 million vehicles would have been unable to tolerate E-10.
        In a dynamic familiar to that which has transpired in the U.S., German automakers, whose cars generally do not score well in efficiency, had been supportive of the E-10 strategy as a way to forestall legislation that might enforce better fuel economy.
        Industry association Verband der Automobilindustrie, anchored by BMW and Mercedes-Benz's had previously submitted what they thought was the correct figure for the number of cars on German roads not capable of running E-10, but somehow, at 360,000 their number was way, way off.
        Now, with the cancellation of E-10, the German car industry will "have to come up with other technical measures" to meet European Union emission targets of 120 grams per kilometer, Gabriel said, joking that auto parts makers would be pleased.