Russ Niles’ latest piece in AVweb on a California resident’s push to get lead out of avgas.

The FAA and EPA have cut a deal that gives aviation until 2030 to come up with a new fuel, and it just seems like most of the players are perfectly comfortable stretching that deadline to the final minute. It seems to me that we could beat that deadline by a few years if something gave in the impasse over G100UL. I have tried, with varying degrees of success depending on who you talk to, to unravel the business, regulatory and personal issues that are in the way, but it seems to be just the way it is for now.

Shepler has witnessed the amazement that many people express when they learn that there is still lead being used in fuel. The knowledge is being used by groups who are less concerned about the health effects of lead than the noise they are enduring or the profits they are missing because of their local airports. Lead emissions are now a standard part of the argument for anti-airport groups and that is helping to spread the knowledge. Shepler is trying to get one of the national news magazine shows interested in the story.

Meanwhile, she continues to attack her part of the battle with calm logic. She’s taken soil samples near the airport and all have lead. A few are right on the threshold where the EPA starts taking notice. She continues to liase with other groups that have formed in other areas of California that are fighting their own regional efforts, and that has resulted in a bill moving through the legislature that would ban leaded avgas.

Read the article in full: A California Mom May Tip The Fuel Battle Scales