Twenty Years of Techron Yield Unclear Results

About 20 miles north of San Francisco, in the city of Richmond, Chevron has built one of the most advanced fuel research centers in the world. One building resembles a car hospital, where engines are attached to dozens of tubes and electronics that measure how they perform using different fluids. In another building, chemists study gasoline samples from all over the world. In a third, researchers dissect engine parts clogged with gunk. Roughly 1,600 people scurry about the complex, one-quarter of them with Ph.D.s. Many of these people have dedicated their lives to perfecting Techron, a detergent for gas that Chevron has been working on for more than 30 years.

Since 1995, the engine-cleaning additive in Chevron’s gas has been the company’s main sales pitch to consumers. In its familiar TV spots, animated cars attest that Techron makes them feel good. There’s little question that advanced science has gone into developing the fuel additive. The question is whether the obsession with Techron is paying off for the company or for consumers. After almost 20 years, drivers still don’t really know what the product is; anyway, they tend to buy gas based on price, not technology. And these days, it’s unclear whether Techron’s proprietary molecule is better than those used by other fuel makers, or whether modern cars suffer many of the problems Techron purports to fix. “Most fuels have these additives, and they all seem to be doing the job,” says Brandt Lucido, owner of One Stop Automotive, a repair shop in Dallas. To this argument, Chevron responds with a stock answer. “Techron is unsurpassed,” says Don Walker, general manager of the brand group at Chevron. “We think our claim is pretty strong.”