Episode 031 - Myth of D975

Is a little D975 all you need in order to know the status of your fuel? In this episode, I’ll be talking about this thing called ASTND975, or the standard specification for diesel fuel oil. There’s a common myth associated with D975, and you will get a chance to understand what that myth is and why you need to be careful to not fall into the trap that many people fall into in this area.

Listen in to hear more about what D975 does, what it is meant to be used for, and who has been behind its important status in the industry. I’ll explain where it stands when it comes to regulatory compliance and industry standards, as well as my thoughts on where people get confused. You will learn about many of the important elements of the D975 tests, what we can take from the results, how we can understand the current fuel stability conditions better, and more.

Listen to the Full Episode:

What You'll Learn: 

• What D975 is and why it’s important to understand.
• The myth that has to do with D975.
• The elements of D975 and things that are commonly missed when using it.
• How to know what your fuel needs.
• The standard that D975 sets and what many people don’t understand about it.
• Who sets the industry and market standards.
• The properties of D975 and how it is standardized.
• Problems with fuel that aren’t always thought of.
• What causes instability in fuel and how we can better understand it.
• How to understand what’s actually in the fuel right now and what tests are telling us for the future.
• The two big exceptions that stand out when it comes to D975 tests.

Ideas Worth Sharing:

• “The myth of D975 has to do with the idea that if you test your stored diesel fuel, and it comes back as meeting all these D975 requirements, then you don’t have anything to worry about.” - Erik Bjornstad
• “Yes, D975 is pretty important, but it would be a mistake to think that it is the only thing you have to think about.” - Erik Bjornstad
• “D975 is not actually a legal definition established by a government authority. It is the accepted de facto standard that is accepted by anyone that means anything in the market.” - Erik Bjornstad
• “It’s important for us to understand what’s in the fuel right now vs. what tests might be telling us concerning a predictive picture of what we might expect to see happening to the fuel in the future if nothing changes.”  - Erik Bjornstad

• "D975 tests are mostly all descriptive. They are not intended to be predictive in the way that an oxidative stability test would be. When you go from no problems now to no problems in the future, there’s something that’s missing in that information. Conditions might change in the future.” - Erik Bjornstad

Resources:

• Erik Bjornstad: LinkedIn