It is not an "option". If you are in a reformulated zone you get gas reformulated for that zone. You can find border stations that can sell non-reformulated gas, but that is hit and miss due to delivery screwups. I ran a station in Jack County and we were always (2 out of 5 deliveries) getting reformulated regular even tho we were outside the attainment zone.
In this context, "option" means it is not a requirement, by state law, for any gas station to sell blended fuel in Texas. Now, the EPA has required areas of Texas to sell only blended fuels as they have been tagged under pollution control.
It also depends on the distributor. There is a local distributor in Grapevine who will take an order for unblended fuel and deliver it.
But you are correct. There are times when a station will get unblended and other times they get blended. Then there are times when they get a low blend (< 10%).
I have hit tanks which were full of unblended, when they were not supposed to be unblended. Easy to tell in the Mini as it loves that unblended fuel. Gas mileage shoots up 15 to 20%, almost instantly. I keep going back to that tank, until it is back to blended, then it is off to a station outside of D/FW to fill. I got a buddy at the distributor who lets me know which stations are taking unblended fuel. That certainly helps.
Of course, you have to know that the "bubba factor" does apply.
