I've seen the same thing in NY state.
Have an idea but I can't be guarentee its the full story.
The ethanol is almost always blended in at the distribution location. In other words at the last leg of the fuel's journey when its going into the trucks taking it to the retail stores.
My guess is that most of the non-eth fuel sold at stations is simply the stuff that was intended for getting mixed with ethanol.
So this stuff has a AKI of 89, or at best 91, because when the 8% ethanol is mixed in, the AKI would increase to 92 or 93.
So yes it has no ethanol, but its not that same as what we were buying back in 1970 or even 1990.
It used to be that there were stations that carried a 94 AKI fuel. Some Sunoco and I don't recall who else. Very much a regional thing. Might have had to do with having enough volume of sales to make it worth it. I've driven through parts of the country, typically rural areas where 91 or 92 was the highest octane at most stations. Demand ? Elevation and climate?
Canada. My recollection from when I was searching the internet for info on gasoline was that the formulations there are different. Also the octane listed at the pump may not be required to be the AKI, it may be Research Octane. Pretty sure in europe that is the case.
Even in the continental US, there are many different blends.
This map was published by Exxon showing some of the regional differences.
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