Flexible-fuel technology started being developed by Brazilian engineers near the end of the 1990s. The Brazilian flexible fuel car is built with an ethanol-ready engine and one fuel tank for both fuels. The small gasoline reservoir for starting the engine in cold weather, used in earlier neat ethanol vehicles, was kept to avoid start up problems in the central and southern regions, where winter temperatures normally drop below . An improved flex motor generation was launched in 2009 and allowed to eliminate the need for this secondary gas reservoir tank. Another improvement was the reduction of fuel consumption and tailpipe emissions, between 10% to 15% as compared to flex motors sold in 2008. In March 2009 Volkswagen do Brasil launched the Polo E-Flex, the first flex fuel model without an auxiliary tank for cold start.