Civic Register
| 5.10.18
Biofuel Regulation Changes Reward Big Oil
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The Story
- President Trump is making changes to the decade-old Renewable Fuel Standard (RFS), handing a win to refiners, a loss to clean air activists, and a possible loss to Big Corn.
- The emerging plan will:
Allow year-round sales of high-ethanol fuel blends, which had previously been banned during the summer because of its contribution to smog on hot days.
Expand financial hardship waivers for refineries that purport to struggle with biofuels blending mandates.
Potentially count exported ethanol toward mandated biofuels volumes.
- The Environmental Protection Agency oversees the RFS, which sets out how much corn-based ethanol and other renewable fuels refiners must blend into gasoline. The program’s intent was to address global warming, reduce dependence on foreign oil and bolster the rural economy by requiring a steady increase in renewable fuels over time. Most agree that the program has not worked as intended.
Why It Matters
- The environment takes a hit, and not just because of increased smog undermining air quality. A growing body of evidence finds a near-zero benefit in switching from fossil fuels to corn-based ethanol, from a greenhouse gas emissions perspective. A far stronger approach would be to reduce vehicle emissions, but the Trump administration just loosened those standards.
- U.S. companies produce only a sliver of the cellulosic fuels called for under the RFS, and much of that is ethanol derived from agricultural leftovers like corn stalks. Given that shortfall, the EPA simply issues waivers for advanced biofuels each year, allowing the industry largely to continue business as usual.
- The waivers program reduces demand for corn-based ethanol, arguably harming the farmers it was meant to help. While the EPA doesn’t disclose waiver recipients, Trump ally and billionaire Carl Icahn’s company, CVR Refining, has been a substantial beneficiary.
- Allowing exports to count toward RFS mandates would have a similarly dulling effect on corn-based ethanol demand, which upsets the National Corn Growers Association. Meanwhile, ethanol exports are down in the first place because of Chinese retaliation to Trump’s recently imposed tariffs.
- Using food crops for fuel presents a moral quandary when people still go hungry, especially considering that there are many alternative fuel stocks that have a far smaller environmental footprint. However, those fuels do not have a powerful lobbying engine behind them.
What do you think?
Should the RFS be revised? Stay the same? Be abandoned? Hit Take Action, then share your thoughts below.
--Sara E. Murphy
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