biofuel

As a gateway to year-round sales of E15 gasoline, Congress should adjust air pollution laws so they apply equally to all blends of ethanol, said groups ranging from the oil industry and fuel retailers to farmers and biofuel makers. In a joint letter Tuesday, the groups said the waiver would …

A Texas-based company filed for a permit with the Iowa Utilities Board on Tuesday to build a 900-mile pipeline across the state to transport liquefied carbon dioxide, collected from the smokestacks of ethanol refineries, to Illinois, where it would be sequestered underground.

Market prices for U.S. corn, soy, wheat and cotton will retreat sharply in the 2023-24 marketing year with normal weather and yields around the world, FAPRI said in an update to its agricultural baseline. However, it expects record wheat and cotton prices in 2022-23.

The trade group Growth Energy sued the EPA last month because it was far behind schedule in setting the ethanol mandate for 2023, the first year the agency has a free hand in drafting the regulation. A consent decree, if approved, would resolve the complaint and oblige the EPA to propose the renewable fuel program by Sept. 16 and finalize it by April 23, 2023.

The Renewable Fuel Standard, which guarantees corn ethanol and other biofuels a share of the U.S. gasoline market, results in the release of at least as much carbon "and likely at least 24 percent higher" greenhouse gas emissions than the petroleum it displaced, say scientists who studied the program's first eight years.

Facing a court-ordered deadline for action, the Environmental Protection Agency denied on Thursday 36 requests by small refiners for "hardship" exemptions from the U.S. ethanol mandate. Biofuel and farm groups lamented the decision "fails to remedy the economic harms" of reduced demand for corn ethanol.

In a letter to President Trump, five Corn Belt senators said on Monday the EPA "is currently undermining your commitment of a 15 billion-gallon RFS." The Republican senators sent the letter on the same day White House officials were scheduled to discuss possible revisions to the ethanol mandate, which requires oil refiners to blend in the corn-based fuel.

Last October, EPA administrator Scott Pruitt said the agency would investigate whether it has the authority to allow year-round sales of E15, a goal of the ethanol industry. It's still doing the research five months later and may find the answer soon, Pruitt told AgDay TV, when asked about possible changes to the Renewable Fuel Standard.

Nearly three months ago, President Trump told oil-state and farm-state senators to find a mutually acceptable resolution to their fight over the Renewable Fuel Standard — the requirement that oil refiners mix biofuel, usually corn-based ethanol, into gasoline and diesel. Now the squabble is back in the president’s hands with a familiar set of proposals on the table for a group of senators who found them unpalatable in the past.

The holding company Icahn Enterprises was subpoenaed for information about its founder’s attempts to change U.S. biofuel policy while he was an informal White House advisor, reported Bloomberg.

President Trump will meet oil industry leaders and their congressional allies for a discussion of the biofuels mandate, reported Reuters, based on two sources. The meeting "could set the stage for negotiations to overhaul the U.S. Renewable Fuel Standard," said the wire service; the industry has pressed for years to eliminate the mandate or revise its requirement to blend biofuels into gasoline and diesel fuel.

China's plan to move to a 10 percent blend of ethanol into its gasoline supply will be a boon for U.S. ethanol exports, said ADM chief executive Juan Luciano. Agrimoney says that Luciano told investors that China could need imports of 8 million tons a year by 2020 to satisfy the E10 target because of the nation's longer-term fuel strategy.