In the News
Sep 29, 2021
Two studies conducted by Transport Energy Strategies (TES) and THiggins Energy Consulting show that gasoline blended with ethanol lowers carbon intensity (CI) even more than what is modeled today and what is shown in recent studies. A key finding in both studies is that blended ethanol not only displaces some of the gasoline but enables a reduction of aromatics in all of the gasoline in the blend. Aromatics have a high CI, and their reduction further decreases the GHG impact of the E10. This advantageous blending attribute is due to ethanol's high octane rating and has been neglected in prior literature.
"For years, the ethanol industry has touted the value of displacing aromatics with ethanol from an air pollution and public health standpoint, but no one has, to our team's knowledge, ever considered what displacement might mean for carbon intensity and for reducing GHG emissions," saidTammy Klein, founder and CEO of Transport Energy Strategies and a member of the study team. "Our findings break new ground."
GREET assessments, along with a study for the US Department of Agriculture and the current values used by the California Air Resources Board, yield an average CI for ethanol that is 40.4% below the value for petroleum gasoline. A recent study led byHarvardpresents a deeper reduction. Using the 40.4% ethanol advantage, and assuming a CI of 93 g/MJ for gasoline, the CI of ethanol is estimated at 55.5 g/MJ.
Displacement of petroleum gasoline to form E10 offers direct benefits from the low CI of the ethanol. In Well-to-Wheels Carbon Intensity for Ethanol Blended Fuels, the TES study team found that when both direct displacement and reduction of aromatics in the blend are attributed to ethanol as the enabling additive, a "reduced blending CI" (BCI) of 43.4 g/MJ is found for ethanol when it is used in E10. Similarly, for anticipated market blending, the BCI for E20 is 44.8 g/MJ, a greater reduction than the 55.5 g/MJ from unblended ethanol. If the 52.4 g/MJ CI for unblended ethanol from the GREET estimate alone is used, the BCI for ethanol in E10 is about 40 g/MJ.
Refinery modeling, economic considerations, availability of feedstocks and examination of gasoline properties supported the conclusion in Quantifying Ethanol CI Benefits in Gasoline Composition that as ethanol is blended into gasoline, so aromatics are reduced to maintain a constant octane rating. "The primary refinery option for lower octane is through lower severity or throughput for the gasoline reformer," saidTerry Higgins, president of THiggins Energy Consulting. "This, in turn, reduces both gasoline aromatic content and carbon intensity. When blended in gasoline, ethanol offers higher GHG benefits than well to wheels studies recognize for pure ethanol."
Transport Energy Strategies (http://www.transportenergystrategies.com) is a consultancy that provides market and policy intelligence, research analysis and strategic advice to clients on a range of global transport energy issues. THiggins Energy Consulting is a consultancy that provides refinery modeling providing energy consulting services to the petroleum and related industries with a primary area of focus on the impact of fuel quality trends on refining and application of new refining technology.
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Sep 28, 2021
WASHINGTON –Today,Congresswomen Cheri Bustos (D-IL-17), Cindy Axne (D-IA-03), Angie Craig (D-MN-02)andSenator Amy Klobuchar (D-MN)led a bicameral group of Congressional members spanning seven states in a letter urging the Administration to increase biofuels usage and reject any reduction in biofuel blending requirements.
After recent reports that the Administration may be considering lowering the Renewable Volume Obligations (RVOs), the group raised serious concerns about the harm a reduction in biofuels usage could cause to the Administrations clean energy goals and economic stability of the renewable fuels marketplace.
“We have strong reservations about the potential for the Administration to destroy over 5 billion gallons of biofuel volume from the 2020, 2021, and 2022 RVOs. This action would directly undermine your commitment to address climate change and restore integrity to the Renewable Fuel Standard (RFS),”the letter states.“Every gallon of biofuels that is blended into our nation’s fuel supply displaces a gallon of oil and cuts carbon emissions…Reducing biofuel blending requirements will increase greenhouse gas emissions.”
“Rather than exempting refiners of their obligations under the Clean Air Act, we urge the Administration to provide additional certainty and stability to the renewable fuels marketplace by issuing strong RVOs for 2021 and 2022, and declining to remand any gallons from the 2020 RVO. These actions will create jobs, drive American investment, and cut carbon emissions from the transportation sector.”
The letter was also signed by Reps. Mark Pocan, Raja Krishnamoorthi, Bobby Rush, David Scott, Tim Ryan and Ron Kind, and Senators Dick Durbin, Tammy Duckworth, Tina Smith, Tammy Baldwin and Debbie Stabenow.
In June, Bustos, Axne, Craig and Klobuchar also led 12 bicameral colleagues in a letter to the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and National Economic Council (NEC) expressing concern about reports that the agencies were considering exempting oil refiners of their obligations under the Clean Air Act’s Renewable Fuel Standard (RFS).
Text of the letter is below:
September 27, 2021
The Honorable Joseph R. Biden, Jr.
President of the United States
The White House
1600 Pennsylvania Avenue, NW
Washington, D.C. 20500
The Honorable Gina McCarthy
National Climate Advisor
The White House
1600 Pennsylvania Avenue, NW
Washington, D.C. 20500
Dear President Biden and Ms. McCarthy:
Thank you for your work to decarbonize our nation’s transportation sector and help the United States achieve a clean energy future. Your efforts are critical to maintaining U.S. competitiveness across the globe while bolstering good-paying, union jobs here at home.
We write today with serious concern about recent reports that the Administration is considering a significant reduction to the annual biofuel blending requirements known as the Renewable Volume Obligations (RVOs). Specifically, we have strong reservations about the potential for the Administration to destroy over 5 billion gallons of biofuel volume from the 2020, 2021, and 2022 RVOs. This action would directly undermine your commitment to address climate change and restore integrity to the Renewable Fuel Standard (RFS).
The RFS was designed to reduce greenhouse gas emissions from the vehicle transportation sector, diversify our fuel supply, strengthen our national security, and drive economic opportunity. When allowed to function as Congress intended, the RFS has delivered on these goals while serving as the economic engine behind a burgeoning bio-based manufacturing sector across rural America and a biofuel industry with a 100-percent U.S. supply chain and a higher union density than the national average.
Every gallon of biofuels that is blended into our nation’s fuel supply displaces a gallon of oil and cuts carbon emissions. Multiple studies from academic institutions, federal agencies, and national laboratories have confirmed that corn ethanol (46 percent ), cellulosic ethanol (70 – 126 percent), and biodiesel (66 – 79 percent) are less carbon intensive than gasoline and petroleum diesel. Reducing biofuel blending requirements will increase greenhouse gas emissions.
Congress clearly intended the RFS to be a forward-looking policy to drive investments in biofuels production, lead to the next generation of advanced biofuels, and fuel a clean energy agenda for decades. Rather than exempting refiners of their obligations under the Clean Air Act, we urge the Administration to provide additional certainty and stability to the renewable fuels marketplace by issuing strong RVOs for 2021 and 2022, and declining to remand any gallons from the 2020 RVO. These actions will create jobs, drive American investment, and cut carbon emissions from the transportation sector.
Again, we appreciate your work to address the climate crisis, and we urge you to reject any actions that would reduce the RVOs or exempt oil refiners of their obligations under the RFS.
We look forward to working with you on this important matter.
Read the original press release here.
Sept 21, 2021
As policymakers in Japan, South Korea and Taiwan consider new emission reduction initiatives to achieve carbon neutrality by 2050, the U.S. Grains Council is working to demonstrate the pathway for decarbonization through increased ethanol blending into local fuel supplies. Each country is focused on reducing economy-wide emissions and the transport sector remains high on the list in terms of achievable emissions reductions.
Japan’s strategic energy plan is being revised this summer and policies are in development to achieve the country’s carbon neutrality goals by 2050. Direct blending of ethanol presents an immediate opportunity for the country to further reduce transport emissions to achieve these policy outcomes. Today, Japan does not currently blend ethanol directly; it relies on pre-blended ethanol in the form of ethyl tertiary-butyl ether (ETBE) that reduces 712,000 tons of carbon dioxide emissions per year. With an average blend rate of just 1.9 percent, direct blending of at least 10 percent would drastically reduce carbon emissions for the transport sector.
Currently, the total potential U.S. market share in Japan for ethanol is up to 66 percent of the estimated demand of 217 million gallons of ethanol used to make ETBE, equal to 142 million gallons per year. Investment to reduce carbon intensity of U.S. ethanol paid off in that market where U.S. product previously had no market share for the first decade of a policy that began in 2009. Even as the greenhouse gas (GHG) reduction requirement became more stringent under that policy’s revision in 2018, U.S. ethanol gained access due to carbon intensity improvements made by the U.S. industry during that time.
Much like Japan, South Korea announced a goal last fall of achieving carbon neutrality by 2050, and the Korean public and private sectors have prepared scenarios and implementation measures for carbon reduction, including creating its Carbon Neutrality Committee that in the future will help set carbon neutrality policies.
The council’s Korea office has been providing stakeholders information on ethanol’s contributions to these goals and helping to create an environment for expanding ethanol use by demonstrating to the government the importance of introducing a fuel ethanol renewable fuel standard. Council staff has spoken at events hosted by the Korea Biofuel Forum and the Transportation Sector Working Group of the Carbon Neutrality Committee, that focuses on the importance of a local policy in achieving 2050 carbon neutrality in South Korea. The Council will co-host the Climate Crisis and Biofuel Symposium in September.
Taiwan is the most recent entrant in the region to announce similar targets to achieve net zero emissions. Like Korea, Taiwan does not blend ethanol into fuel. In the past, Taiwan has looked to pilot programs to blend ethanol in the market, but uptake was minimal, and the programs were discontinued. The enormity of the opportunity is immediate to demonstrate the role that ethanol has in supporting these policies as the U.S. ethanol industry value chain invests further to access these markets in the long term.
Author:Brian Healy
Director of Global Ethanol
Market Development
U.S. Grains Council
202.789.0789
This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.
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By Geoff Cooper
Renewable Fuels Association
Sep 20, 2021
Anyone who has been around the ethanol business for very long knows that one the founding pillars of our industry was the dire need for a more secure energy supply. It all started with the oil embargoes of the 1970s. President Carter, in a major televised speech on the energy crisis in 1979, vowed that “this nation will never use more foreign oil than we did in 1977—never,” and ethanol was part of the solution he presented.
Likewise, when President George W. Bush signed the Renewable Fuel Standard into law just over a quarter century later, he spoke of the role renewable fuels would play in this area. “Every time we use a home-grown fuel … we're going to be helping our farmers, and at the same time, be less dependent on foreign sources of energy.”
It was therefore understandably difficult to recently learn that President Biden was calling on the OPEC+ nations to increase oil production as a way of combatting higher fuel prices at the pump. In a letter to the president two days after this announcement, the Renewable Fuels Association made clear our position—a position that many of the president’s predecessors would agree with:
The key to cleaner and more affordable energy for American consumers lies not in the oil fields of Saudi Arabia and Russia, but in the farm fields of our nation's heartland.
We do agree with President Biden that higher gasoline prices threaten to derail our nation’s economic recovery from the Covid-19 pandemic, and we support the administration’s call for an investigation into the true causes of recent higher gas prices. However, rather than hoping Iraq, Iran, Venezuela and other OPEC+ countries will provide the cure to escalating gas prices in the United States, we urge the president to pursue a real and immediate solution to higher pump prices—increased production and use of low-carbon renewable fuels like ethanol. Using more domestically produced ethanol would not only result in lower fuel prices for consumers, but it would also support this administration’s goals related to clean energy, climate change, and jobs.
While some oil refiners continue to falsely claim the RFS somehow increases the cost of gasoline, the facts are clear. Expanded use of ethanol under the RFS has lowered gasoline prices by an average of 22 cents per gallon in recent years, saving the typical American household $250 annually. In recent weeks, gasoline containing just 10 percent ethanol (E10) has typically sold for 30-40 cents per gallon less than gasoline with no ethanol, on average. And by increasing our liquid fuel supply, it helps dampen gasoline price shocks that result from sudden oil market disruptions.
With the right policy and regulatory actions, renewable fuels can do even more to keep pump prices in check, reduce petroleum dependence, and reduce carbon emissions. We encourage the Biden administration to take three steps: Quickly finalize robust RFS volume requirements for 2021 and 2022, take action to ensure consumers have year-round access to gasoline containing 15% ethanol (E15), and work with Congress to ensure upcoming legislation includes the incentives necessary to support increased FFV production and expanded infrastructure for higher ethanol blends like E15 and E85.
U.S. ethanol producers stand ready to work with the Biden administration and Congress to deliver immediate and effective solutions to the challenges posed by high pump prices and our long history of over-reliance on petroleum. Rather than calling on the cartels of the Middle East to solve our problems at the pump, our leaders in Washington should be calling on the farmers of the Midwest.
Read the original story here.
Sep 15, 2021
Full electrification of the economy is simply not an attainable goal, former US Energy Secretary Ernest Moniz said at an industry forum Sept. 15, as he advised policymakers and the private sector to turn more attention to low-to-no-carbon fuels and carbon-negative technologies.
"I believe when you think this through that you reach the conclusion that while electricity and electrification are the lead horse in the decarbonization race, we also need a fuel," Moniz said during a fireside chat at Siemens Energy's North America Energy Week conference.
The economy in general and particularly the hard-to-decarbonize sectors, such as the transportation, industrial and agricultural sectors, will need a fuel source, and there are a number of possibilities if sufficient attention is paid to the issue, Moniz asserted.
Among those possibilities are biofuels, which Moniz said "have been a promise for a long time without fulfilling the promise," as well as newer fuel alternatives such as an emerging class of carbon-neutral electrofuels produced with hydrogen and hydrogen itself.
Renewable Fuels Association members in July pledged to President Joe Biden that ethanol would achieve a net-zero carbon footprint, on average, by 2050 or sooner. Renewable fuel producers on RFA's board further committed to reducing greenhouse gas emissions from ethanol by at least 70%, on average, compared with gasoline by 2030. Corn ethanol already cuts GHG emissions by about 50% compared to petroleum, according to experts at the departments of Energy and Agriculture, Harvard University, MIT and other institutions.
Deflecting from innovation needs
Moniz warned that statements about full electrification of the economy were deflecting from the need to innovate to usher in significant volumes of low-to-no-carbon fuels at a low cost.
But even with electrification and a green fuel option, the US cannot fully decarbonize the economy, he argued, insisting that direct air capture and other carbon dioxide removal (CDR) technologies will be necessary to eliminate carbon from dilute sources, namely the atmosphere and the upper layers of the ocean.
He took issue with "detractors who view [CDR] as a focus on offsets and ... a bad thing."
Because CO2 in the atmosphere is a cumulative issue, Moniz said "How you get to net-zero, the trajectory through 2030 and 2040 is very important." Further, "we don't want to stop at net-zero," but continue on to "an economywide negative carbon world," he said, asserting that some are getting too caught up in the net-zero emissions by 2050 mantra.
"You cannot have a net negative economy without negative carbon technologies, and so we should be working on that much, much harder than we are today," Moniz said. "And we should not equate negative carbon technologies just with direct air capture, which is getting a lot of attention and I think is very important, but there are many, many other pathways to negative carbon."
A concerted effort must be made to make those pathways "viable, starting by the end of this decade and growing to a very substantial contribution by midcentury," he said.
DOE's role
Along those lines, if he were back in office at the Department of Energy, he said a top priority, from the energy transition context, would be to steward the energy innovation agenda in the US and abroad, with an emphasis on "stimulating major international collaboration" on the three big pillars for reaching success: electricity, fuel and CDR.
Secondly, he said DOE should take a look at its large-scale demonstration projects and deployment efforts.
"Let's face it, we're fairly desperate to accelerate the pace of change," he said. So things like the DOE loan program, for example, need to play a larger role, he contended.
"Back in the earlier Obama period, one failed loan became a big fiasco," he said. "The reality is the loan program as a portfolio was extremely successful in deploying $30 billion of debt financing and doing its job, starting up some areas, bringing in private capital, and then being able to walk away from them, and letting the private sector do the job."
He pointed to DOE's debt financing of the first five utility-scale solar plants in 2009 and 2010 and how that helped spur 60 or 70 more plants without government backing. "That's the kind of success story that I think we need more of."
Read the original story here.
Sep 14, 2021
When he arrived at a start-up ethanol plant site in Portales, New Mexico, for the first day on the job as a carpenter, tools in hand, Randy Doyal didn’t know that he wasn’t being hired to build buildings, but to help build an industry.
“I went up and interviewed with the guy in this little kind of ratty trailer,” Doyal recalled. “He said yes, we’re building ethanol plants. I had no idea, And I didn’t care. Do you need a carpenter? Basically, he said yes, we do need a carpenter and we’re building eight one-million-gallon ethanol plants.”
Doyal showed up at 6:45 the next morning, lugging two big toolboxes, and was surprised to be shown all around the one plant on the site that was already operational— “It’s loud, it’s hot, and it smells funny.” And then the surprise came.
“We walked through this little building with all these tanks and pipe and odd equipment. And as we’re entering this small sort of office space that has some very rudimentary lab equipment in it, he says, OK, now go do that. I said, go do what? He said, you’re my cooker. I said no, I’m a carpenter. He goes no, you’re my cooker. I said, no, dude, I am a carpenter. What are you talking about? He said, well, I had someone quit, and they gave you to me. I need a cooker. And I said, you’ve got to be kidding. He said, do you need a job? I said OK.”
From cooking he eventually moved to distilling and then, when the second plant opened, he was on the startup crew. When the third plant was built, that was his to manage. The company was Mountain Development Corp. A short time later, Doyal learned of another, much larger (10 million gallon) ethanol project being built just down the hill in Portales in early 1985. He actually worked as a carpenter on that project and was hired to be a shift supervisor when the plant was nearing completion. It had been built by a company called Energy Fuels Development Corporation. Its president, Ben Henneke, was on the RFA board at the time.
The plant would go through changes of ownership during Doyal’s time there, and in 1995 Doyal and his family made the move a thousand miles northeast from Portales to Claremont, Minnesota, and Al-Corn Clean Fuel, becoming its general manager. Doyal continues at Al-Corn as its CEO and has been an RFA board member since 1995, serving as board chairman in 2015-2016. Last year, Al-Corn celebrated its billionth gallon of ethanol production.
Among the early challenges Doyal recalls is that the industry, in its youth, did not know how to deal with some of the coproducts of ethanol production—especially during his time at those million-gallon plants in New Mexico.
“We didn’t know what we were doing,” Doyal said, citing one example in particular. “We didn’t really have a plan for the feed that we were producing, because we didn’t think of it as feed. We called it slops. That’s not a good way to think about a feed product. We needed to learn to focus on how we could use this material for the livestock out there. There were a lot of people who could utilize it.”
In Minnesota, Doyal found an industry where plants were more numerous and in closer proximity. The nearest plant to his in Portales at that time, he said, was in Colwich, Kansas.
“When I got up here and saw the ethanol plants that existed and more being built, I thought this should be great,” he said. “But the plants were not working together. So, we started a process here at Claremont to invite all the managers and maintenance folks to look at our plant. We gave them a tour and talked about how we can work together. This was the start of the collaborative nature of much of our industry in Minnesota.”
This idea evolved from sharing spare parts with mechanical breakdowns to looking at improving ethanol marketing, and the creation of RPMG, the Renewable Products Marketing Group. Since its founding in 1996 by Al-Corn and Heartland Corn Products, RPMG now represents 19 plants across seven states.
“We thought we were doing something big with 20 million gallons to market from our two plants, and now RPMG is doing more than two billion a year,” he said. “Working together as an industry, being open and willing to share what you’re doing, so that people can look at it and see and ask questions. All of us trying to get better. It has helped everybody, and it’s continued to grow.”
His experience with RFA proved valuable in a similar way, Doyal said.
“When I got personally involved in RFA on the board was when I came up here to Minnesota. I saw it as another place where more of the industry was getting together and I got to learn about what else was going on out there, across the country, and what was possible for our industry. It was so much greater to see everybody working together, and I had opportunities to serve on different committees and to go and see what the developments were like—to see how fast all kinds of technologies were being developed. That was incredibly interesting to me.”
Having seen the industry grow over the decades he’s helped build it, Doyal rightly remains bullish on its future.
“Renewable fuels will become even more critical. I don’t consider myself an environmentalist, it’s more about stewardship. Oil is a phenomenally valuable resource that we use, and in all kinds of things, but it’s limited. Replacing that with molecules that we can produce in a sustainable renewable fashion makes perfect sense from the stewardship perspective. I hope that people get that message and understand that, especially as we continue to populate this earth. We’re going to need fuels that can be renewable, produced in a sustainable way and are better for the environment.”
Read the original story here.
Sep 13, 2021
The Renewable Fuel Standard’s compliance credit market mechanism does not have any impact on retail gasoline prices, according to a new analysis released today by the Renewable Fuels Association. The analysis finds that while RFS compliance credits—known as RINs, or Renewable Identification Numbers—are a factor in wholesale gasoline prices, there is no evidence that RIN costs have any measurable effect on the retail prices paid by consumers.
RFA Chief Economist Scott Richman found that, not surprisingly, the main driver of recent higher retail gas prices is higher crude oil prices. He calculates that retail gasoline prices have had a correlation of 0.96 with West Texas Intermediate crude oil prices on a monthly basis from January 2013 to July 2021 (with 1.00 representing a perfect correlation and 0.00 representing no correlation whatsoever). Meanwhile, there has been essentially zero correlation (-0.05) between gasoline prices and the prices of RINs. The new analysis is consistent with similar studies conducted by Informa in 2015 and 2017.
“Higher gasoline prices this summer were caused primarily by OPEC+ oil production cutbacks and an increase in gasoline demand,” writes Richman. “Additionally, supply issues such as the Colonial Pipeline shutdown and refinery closures due to Hurricane Ida accentuated price pressures at times. RINs are a convenient target for accusations since they are not widely understood, but as the analysis confirms, RINs do not contribute to higher retail gasoline prices.”
RFA President and CEO Geoff Cooper put the report’s findings into context: “The topic of RFS compliance and RINs can be complex and confusing, and oil refiners have used that complexity to their advantage in their relentless campaign against the RFS. One minute the refiners claim RIN prices cause higher retail gas prices, implying that they somehow fully pass RIN costs on to consumers. Then the next minute they claim RINs are eating into their bottom line because they can’t pass costs along to the pump. Neither of those arguments holds water, as this new analysis shows. The truth is, merchant refiners fully recoup RIN costs by passing them along to wholesale buyers at the terminal; then the RIN value is fully offset when ethanol is blended with gasoline. There is no impact to the consumer.”
Cooper also stressed that the debate over RINs wouldn’t even exist today if refiners had appropriately reacted to the investment signals sent when the RFS was expanded nearly 15 years ago. Refiners who acquire and blend physical volumes of renewable fuel—the original intent and purpose of the RFS—secure RINs free of charge.
When it comes to retail fuel prices, the U.S. Energy Information Administration has stated that crude oil prices and gasoline supply and demand are the main drivers. The EIA estimates that the cost of crude oil accounted for more than half of what consumers paid for gasoline from 2011 to 2020, and crude oil and taxes together represented nearly three-quarters of the total.
Read the original news release here.
Sep 9, 2021
U.S. fuel ethanol production expanded by 2 percent the week ending Sept. 3, according to data released by the U.S. Energy Information Administration on Sept. 9. Weekly ending stocks of fuel ethanol were down more than 3 percent.
U.S. ethanol production averaged 923,000 barrels per day the week ending Sept. 3, up 18,000 barrels per day when compared to the prior week, and marking the first weekly increase of ethanol production since early July. When compared to the same week of last year, ethanol production for the week ending Sept. 3 was down 18,000 barrels per day.
Weekly ending stocks of fuel ethanol fell to 20.39 million barrels for the week ending Sept. 3, the lowest level of ending stocks reported since early June. When compared to the previous week, stocks for the week ending Sept. 3 were down 720,000 barrels. When compared to the same week of last year, stocks were up 397,000 barrels.
Read the original story here.
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Sep 8, 2021
Today, Rep. Cindy Axne (IA-03) announced that she had secured $1,000,000,000 for biofuels infrastructure in the House’s initial draft of the Build Back Better Act to support expanded availability and use of renewable fuels.
“This is a great day for our rural communities, our agricultural economy, our planet, and for hundreds of thousands of Americans whose jobs will be supported by the investments I’ve helped secure in the Build Back Better Act,”said Rep. Axne.“Make no mistake, this was no easy fight. For months, I have been helping members of the administration, the Senate, and my own colleagues in the House understand the key advantages of biofuels – from the fact that it’s been proven to be more than twice as clean as fossil fuels to how much it can help the economies of states like Iowa. But I wouldn’t let up, because it was clear from other infrastructure negotiations that this was not as much of a priority for others in Washington.
“While I will still withhold my final decision on this package until I see the full bill, seeing these investments included will be a critical part of my choice,” Rep. Axne added.
This week, House committees are beginning to consider their sections ofthe Build Back Better Act, a comprehensive legislative package that will tackle a range of issues from infrastructure to health care, education, and climate.
Included in the initial draft of the bill is $1 billion in funding for the U.S. Department of Agriculture to provide grants over the next 8 years to expand biofuel pump infrastructure, upgrade existing tanks and pumps, and increase usage of higher blends of ethanol and biodiesel.
That investment is double the amount originally proposed by Axne in herRenewable Fuels Infrastructure Investment and Market Expansion Act, which she introduced in March.
Axne has reiterated the value that renewable fuels will have in the fight against a warming planet and a changing climate in discussions with her colleagues to secure this funding.
“The proof of a changing climate is more apparent each and every day. From devastating floods and hurricanes to droughts, derechos, and wildfires, our world’s foremost climate experts are sounding the alarm that if we do not take an all-hands-on-deck approach to lowering emissions, climate disasters will only get more frequent and more powerful,”said Rep. Axne. “If we’re going to drastically reduce our reliance on fossil fuels quickly, we can’t just rely on energy technologies that are still years away from being available in our rural areas. That’s where renewable fuels come in. Biofuels have been shown to be over 50% cleaner than fossil fuels and has the potential to be net-zero carbon emissions with continued innovation. With the right infrastructure investments, we can quickly expand the availability of this low carbon fuel across the U.S. To fight climate change, we can’t just keep arguing over what one policy is best to cut emissions. We need to use every tool in our toolbelt – both renewables and electric – to meet the challenge we’re facing.”
Background:
Rep. Axne has emphasized both in public and private for months that biofuels investments are a key priority for her in any infrastructure agenda.
In April, Axne urged relevant House committee chairs to include biofuels investments in infrastructure discussions.
Since that letter, Axne has met with dozens of House colleagues – including the committee chairs charged with agriculture, tax, and climate policies – to make the case for biofuels.
Last week, Axne again laid out the reasons to invest in biofuels to her House and Senate colleagues – penning an open letter with her Midwestern colleagues to emphasize how renewable fuels would help reduce carbon emissions and reliance on fossil fuels.
Read the original press release here.
Sept 2, 2021
WASHINGTON – U.S. Senators Amy Klobuchar (D-MN), Tammy Duckworth (D-IL), Tammy Baldwin (D-WI), Tina Smith (D-MN), and Dick Durbin (D-IL) and Representatives Cindy Axne (D-IA), Angie Craig (D-MN), Cheri Bustos (D-IL), and Mark Pocan (D-WI) sent a letter to Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) and Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) urging them to include support for homegrown renewable fuels in the upcoming reconciliation package.
“Providing additional market access for higher blends of low carbon fuels in the budget reconciliation process will create jobs in rural communities, lower the price of fuel for consumers at the pump, reduce our dependence on fossil fuels, and, most importantly, decrease carbon emissions,” the legislators wrote.
They continued later in the letter: “We know that the climate crisis is happening right now and we need to confront it with a sense of urgency. Our goal is to decarbonize our transportation sector through an all-hands-on-deck approach that includes investment and incentives for both electric vehicles (EVs) and homegrown renewable fuels.”
The legislators specifically asked Schumer and Pelosi to consider including the Biofuel Infrastructure and Agricultural Product Market Expansion Act, Consumer and Fuel Retailer Choice Act, Low Carbon Biofuel Credit Act, Clean Fuels Vehicle Act, Biodiesel Tax Credit Extension Act, and enacting a long-term extension of the Second Generation Biofuel Producer Tax Credit in the budget legislation.
Full text of the letter can be found HERE and below.
Dear Leader Schumer and Speaker Pelosi:
We write to respectfully urge you to make sure that the upcoming budget legislation currently being drafted includes support for homegrown renewable fuels. Providing additional market access for higher blends of low carbon fuels in the budget reconciliation process will create jobs in rural communities, lower the price of fuel for consumers at the pump, reduce our dependence on fossil fuels, and, most importantly, decrease carbon emissions.
Recent studies from the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) and Harvard and Tufts Universities have demonstrated that using renewable fuels to displace fossil fuels reduces greenhouse gas emissions between 39 and 46 percent. When including on-farm adoption of climate-smart conservation practices, such as cover crops, no-till, or precision technologies, and improvements in biorefineries, emissions could be reduced by 70 percent over gasoline by 2022. Biodiesel producers are making fuels that emit as much as 89 percent less greenhouse gas compared to petroleum based diesel.
We know that the climate crisis is happening right now and we need to confront it with a sense of urgency. Our goal is to decarbonize our transportation sector through an all-hands-on-deck approach that includes investment and incentives for both electric vehicles (EVs) and homegrown renewable fuels. The above studies confirm that renewable fuels can play a complementary role to EVs, immediately cut carbon emissions, and help meet our new commitment under the Paris Climate Agreement to reduce emissions by 50 – 52 percent by 2030.
In the budget reconciliation process, we ask you to consider the following bipartisan proposals that will strengthen the production and sale of homegrown renewable fuels and allow them to play a significant role in supporting a greener economy.
- Biofuel Infrastructure and Agricultural Product Market Expansion Act(S.2271/H.R.1542): Fuel retailers want to offer smarter fuel options to their customers and consumers want to purchase lower cost and more environmentally friendly fuel, but a lack of federal investment has prevented them from moving forward. This legislation would provide for the installation of new fuel pump infrastructure to deliver ethanol blends greater than 10 percent and biodiesel blends greater than 20 percent. This sorely needed federal investment in renewable fuel infrastructure will allow small businesses across the nation to provide cleaner, more affordable, and lower emission options to American drivers.
- Consumer and Fuel Retailer Choice Act (S.2339/H.R.4410): In 2019, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) finalized a rule to extend a Reid Vapor Pressure (RVP) volatility waiver to fuel blends with 15 percent ethanol (E15). The rule allowed for an open marketplace with more fuel options for consumers while encouraging competition and driving down fuel costs. E15 has been proven to lower evaporative and tailpipe emissions when compared to 10 percent ethanol fuel. Unfortunately, a July D.C. Circuit court ruling vacated EPA’s final rule. This legislation would make permanent the ability of retailers to sell E15 year-round.
- Low Carbon Biofuel Credit Act (S.2262/H.R.4254): Federal tax incentives – along with the Renewable Fuel Standard (RFS) – have been critical in the development of homegrown renewable fuels. This legislation would build upon previous renewable fuel tax incentives by establishing a low carbon fuel tax credit to incentivize ethanol blends of 15 percent or greater in the marketplace, which will reduce emissions, diversify our fuel supply, and provide for rural economic development.
- Clean Fuels Vehicle Act (S.2267): The ability of renewable fuels to decarbonize liquid transportation fuels has been constrained due to the fact that roughly 90 percent of the vehicles on the road today are legally approved to use only E15 or less. The production of flex fuel vehicles (FFVs) – vehicles capable of utilizing higher blends of ethanol like E85 – peaked in model year 2014 at 2.8 million vehicles and fell to just 716,000 for model year 2019. This legislation would incentivize Original Equipment Manufacturers (OEMs) to manufacture FFVs for the market by offering a $200 tax credit and restoring Corporate Average Fuel Economy (CAFE) credits for FFV production. The more renewable fuel that can be utilized in the light duty vehicle fleet, the lower the carbon emissions and better the air quality will be for all Americans.
- Biodiesel Tax Credit Extension Act (S.1806/H.R.3472): The domestic growth in production of biodiesel has been spurred through the biodiesel tax credit. After the 2019 extension of the credit, production grew more than 150 million gallons despite headwinds from coronavirus related market challenges. This legislation would extend the current federal biodiesel tax credit through 2025. The U.S. Department of Energy has noted that when used as a vehicle fuel, biodiesel offers considerable greenhouse gas emissions benefits, including a lifecycle analysis for 100 percent biodiesel (B100) that showed a 74 percent reduction in emissions as compared to petroleum diesel.
Finally, we also support enacting a long-term extension of the Second Generation Biofuel Producer Tax Credit (§40(B)), which expired in 2020. This $1.01 per gallon credit will help increase the production of advanced biofuels that cut carbon emissions between 70 and 126 percent.
We believe Congress can and should do more to ensure support for homegrown renewable fuels. We encourage you to include these provisions in the upcoming budget reconciliation package.
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Sep 2, 2021
The U.S. exported 51.64 million gallons of ethanol and 1.06 million metric tons of distillers grains in July, according to data released by the USDA Foreign Agricultural Service on Aug. 2. Exports of both products were down when compared to July 2020.
The 54.64 million gallons of ethanol exported in July was down significantly from both the 81.86 million gallons exported during the previous month and the 72.91 million gallons exported in July of last year.
The U.S. exported ethanol to more than 30 countries in July. Canada was the top destination for U.S. ethanol at 29.24 million gallons, followed by South Korea at 5.32 million gallons, and the Netherlands at 4.02 million gallons.
The value of U.S. ethanol exports was at $138.82 million in July, down from $189.11 million in June, but up from $129.47 million in July 2020.
Total U.S. ethanol exports for the first seven months of 2021 reached 715.86 million gallons at a value of $1.39 billion, compared to 788.55 million gallons at a value of $1.36 billion exported during the same period of last year.
The 1.06 million metric tons of distillers grains exported July was up from the 939,177 metric tons exported in June, but down slightly from the 1.08 million metric tons exported in July 2020.
The U.S. exported distillers grains to nearly three dozen countries in July. Mexico was the top destination at 247,511 metric tons, followed by Turkey at 151,738 metric tons and Vietnam at 151,499 metric tons.
The value of U.S. distillers grains exports reached $262.64 million in July, up from $248.55 million in June and $226.47 million in July of last year.
Total U.S. distillers grains exports for the first seven months of this year reached 6.49 million metric tons at a value of $1.69 billion, compared to 6.02 million metric tons at a value of $1.29 billion exported during the same period of 2020.
Additional data is available on the USDA FAS website.
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Aug 30, 2021
The USDA predicts fiscal year (FY) 2021 ethanol exports will be at $2.2 billion, down $60 million when compared to FY 2020. Moving into FY 2022, however, U.S. ethanol exports are expected to reach $2.4 billion, up $200 million from FY 2021.
The agency made those predictions in its latest quarterly trade forecast, released Aug. 26. Beginning with this latest quarterly trade forecast, the USDA said it is adopting the World Trade Organization’s definition of “agricultural products,” which adds ethanol, distilled spirits and other products to the agency’s previous definition of agricultural products.
According to the Aug. 26 export forecast, the USDA currently predicts U.S. ethanol exports for FY 2022 will reach $2.4 billion, up $200 million from FY 2021 on volume and unit value gains. The agency said higher expected corn prices keep ethanol unit values elevated. Modest volume gains are projected for many markets, as gasoline fuel markets continue to recover and demand for industrial ethanol grows with the economic recovery and continued elevated demand for disinfectants.
For FY 2022, the largest export gains for U.S. ethanol are expected for Brazil and the U.K. The USDA said an expected sharp sales increase to Brazil is supported by the recent drought and frost damage that lowered sugarcane yields, higher sugar prices, and ongoing fuel recovery demand. The U.K. is raising its fuel ethanol blend to E10 this fall, increasing their overall demand, the agency added. India’s push to meet its E20 by 2025 continues to expand the demand for industrial ethanol. Uncertainty persists on the future of fuel ethanol exports to China, according to the USDA. The agency also said that the proportion of U.S. ethanol exports used as fuel remains at a historically low 60 percent since the pandemic eroded gasoline use and spurred demand for disinfectants.
For FY 2021, the USDA predicts ethanol exports will be at $2.2 billion, down $60 million from the previous year with higher export unit values only partially offsetting lower export volume. U.S. exports of fuel ethanol to Brazil in FY 2021 have fallen to levels not seen in a decade, according to the agency. In addition, Colombia’s lower blend mandate has reduced imports from the U.S. Exports sales to Mexico and Nigeria are also down from FY 2020 records, following the earlier demand surge for medical-grade ethanol. U.S. industrial ethanol sales to India are lower due to higher U.S. prices and the substitution of surplus sugar supplies to ethanol. U.S. fuel ethanol exports to China reached their second-highest level on record due to low, early-year U.S. prices, according to the USDA. U.S. sales to Canada are up on fuel demand recovery, while sales to South Korea are up due to record demand for industrial product.
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Aug 25, 2021
Representatives of the ethanol industry called on the U.S. EPA to address high-octane, low-carbon fuels as part of its proposed greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions standards for 2023-2026 light-duty vehicles during a hearing held Aug. 25.
The EPA on Aug. 5 released a proposed rule to set light-duty vehicle GHG emission standards through 2026. Despite calls from government officials and industry trade groups, the proposed rule does not currently address biofuels or include a high-octane standard.
The proposed rule aims to revise the SAFE Vehicles Rule finalized by the Trump administration in March 2020. That rule replaced CAFE and GHG emissions standards put in place by the Obama administration. President Biden directed the EPA and U.S. Department of Transportation’s National Highway Traffic Safety Administration to revise the existing CAFE and GHG emission standards through an executive order issued in January 2021.
The proposed rule would set an industry-wide target of 171 grams of CO2 per mile, or a 52 miles per gallon (mpg) equivalent, for model year 2026 passenger cars and light trucks. That is more stringent than the 205 grams of CO2 per mile, or 43.3 mpg, standard put in place by the current SAFE rule. A previous rule put in place in 2012 would have set the standards at 177 grams of CO2 per mile, or 50.1 mpg.
The agency held a virtual hearing on the proposed rule on Aug. 25. Representatives of the American Coalition for Ethanol, Renewable Fuels Association and Growth Energy were among those to offer testimony at the event.
Testimony offered by Brian Jennings, CEO of ACE, emphasized how the proposal must place much greater emphasis on improving the quality of liquid fuel, which 98 percent of the 270 million light-duty vehicles on the road use, by including steps to replace fossil fuel with a lower carbon and higher octane fuel, such as ethanol, in order to significantly cut CO2 emissions from their tailpipes.
“If the overarching goal is net-zero emissions by mid-century, let’s start making progress right now by taking full advantage of the 15 billion gallons of domestically produced ethanol available today as an affordable way to boost octane and meaningfully reduce GHG emissions from gasoline powered engines,” Jennings remarks state.
Jennings testimony on behalf of ACE members concludes by highlighting three recommendations for EPA’s consideration in the final rule that ACE will detail, along with others, in its submitted comments. Those recommendations include the establishment of a research octane number (RON) rating for fuel in the range of 98 to 100 RON with 25 to 30 percent ethanol and provide automakers with a corresponding cert fuel for engine testing purposes; adoption of the latest U.S. Department of Energy GREET model with respect to the lifecycle GHG emissions of ethanol and other transportation fuels; and the establishment of a technology-neutral approach that provides automakers with incentives to produce flexible fuel vehicles (FFVs) and vehicles designed to achieve optimal efficiency and reduced emissions on high octane ethanol blends.
Testimony offered by Geoff Cooper, president and CEO of the RFA, also focused on the inclusion of high-octane, low-carbon fuels. “If our nation is to reach its goal of net-zero GHG emissions by mid-century, we’ll need both cleaner, more efficient cars and cleaner, more efficient fuels,” Cooper said in prepared remarks. “That’s why RFA’s member companies recently committed to achieving a net-zero carbon footprint by 2050 or sooner.”
RFA expressed its disappointment that EPA’s proposed GHG standards continue to focus solely on engines and vehicles, while ignoring the important influence of fuels on emissions and mileage.
“Unfortunately, EPA’s proposal fails to recognize that the fuels we put into our engines can have as much—or more—impact on fuel economy and GHG emissions as the engine technologies themselves,” Cooper said, noting that the proposal assumes automakers will increase production of certain engine technologies that rely on higher-octane fuels. “The proposed rule counts on broad deployment of high-compression ratio engines that will require high-octane fuel but does nothing to ensure those high-octane fuels will actually be produced and available in the marketplace.”
Cooper concluded by calling on EPA to use the current rulemaking, as well as the upcoming process to set GHG standards for 2027 and beyond, to create a higher octane standard for gasoline.
“Action by the EPA will be necessary to catalyze the development and introduction of cleaner, more efficient fuels into the marketplace, just as EPA action was required to eliminate lead, limit benzene, and reduce the sulfur content of our gasoline and diesel fuel,” Cooper added. “We respectfully ask that EPA use the current rulemaking process and future rulemakings to establish the roadmap for increasing the required minimum octane rating of our nation’s light-duty vehicle fuel.”
Chris Bliley, senior vice president of regulatory affairs at Growth Energy, urged EPA to consider the vital role that environmentally sustainable fuel options, such as ethanol, will play in reducing GHG emissions from the current and future vehicle fleet in his testimony.
“We appreciate EPA’s work to reshape the nation’s transportation mix to make it more sustainable as it is a central driver for our industry as well,” Bliley said. “Vehicles and fuels operate as a system and liquid fuels will continue to play a dominant role in the transportation sector for decades to come, even as alternative technologies flourish. As such, it is imperative to consider the vital role that environmentally sustainable fuel options such as ethanol will play in reducing greenhouse gas emissions from the current and future vehicle fleet.”
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Aug 12, 2021
As policymakers in South Korea and Japan consider new emission reduction initiatives, the U.S. Grains Council (USGC) is working to demonstrate the carbon-reduction benefits of blending ethanol into local fuel supplies.
South Korea announced a goal last fall of achieving carbon neutrality by 2050. Since then, the Korean public and private sectors have been preparing scenarios and implementation measures for carbon reduction. In May 2021, a Carbon Neutrality Committee was launched to establish the 2050 Carbon Neutrality policy measures and, in the future, play a role in setting carbon neutrality policies.
Haksoo Kim, USGC director in South Korea, has been reaching out to stakeholders to offer information on ethanol’s contributions to these goals. He has spoken at events hosted by the Korea Biofuel Forum and the Transportation Sector Working Group of the Carbon Neutrality Committee, where he focused on the importance of a renewable fuel standard (RFS) in achieving 2050 carbon neutrality in South Korea.
“This year is the best time to create an environment for expanding ethanol use by persuading the government to introduce a fuel ethanol renewable fuel standard (RFS) to offer carbon benefits,” Kim said.
USGC will also co-host the Climate Crisis and Biofuel Symposium on Sept. 8 and will have a booth at the Seoul International Motor Show from Nov. 16 to Dec. 5.
South Korea, a major importer of U.S. grains and grain products, imported 81 million gallons of U.S. ethanol in 2020, mostly for industrial uses including sanitizer products and windshield washer liquid.
Like South Korea, ethanol is a major focus for the Council in Japan, another critical trading partner for the U.S. grains sector.
Japan’s strategic energy plan is being revised this summer, and policies are also in development to lead the country to carbon neutrality by 2050. Direct blending of ethanol presents an immediate opportunity for Japan to further reduce transport emissions under these policies.
Japan does not currently blend ethanol directly, instead relying on pre-blended ethanol in the form of ethyl tertiary-butyl ether (ETBE), reducing 712,000 tons of CO2 emission per year. Japan has an average blend rate of just 1.9 percent; direct blending at an E10 level would immediately expand CO2 emission reductions by five times.
The total potential U.S. market share today in Japan for ethanol is up to 66 percent of the estimated demand of 217 million gallons of ethanol used to make ETBE, equal to 142 million gallons per year.
“It’s important to make Japan aware of the benefits of bioethanol in reducing carbon emissions in the transportation sector, which is a focus of our work daily,” said Tommy Hamamoto, USGC director in Japan.
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Aug 21, 2021
After suffering through more than a year of quarantines, stay-at-home orders, and travel lockdowns, millions of Americans have eagerly returned to the nation’s highways this summer for long-awaited vacations and road trips. As a result, gasoline demand has surged to record highsand pump prices are at levels not seen since 2014.
In recent weeks, regular-grade gas prices averaged $3.17 per gallon, up almost 50 percent from the same time last year. With higher fuel prices threatening to undermine the nation’s ongoing economic recovery, it’s easy to see why the Biden administration is looking for ways to ease America’s pain at the pump.
But what’s not easy to see is why the White House recently chose to respond to higher pump prices bypushing OPEC+ countries to increase oil production. It was a baffling move that raised eyebrows across the political spectrum. After all, calling on countries like Saudi Arabia and Russia to boost their output of dirty, high-carbon crude oil obviously runs counter to the president’s stated goals regarding climate change, clean energy, domestic job creation and energy security.
At the same time, the administration’s ambitious electric vehicle goals are taking a hit due to geopolitical instability and uncertainty regarding the availability of minerals needed for electric vehicle batteries. The rapid fall of Afghanistan to the Taliban regime threatens to hand one of the world’s largest deposits of lithium— the most crucial mineral for batteries — over to Russiaand China, which already dominates the world market for rare earth metals. Indeed, the Pentagon once warned that Afghanistan could become the "Saudi Arabia of lithium.”
Before the Biden administration looks to OPEC+ countries or mineral-rich nations like Afghanistan, China and Bolivia for help, it has an opportunity to turn to America’s heartland for a homegrown solution. Renewable fuels like ethanol have a 40-year proven track record of success in helping to lower prices at the pump while simultaneously reducing carbon emissions, supporting good-paying clean energy jobsand curtailing crude oil imports.
Four decades’ worth of investment and innovation by ethanol producers has resulted in real breakthroughs in lower-carbon transportation fuels. Today’s corn-based ethanol reduces carbon emissions by 52 percent when compared directly to gasoline, according to a recent studyfrom the Department of Energy’s Argonne National Laboratory. Another studyby scientists from Harvard University, Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) and Tufts University similarly shows corn ethanol achieves an average carbon reduction of 46 percent compared to gasoline, with some ethanol in the market today achieving a 61 percent carbon reduction.
In response to policies like the Renewable Fuel Standard (RFS), California Low Carbon Fuel Standard, and Oregon Clean Fuels Program, along with the Biden administration’s recommitment to the Paris Agreement, the pace of low-carbon innovation and investment is accelerating. We firmly believe ethanol will achieve a net-zero carbon footprint in the years ahead, as the supply chain adopts carbon capture and sequestration technologies, uses more renewable electricity and biogas to power biorefineries, and expands carbon-efficient feedstock production. In fact, the members of my organization sent a letterto President Bidenin July pledging to ensure that ethanol is a fully carbon-neutral fuel source by 2050 or sooner.
For this vision to become a reality, our industry is looking to the Biden administration and Congress to take action that drives further innovation and creates certainty in the biofuels marketplace. The first step should be enforcing robust RFS volumes and resisting presurefrom oil refiners to waive biofuel blending requirements or push their blending obligations off on retail gas station owners. In addition, Congress and the administration should support the development of a national clean fuel standard, as well as provisions to expand ethanol infrastructure and production of flex-fuel vehicles that can operate on fuels containing up to 85 percent ethanol.
Before we turn to the Persian Gulf for answers to our nation’s energy and climate challenges, let’s give the American heartland a shot. The solution to high pump prices and decarbonization lies in the farm fields of Minnesota, Wisconsin, Iowa and other Midwest states — not in the oil fields of Iraq, Saudi Arabia, and other Middle East nations.
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Aug 11, 2021
If the global priority with regards to the transportation sector is to reduce carbon emissions, then putting all our eggs in one basket and waiting for electrification to transform the world is already a failed strategy. With nearly 1.5 billion vehicles in the world, and with more than 90 million new vehicles sold annually (*nonpandemic years, of course), it is impossible to envision a transition to relying on only battery electric vehicles (BEV) any time soon, no matter what governments may try to do in terms of sales requirements. So, what should be done regarding the existing and continuing combustion engine-liquid fuels market? To find viable solutions—and we certainly can—we must adopt a broader perspective, be open to options and think about engines and fuels as a system.
Relevant to this topic is our musical feature of the month: Willie Nelson. The song “On the Road Again” plays well with some of the recurring themes found in this column, but the primary importance is found with Willie himself, a strong advocate for the use of biofuels who even established a brand of biodiesel called “BioWillie.” His support for the fuel was based upon personal experience with its performance but also his interest in supporting farmers and reducing America’s reliance on foreign oil.
There are options to improve the emissions profile and lower the carbon impact of traditional powertrains by evaluating engines and fuels from a systemic perspective. One of the most developed efforts in this context involves high compression engines and higher-octane fuel. The U.S. Department of Energy’s Co-Optimization of Fuels and Engines initiative has done great work evaluating what might be possible and how fuel enabling more efficient engine design could be produced.
In addition to what Co-Optima has produced, the Fuels Institute published two reports on octane evaluating its role in engine performance and what it would take to introduce a new high-octane fuel into the market to support advanced engine design. Short story: It would take about 20 years and cost quite bit of money to transition the entire market. But the idea of maximizing fuel properties to improve the efficiency of engines is the right approach, and the results of the Co-Optima research provide some valuable insights into possibilities.
The octane discussion continues, and there are opportunities to be exploited.
BIOWILLIE AND FRIENDS
We have been blending biofuels into petroleum products for decades, and there could be opportunities to leverage that experience to reduce the overall carbon intensity of our fuel, thereby having an immediate impact on carbon emissions from existing and future combustion engine vehicles.
According to the California Air Resources Board (CARB), biofuels already provide a lower carbon footprint than hydrocarbon fuels and are projected to improve over time as energy inputs for producing the fuels becomes greener. Compared with California-specification gasoline, starch ethanol (i.e., produced from corn) is 28% less carbon intense and is projected to reach 55% reduction by 2040. Meanwhile, biomass-based diesel (both biodiesel and renewable diesel) is 70% less carbon intense. These are fuels currently available throughout the market with decades of user experience.
While there are some compatibility issues associated with increasing the use of biofuels, these can be overcome on a shorter time frame than will be required to convert the fleet to BEVs. And, according to a study currently under development by the Fuels Institute (slated for release this summer), there are business opportunities associated with the retail of biofuel blends.
The benefits of incorporating more biofuel blends into the market can be enhanced if we apply the systems approach mentioned above. Not all vehicles are manufactured to run on all the biofuel blends that can be brought to market, but if there were a strategy in place in which new combustion engines were designed to take advantage of the performance properties of biofuels, then new markets could develop.
LESSONS FROM THE HIGHWAYMEN
Willie Nelson was a great solo act, but he also found success by joining with Johnny Cash, Waylon Jennings and Kris Kristofferson to form the Highwaymen—a country music supergroup. I think our policymakers can learn a lot from this example of bringing together the best of the best to create something even better—let’s combine the best options available to us to reduce emissions.
I believe the next couple of years represent a unique opportunity to consider the future of federal biofuels policies. The statutory volumetric standards of the Renewable Fuel Standard extend only through 2022, at which point the Environmental Protection Agency will be fully responsible for setting requirements. There are many who believe the program needs to be reconsidered by Congress, and some are suggest that California’s Low Carbon Fuel Standard should be reviewed as a possible model. I have no idea how these discussions will play out, but the data suggest a robust biofuels policy could be a significant contributor to the overall objectives of lowering our carbon emissions.
In the shadow of all the attention being given to electrification, it is my hope that policy discussions will incorporate the many ideas that exist and do not ignore the continuous role of the dominant transportation energy source in the world—liquid fuels.
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