The Environmental Protection Agency receives nine more petitions from oil refiners to waive the Renewable Fuel Standard.
This brings the total to 98, including 67 which are retroactive. The ethanol industry has made appeals to President Trump, but Growth Energy CEO Emily Skor says that the EPA is sitting idle and shrugging the pleas aside.
“They’re going to delay decisions so they don’t have to deal with the politics of the decision. The unfortunate thing is that it’s further uncertainty for this ethanol market place at a time when we need this to end,” Skor states. “We need certainty. We need to get back onto a road to recovery.”
Noting the renewable fuel’s significance in farm country, Skor calls the ethanol industry “the economic engine for rural America”.
Dept. of Energy recommends granting biofuel waivers.