EPA Rule Would ‘Kill Off’ Corn Ethanol: Peterson

An Environmental Protection Agency plan for measuring a biofuel’s effects on land cultivation would “kill off” U.S. corn-based ethanol, according to House Agriculture Committee Chairman Collin Peterson.

The proposed methods to gauge greenhouse-gas emissions, part of the EPA’s implementation of a 2007 energy law, are based on “ideology” and aren’t reliable enough to craft policy, Peterson told reporters today outside a congressional hearing in Washington. He said the EPA plan is prompting him to oppose any climate-change legislation that Congress may consider.

“You can’t trust them,” the Minnesota Democrat said of the agency, which would write rules under any bill that would be passed. “I no longer have any confidence in the EPA.”

An initial EPA review released yesterday found that certain methods of corn-based ethanol production don’t meet a requirement to emit 20 percent less greenhouse gas than gasoline. The average was 16 percent less, EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson said.

Still, certain production methods could meet the law’s requirements, she said. The agency is seeking public and scientific comment on its proposal during the next 60 days. In the U.S., corn is the primary source of ethanol, a gasoline additive.

Industry Concern

The EPA proposal has generated concern among ethanol lobbyists, including the Renewable Fuels Association, which says restrictive rule-making may discourage investment in the biofuel. The Washington-based group represents ethanol producers including Archer Daniels Midland Co., the country’s second- largest.

The RFA praised other parts of the plan the Obama administration laid out yesterday to increase production of renewable fuels, including spending almost $2 billion to encourage more production of advanced biofuels made from sources other than corn.

Lawmakers at today’s hearing, called to review the EPA’s proposal, expressed frustration with the agency and with the U.S. Department of Agriculture, which helped develop the plan. They criticized the decision to include land-use considerations in measuring emissions and said they haven’t had enough time to examine it properly.

‘Novel Methodology’

“We’re not getting a look about how you came upon this very novel methodology,” Republican Representative Robert Goodlatte of Virginia told Margo Oge, an EPA air-quality director. “The process is very accelerated and is not giving people a chance to see what you’re doing.”

Oge told lawmakers current corn-ethanol plants and ones under construction would be exempt from the new rule, reducing the impact on the industry. Those facilities alone would be able to produce the 15 billion gallons a year of corn-based ethanol Congress has called for by 2022, under the Renewable-Fuels Standard passed in 2007, she said.

The legislation quadrupled the requirement for blending ethanol and other biofuels into gasoline supplies, to 36 billion gallons by 2022. Cellulosic ethanol, made from switchgrass, wood chips and agricultural waste such as corn cobs, is slated to account for 20 billion gallons of that amount. The country must use 10.5 billion gallons of renewable fuels such as ethanol this year.

The rising ethanol mandate means that as much as 35 percent of the U.S. corn crop may be used for the fuel for the next decade, the USDA said in February.

Biodiesel Producers

Producers of soy-based biodiesel are concerned that the EPA plan may exclude their fuel from quotas mandated by Congress because it fails to meet emissions standards, while animal fats and restaurant grease are acceptable as diesel sources. The proposed rule would devastate the industry, said Manning Feraci, the vice president of federal affairs for the National Biodiesel Board in Jefferson City, Missouri.

“Biodiesel producers find themselves in the midst of a severe economic crisis,” he said at the hearing.

Peterson’s opposition increases fissures among House Democrats over a proposal to cut U.S. greenhouse-gas emissions.

In his February budget proposal, President Barack Obama said the federal government should auction billions of dollars worth of carbon-dioxide permits that would be created under a “cap-and-trade” program.

House Energy and Commerce Committee Chairman Henry Waxman last month unveiled a plan that did not say how many permits should be auctioned. A number of Democrats on the committee have been pushing Waxman to give away a large share of the permits rather than sell them at auction.

Waxman, a California Democrat, has set a Memorial Day deadline for the committee to finish work on a carbon cap-and- trade bill. The U.S. holiday will be celebrated this year on May 25.

source: truthabouttrade.org