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Jul 16, 2015
The American Soybean Association (ASA) urges all members and stakeholders to submit comments on the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency's (EPA) Proposed Rule for the Renewable Fuel Standard (RFS) before July 27, 2015. The background information is below and a draft template is provided for your use. ASA encourages growers to personalize and tailor the comments, if possible.
To submit comments: www.regulations.gov Docket No. EPA-HQ-OAR-2015-0111
Background The U.S. EPA issued a Proposed Rule to establish the volume requirements for the Renewable Fuel Standard (RFS), including the volume requirements for biomass-based diesel for 2014, 2015, 2016, and 2017. EPA proposed setting the biomass-based diesel volumes at the following levels:
The volumes proposed by EPA are certainly an improvement over the previous proposal, which would have set the Biomass-based Diesel requirements at 1.28 billion gallons for 2014 and 2015. The increases proposed by EPA will provide some benefit and certainty to the domestic biodiesel industry and to soybean growers who supply much of the feedstock. However, ASA believes the EPA and the Obama Administration could do more to capitalize on additional benefits that could be achieved with more robust biomass-based diesel volumes. Specifically, ASA and the biodiesel industry are urging that EPA reconsider the biodiesel standards in the Proposed Rule and finalize stronger standards for 2016 and 2017. The biodiesel industry has previously requested volumes of 2.4 billion gallons in 2016 and 2.7 billion gallons in 2017. While those volumes are readily achievable and sustainable, at a minimum EPA should set the standards at not less than 2 billion gallons for 2016 and 2.3 billion gallons for 2017.
The deadline for submitting comments is July 27, 2015. Comments can be submitted through www.regulations.gov.
For ASA's comments to EPA, please click here. Thank you for your work on this issue. ASA will keep you updated in the coming weeks.
