EPA Official: 2014 RFS in Spring

STREATOR, Ill. (DTN) -- The Environmental Protection Agency will release, at a minimum, the 2014 Renewable Fuel Standard mandate sometime this spring, according to an agency official.

The statement was reportedly made this week by Paul Argyopoulos, senior policy adviser in the EPA's Office of Transportation and Air Quality -- the division that oversees the RFS -- during the National Biodiesel Board conference this week in Fort Worth, Texas.

A spokesperson for the EPA confirmed Argyopoulos' comments Wednesday afternoon with DTN, but declined to release any more detail.

"That timing does track with recent statements our senior officials have made," the EPA spokesperson said.

The language expanding the RFS in 2007, found in the Energy Independence and Security Act, increases the demand mandate for renewable fuels each year through 2022. However, the EPA proposed but never finalized the renewable volume obligations (RVO) for 2014.

Facing "blend wall" issues in expanding the market for ethanol within the gasoline pool, in November 2013 the EPA proposed a reduction in the mandate for 2014 from the statute requirement of 18.1 billion gallons to a 15.0 billion to 15.52 billion gallon range. After lobbying and a review process of public comments on their proposal, EPA said last November it would not mandate a RVO for 2014 that year, instead planning to address 2014, 2015 and 2016 RVOs this year. By statute, the RVO must be finalized by Nov. 30 of the prior year.

The largest proposed cut in the 2014 RFS was for the D6 renewable fuel nested category from 14.4 billion gallons stated by statute to 13.0 billion gallons, which would be the first reduction in this category, primarily satisfied with corn-based ethanol. Actual production in the D6 category last year totaled 12.915 billion gallons.

The EPA also proposed an adjustment to this year's volume requirement for D3 cellulosic biofuel from 17 million gallons to between 8 million and 30 million gallons. Actual cellulosic biofuel produced in 2014 was 32.970 million gallons.

EPA proposed a range between 2.0 billion and 2.51 billion gallons for D5 advanced biofuels compared with statue volume of 2.2 billion gallons. D5 gallons produced in 2014 totaled 131.082 million gallons.

The D5 nested category includes D3 and D4 blending volume, with D4 representing biomass-based diesel.

The EPA proposal left unchanged at 1.28 billion gallons this year's D4 biomass-based diesel volume mandate, which is above the statute's 1.0-billion-gallon requirement. Actual production of biomass-based diesel meeting the D4 qualification in 2014 was 1.751 billion gallons.

Myke Feinman can be reached at myke.feinman@dtn.com

(BM/AG)

Copyright 2015 DTN/The Progressive Farmer. All rights reserved.