Biofuels Group: Big Oil Also behind Ethanol Waiver Requests
by Zack Coleman (The Hill/E2Wire) …Monte Shaw, executive director with the Iowa Renewable Fuels Association, credits the uptick in gubernatorial and congressional interest to oil groups viewing 2013 as the last chance to nix the RFS before it forces them to change business practices.
“2013 is the last chance to dismantle the RFS before it actually does something, so that means the 2012 election is very important, so they’re doing a lot of things to set it up,” Shaw said. “When the waiver’s denied, and it will be, you will see statements to the effect of, ‘Oh, we couldn’t even get this changed during a drought.’ ”
In 2014, refiners will be required to blend 14.4 billion gallons of corn-based ethanol into traditional transportation fuel. Given corn supply shortages and depressed gasoline consumption, Shaw said refiners will likely exhaust corn ethanol refining credits to meet RFS obligations this year and next.
Shaw said that means refiners in 2014 will need to produce gasoline with a higher ethanol content, pay fines or hope other refiners overproduce that fuel and buy credits from them. All those would “break petroleum’s monopoly,” he said. READ MORE
