Interest Groups Flood EPA with Comments on Tailpipe Rules DEADLINE July 5, 2023

by Mike Lee (Politico Climatewire) Observers say the avalanche of responses is a precursor to months of heated debate over the future of U.S. transportation. -- Special interest groups have a lot to say about EPA's plans to cut tailpipe emissions.

EPA has received tens of thousands of comments in the two months since the agency proposed two rules — one for cars, the other for trucks — that are designed to cut greenhouse gas emissions from the transportation sector. Observers say the avalanche of responses is a precursor to months of heated debate over the future of U.S. transportation.

The public comment period for the truck rule closed Friday. The public comment period for the car rule is scheduled to close July 5. EPA expects to finalize both regulations by the end of the year.

The two proposed rules, released on the same day in April, would set strict enough limits on tailpipe pollution that manufacturers would be compelled to more quickly shift their production away from vehicles that run on fossil fuels and toward those that are powered by batteries, fuel cells and other cleaner systems. READ MORE

Excerpt from Reuters: The trade group representing nearly all major automakers wants the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency to soften its proposal to sharply cut vehicle emissions through 2032 saying it is "neither reasonable nor achievable."

The Alliance for Automotive Innovation, which represents General Motors (GM.N), Volkswagen (VOWG_p.DE), Toyota Motor (7203.T), Hyundai Motor (005380.KS) and others recommended "adopting requirements for 40 to 50% (electric, plug-in electric and fuel vehicles) in 2030 with continued increases through 2032."

The group called the proposal a "de facto battery electric vehicle mandate." The automaker group noted EVs represented about 6% of new light-duty vehicles sales in 2022.

Environmentalists are pressing the Biden administration not to soften the proposal and many are running advertising on social media websites in favor of the EPA plan. Some say the EPA should have proposed tougher rules.

The automaker group sought major changes and argued it should align with President Joe Biden's August 2021 executive order that set a target of 50% of vehicles by 2030 as EVs or plug-in hybrids.

Major automakers in 2021 agreed to a goal of producing between 40% and 50% EVs or plug-in electric hybrids by 2030.

"EPA’s standards cannot be met without substantially increasing the cost of all vehicles, reducing consumer choice and disadvantaging major portions of the U.S. population and territory," said the group representing nearly all major automakers except Tesla.

Alliance CEO John Bozzella said in a blog post the EV rules "are out of whack" and suggested "the 60+ percent BEVs by 2030 plan, on the other hand, is a house of cards... It rolls up rosy forecasts (like EV batteries will eventually cost automakers nothing) and other hopeful assumptions."

The group said the EPA proposal "substantially underestimates the cost of batteries while overestimating the availability of consumer and manufacturing tax credits." READ MORE

Excerpt from Brownfield Ag News: American Coalition for Ethanol CEO Brian Jennings says the agency’s plan to require battery electric vehicles by 2032 is seriously misguided.

“It’s unachievable, and it’s not going to do a whole lot to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. So they need to fix their proposal and make sure that it’s a technology-neutral approach that leaves room for other low-cost, low-carbon alternatives such as renewable fuels like ethanol.”

Renewable Fuels Association CEO Geoff Cooper tells Brownfield groups representing biofuels, agriculture, petroleum manufacturers, automakers, and consumers are expressing concern with EPA’s proposal.

“So we hope that makes an impact and we hope it causes EPA to take a big step back from this proposal, go back to the drawing board, and figure out the right way to reduce emissions from transportation.”

Jennings tells Brownfield E15 and E-85 have been proven to significantly reduce greenhouse gas emissions compared to gasoline, and he suggests it’s not feasible to convert the entire transportation sector to electric in such a dramatically quick timeframe.

“Just trying to inject some common sense into the EPA line of thinking about how they’re going to transition vehicles in the future.”

Growth Energy CEO Emily Skor calls the proposal unnecessarily narrow and says EPA is ignoring the proven, available, and American-made solution of emission-reducing biofuel.

National Corn Growers Association president Tom Haag says EPA’s proposed rule picks winners and losers in the energy sector and places ethanol on the losing side.

It is a little late to complain about EPA. Once EPA gets comments on a proposed rule, EPA doesn’t change course. The problem started over 10 years ago when EPA set out using manipulated test fuels to model ethanol worse for vehicle tailpipe emissions. EPA’s MOVES model has ethanol raising emissions to include ozone. This is not correct but the ethanol industry is not standing up to EPA and calling them out for letting the oil industry manipulate their models. If EPA believes ethanol is worse, do we really expect EPA to create favorable policy? READ MORE; includes AUDIO