WASHINGTON, DC, July 23, 2008 (ENS) – In April, Texas Governor Rick Perry requested a 50 percent waiver from the grain-based Renewable Fuels Standard mandated under the Energy Independence and Security Act of 2007, enacted last December. The governor says corn prices are soaring because of the demand for corn to make ethanol, which also raises prices for meat, milk and other food products.

“We appreciate the good intentions behind the push for renewable fuels. In fact we’re diversifying our state’s energy portfolio at a rapid rate, but this misguided mandate is significantly affecting Texans’ family food bill,” said Governor Perry in April when he made his initial request for a waiver. “There are multiple factors contributing to our skyrocketing grocery prices, but a waiver of RFS levels is the best, quickest way to reduce those costs before permanent damage is done.”[img]/UPLOADS/blog/ecommunity_news/blogpost_data/08_07_21/20080723_093large_e85.jpg]

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency was scheduled to issue its decision on the waiver by July 24, but on Tuesday EPA Administrator Stephen Johnson said the decision would be delayed until August.

“Given the amount of work that remains to sufficiently answer the Texas request for a waiver from the Renewable Fuels Standard, it is now clear that a final decision on the request will not be completed by July 24,” said Johnson.

“Shortly after receiving the waiver request, EPA initiated a public comment during which the agency received over 15,000 comments and a number of these comments raised substantive issues and included significant economic analysis,” he said. “I believe it is very important to take sufficient time to review and understand these comments in order to make an informed decision.”

“Additional time is needed to allow staff to adequately respond to the public comments and develop a decision document that explains the technical, economic and legal rationale of our decision,” Johnson said.

The EPA is also required to consult with the Departments of Agriculture and Energy in considering whether to grant or deny the waiver request and has begun these consultations, the administrator explained.

“The process remains fair and open and no agreements have been made with any party in regard to the substance and timing of the decision on the waiver request,” he said. “I am confident that I will be able to make a final determination on the Texas waiver request in early August.”

Governor Perry said Tuesday, “I appreciate the diligent approach Administrator Johnson and his staff are taking in addressing our waiver request and the 15,000-plus comments they have received on this issue.

“We still believe the solution to the unintended consequence of this federal RFS mandate is simple: a one-year, 50 percent waiver,” the governor said.

“The RFS waiver is an essential step toward decreasing the devastating statewide, national and international impact of skyrocketing feed and food costs,” he said.

Corn prices rose 138 percent globally over the last three years and global food prices increased 83 percent over the same time period. “With the implementation of the new RFS mandate, some estimates predict corn prices will rise to $8.00/bushel for the 2008 crop, resulting in a negative impact of $3.59 billion to the state,” the governor said.

National Biodiesel Board Chief Executive Officer Joe Jobe said it is important to remember that all renewable fuels qualify for the Renewable Fuels Standard, not just ethanol.

“If the RFS is waived or cut in half in 2008, then the growth of all biofuels, including ‘advanced biofuels’ such as biodiesel, will be severely hindered,” Jobe warned.

“As Governor Perry himself pointed out just last month, alternative fuels such as biodiesel play in an important role in ‘diversifying not only our energy portfolio, but our economic landscape,’” Jobe said.

“Beyond the environmental and energy security benefits provided by biofuels,” he said, “the opportunity for green jobs and the continued economic development of biodiesel refineries in Texas must be taken into account by the EPA when evaluating whether to waive the RFS.”

“While a delay is understandable considering the complexity of the issue before them, we urge the EPA to ultimately reject the waiver request. Gov. Perry had it right when he praised biodiesel for ‘providing a necessary alternative to fossil fuels without negatively impacting our food supply.’”

The Renewable Fuels Association, which represents the ethanol industry, says reducing the use of ethanol will not bring down grain prices for livestock producers and food processors in Texas.

“But eliminating 4.5 billion gallons of fuel from the marketplace – as the 50 percent waiver of the Renewable Fuels Standard sought by Governor Perry would do – will increase gasoline and diesel prices even more. While this may benefit Texas oil companies, it will certainly hurt consumers in Texas and the rest of the country,” the organization said.

A recent study by Texas A&M University requested by Governor Perry’s office found that, “Relaxing the RFS does not result in significantly lower corn prices.”

The waiver request may actually have the opposite effect on corn prices, said National Corn Growers Association President President Ron Litterer. “This waiver request could potentially send a signal to the corn market that demand from the ethanol sector is not a sure thing. The response from farmers could be fewer planted acres of corn and higher corn prices.”

The Texas A&M study also found that “corn prices have had little to do with rising food costs.” This finding is bolstered by recent studies by the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Economic Research Service, Kansas City Federal Reserve, and other third parties.

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WASHINGTON, DC, December 19, 2007 (ENS) – The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, EPA, has denied California’s request to impose greenhouse gas emissions limits on motor vehicles. It is the first time the EPA has ever denied a waiver request under the Clean Air Act, and California officials are already preparing their lawsuit.

California sought a waiver of federal standards as the state is entitled to do under the Clean Air Act so that the state could adopt stricter standards.

California’s law requires a 30 percent reduction in greenhouse gas emissions standards from motor vehicles by 2016, while the federal government does not regulate greenhouse gas emissions at all.

The denial will trigger a lawsuit against the EPA, said California Attorney General Edmund G. Brown Jr. today.

“There is absolutely no legal justification for the Bush administration to deny this request,” he said. “Governor [Arnold] Schwarzenegger and I are preparing to sue at the earliest possible moment.”

Sixteen other states – Arizona, Colorado, Connecticut, Florida, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, New Jersey, New Mexico, New York, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, Utah, Vermont, Washington – have adopted, or are in the process of adopting California’s emissions standards. Approval of California’s waiver would have meant that other states get approval automatically.

Traffic jam in
Los Angeles, California
(Photo credit unknown)

In rejecting California’s request, EPA Administrator Stephen Johnson said the energy bill signed into law by President Bush today is “a national solution” that is better than a “confusing patchwork of state rules – to reduce America’s climate footprint from vehicles.”

But the Energy Independence and Security Act does not regulate greenhouse gas emissions, although it does mandate a fuel economy standard of 35 miles per gallon in the year 2020.

The two policies differ in that the California Clean Cars Program would begin with model year 2009, a decade before the 35 miles per gallon standard in the energy bill kicks in.

“It is completely absurd to assert that California does not have a compelling need to fight global warming by curbing greenhouse gas emissions from cars,” said Brown.

State and local clean air officials today decried EPA’s denial of California’s request for a waiver. Executive Director of the National Association of Clean Air Agencies Bill Becker said, “By refusing to grant California’s waiver request for its new motor vehicle standards to control greenhouse gas emissions, the Administration has ignored the clear and very limited statutory criteria upon which this decision was to be based. Instead, it has issued a verdict that is legally and technically unjustified and indefensible.”

Environmentalists are angry. Fred Krupp, president of the nonprofit Environmental Defense, called the denial “outrageous.”

“Doing nothing about global warming is bad enough – but going out of your way to block the leaders who are trying to solve this is an outrage,” said Krupp, adding that he will be working “with the rest of the environmental community to explore all legal avenues to fight this decision.”

The nonprofit Environment California said the EPA “has chosen to ignore the science behind global warming and the Clean Air Act and bowed to political pressure from automobile industry and their friends in the White House.”

“While President Bush signed into law fuel economy standards today, the two policies are not comparable with regards to global warming pollution reductions by 2020,” Environment California said in a statement.

Burning gasoline emits
greenhouse gases that
contribute to global warming.
(Photo credit unknown)

“In fact, California will emit three times more global warming pollution per year by 2020 under the fuel economy standards signed into law today by President Bush, than it would have under the Clean Cars Program had the waiver been granted,” the organization said.

David Doniger, Climate Center policy director with the Natural Resources Defense Council, said denial of the waiver will be damaging to the climate.

“The California standards are the single most effective step yet taken in the United States to curb global warming,” he said. “By blocking the California standards, the administration has stuck a thumb in the eye of governors from both red and blue states who have led the way on global warming by adopting these landmark rules.”

“Their right to do so has been affirmed by three federal court decisions this year, including the Supreme Court’s landmark ruling that carbon dioxide is an air pollutant, just like any other,” Doniger said. “The new energy law signed by the president today explicitly preserves this Clean Air Act authority.”

EPA Administrator Johnson argues that California’s current waiver request is “distinct from all prior requests” because previous requests “covered pollutants that predominantly impacted local and regional air quality. Greenhouse gases are fundamentally global in nature,” said Johnson.

“These gases contribute to the challenge of global climate change affecting every state in the union,” Johnson said. “Therefore, according to the criteria in section 209 of the Clean Air Act, EPA did not find that separate California standards are needed to “meet compelling and extraordinary conditions.”

But Attorney General Brown argues that California does face compelling and extraordinary conditions.

There are 32 million registered vehicles in California, twice the number of any other state and cars generate 20 percent of all human-made carbon dioxide emissions in the United States, and at least 30 percent of such emissions in California,” Brown said.

“If California’s landmark global warming law – and the corresponding 30 percent improvement in emissions standards – were adopted nationally,” he said, “the United States could cut annual oil imports by $100 billion dollars, at $50 per barrel.” Today, the price of oil hovers around $90 per barrel.

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