On Friday eve, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit struck down three Small Refinery Exemptions (SREs) improperly issued by EPA. The court ruling is the result of a May 2018 challenge brought by the Renewable Fuels Association, the National Corn Growers Association, the American Coalition for Ethanol and National Farmers Union. Procedurally, the 10^th Circuit immediately vacated the three SREs in question. However, any SRE issued by EPA inconsistent with the opinion is vulnerable to legal challenge, as Reuters pointed out this morning

See: Court decision casts doubt on dozens of U.S. refinery biofuel waivers

Congress passed and President Trump signed legislation extending numerous biofuel tax provisions, including the Second Generation Biofuels Producer Tax Credit (PTC) and the Biodiesel Blender’s Credit. Click: here.

ABBC Executive Director Brooke Coleman testified today before the House Science Subcommittee on Energy. Full coverage of the hearing can be found here:

THE NEXT MILE: TECHNOLOGY PATHWAYS TO ACCELERATE SUSTAINABILITY WITHIN THE TRANSPORTATION SECTOR

Clariant announced today that it has conducted tests on approximately 30 tons of miscanthus provided by INA, Croatia’s leading oil and gas company. Using sunliquid® technology, the consortium successfully converted miscanthus biomass into lignocellulosic sugars and ethanol at its pre-commercial scale facility bases in Straubing, Germany. Please find the full media release media release click here on the testing, check out INA’s video of the harvesting and visit GRACE’s website for the full scope of the project.

U.S. Senators Chris Coons (D-DE) and Jerry Moran (R-KS) and Representatives Mike Thompson (D-CA-05) and Ron Estes (R-KS-04) re-introduced bipartisan legislation to level the energy playing field by giving investors in a range of clean energy projects access to a decades-old corporate structure whose tax advantage is currently available only to investors in fossil fuel-based energy projects (Master Limited Partnerships or MLPs). Click here for more information

Today, Congresswoman Abby Finkenauer (IA-01) led 18 members of Congress in a letter to the Ways and Means Committee Chair, Richard Neal (D-MA) supporting tax credits to grow the second-generation biofuel industry. See Congresswoman Finkenauer’s press release here (ABBC statement included in the release).

The New York Times Magazine published a letter submitted by the ABBC, refuting claims made by the magazine that the U.S. Renewable Fuel Standard has something to do with the global palm oil issue. The letter can be found here.

Today, seven leading waste-to-energy advanced biofuel companies sent a letter to the House Committee on Ways and Means calling for action on tax extenders. For more information: PTC_MSW_feb7.19 – Copy

(Channeling Daniel Patrick Moynihan), NWF is certainly entitled to its own opinion of E15, but not its own facts about E15. NWF’s recent statements about E15 and air quality are too misleading to ignore. Our response can be found here: E15 Emissions Response NWF

The  Council submitted comments to EPA today on the proposed 2019 RVO. The Council is seeking improvements to the methodology used to forecast cellulosic biofuel production and faster fuel registration, among other things. See: ABBC_2019RVOCommentsFINAL