U.S. Sens. Deb Fischer (R-NE), Mike Rounds (R-SD), Roy Blunt (R-MO), Joni Ernst (R-IA), Pat Roberts (R-KS), John Hoeven (R-ND), and Jerry Moran (R-KS) led a bipartisan effort to give Americans more fuel choices beginning this summer.
On the heels of U.S. President Donald Trump’s announcement last month that the administration may allow the sale of gasoline containing 15 percent ethanol (E15) throughout the year, the senators want the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to set a timeline toward making it happen.
“Allowing an open marketplace with more fuel options for consumers encourages competition and drives down consumer fuel costs. Moreover, E15 lowers evaporative and tailpipe emissions when compared to 10 percent ethanol fuel, improving the environment,” according to their April 30 letter to EPA Administrator Scott Pruitt.
Several Democrats also signed the letter, including U.S. Sens. Heidi Heitkamp (D-ND), Amy Klobuchar (D-MN), and Dick Durbin (D-IL), with many of them representing America’s agriculture-heavy states. Allowing the sale of year-round E15 fuel blends could help farmers across the country by boosting the demand for corn, which is used to make such biofuels.
Major oil companies, however, say the Renewable Fuel Standard (RFS), which requires them annually to add biofuels into gas, needs to be reformed.
The EPA now bans the higher E15 blends, particularly during the summer due to environmental concerns around smog contribution. Gas most often is 10 percent ethanol. For E15 to make it to the marketplace year-round, the EPA would need to issue a nationwide Reid Vapor Pressure (RVP) waiver.
During a January Senate hearing, Pruitt said the EPA was actively exploring whether the agency has the legal authority to issue an RVP waiver. The agency is considering comments on its December 2017 notice of proposed rulemaking related to fuel pathways using distiller sorghum oil to produce biofuel. The comment period on the proposed rulemaking to amend RFS regulations closed Jan. 26. Senators now want clarity on the rulemaking timeline, they said.
In their letter, the senators also told Pruitt that Congress never intended the RVP waiver to be a market cap on the amount of ethanol blended in gasoline.
“Rather, this provision was intended to provide a pathway for ethanol to grow and thrive in the fuel marketplace when it was passed in 1990,” they wrote. “The current interpretation is outdated and has created an untenable regulatory barrier to E15 as a readily available option for motorists.”
At the same time, the nation’s fuel marketplace has changed during the past 28 years since the RVP waiver for 10 percent ethanol blends was approved, the lawmakers noted. “This provision needs to change as well,” they said.
In their letter, the senators make two specific requests: they ask the EPA Administrator to provide an expected timeline for an administrative RVP waiver and request the agency allow for the summer time sale of E15 gas in the interim, according to a statement from Sen. Fischer’s office.
“Doing this,” they wrote, “will fulfill the president’s commitment to allow consumer’s access to these fuels year-round, expand consumer choice, and eliminate confusion at the pump.”