In Brazil, now that Petrobras has divested from biofuels in its attempt to raise funds to pay off massive $100 billion debt, it has come out against the government’s new RenovaBio program meant to raise biofuel production and consumption, claiming that biofuels negatively impact forests and threaten food production. It continued by saying that biofuel […]
In Hawaii, the state’s Senate Committee on Ways and Means passed a bill seeking to use 100% renewable fuel for transport by 2045 but was changed to remove its mandate, instead seeking to just move the industry in that direction. The Department of Business, Economic Development and Tourism and the Hawaii Petroleum Marketers Association felt […]
In Washington, the Citizens’ Climate Lobby is seeking to get Congress to enact a carbon fee beginning at $15 per ton of CO2 and increasing $10 per year in order to force a move away from fossil fuels. The group wants the fee to be redistributed to families to help them offset the costs of […]
In Washington, EPA Administrator Pruitt issued an agency-wide memorandum on implementation of Executive Order 13777 on March 24, which announced members of the required Regulatory Reform Task Force and directed program offices to seek public input on existing regulations and report findings to the Task Force. EPA formerly began seeking public comments on April 11 […]
In Washington, presidential advisor Carl Icahn’s CVR Energy did in fact short the RIN market in 2016, selling RINs at an average of 77 cents and reaching highs of $1 while the credits it now needs for compliance are averaging 55 cents. Prices fell after President Trump won the election and then again when Icahn […]
In India, the drought has hit sugarcane production, and therefore ethanol production, very hard with some states like Maharashtra seeing production fall by more than half. As a result, achieving the E10 blending mandate seems even further away. The October tender held to supply ethanol to achieve the mandate saw only 780 million liters offered […]
In Mexico, the head of the Senate’s special commission on climate change has called for a review of new alterative fuels in an attempt to reduce greenhouse gas emissions in line with the country’s COP21 commitments. Policy restricts the use of corn as ethanol feedstock only to times when there is sufficient stocks in the […]
In Washington, the Main Street Energy Alliance has launched to urge the Environmental Protection Agency to resist the efforts of a small group of special interests including Valero, Monroe Energy and investor Carl Icahn who are trying to alter the point of obligation requirement under the Renewable Fuel Standard in order to serve their own […]
In Australia, two MPs have come out against a report by the federal government’s Productivity Commission that warned ethanol blending was a bad investment for the economy, saying that dropping the 6% ethanol mandate in New South Wales would be instead devastating to the economy, especially on the South Coast. The province has invested heavily […]
In Washington, as expectations of a quick resolution to the point of obligation debate or even reform to the Renewable Fuel Standard in general begin to fade, prices for RINs are beginning to rebound. Despite expectations since December that reform could come quickly as a result of the new administration’s various appointments, those opportunities are […]
