1 US EPA Says it is Auditing Biofuel Producers' used Cooking Oil Supply

Thurman Morford edited this page 6 months ago

By Leah Douglas

Aug 7 (Reuters) - The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency has launched investigations into the supply chains of at least two renewable fuel manufacturers amidst industry issues that some may be using deceptive feedstocks for biodiesel to secure lucrative federal government subsidies.

EPA spokesperson Jeffrey Landis told Reuters that the agency has released audits over the previous year, but decreased to identify the business targeted since the investigations are ongoing.

The production of biodiesel from sustainable ingredients, like utilized cooking oil, can earn refiners a of state and federal ecological and climate subsidies, consisting of tradable credits under a program administered by the EPA called the Renewable Fuel Standard. But fears have actually been mounting that some supplies labeled as utilized cooking oil are actually more affordable and less sustainable virgin palm oil, an item that is associated with logging and other ecological damage.

The issue entered focus following a rise in used cooking oil exports from Asia in the last few years that experts have actually stated involves unrealistically high volumes relative to the quantity of cooking oil used and recovered in the area. The European Union is also investigating feedstocks over the fraud concerns.

The EPA audits started after the agency upgraded domestic supply-chain accounting requirements in July 2023 for sustainable fuel producers seeking to make credits under the RFS, he said.

"EPA has carried out audits of renewable fuel manufacturers because July 2023 that includes, amongst other things, an examination of the locations that utilized cooking oil used in eco-friendly fuel production was collected," he stated. "These investigations, however, are continuous and we are not able to talk about continuous enforcement examinations."

U.S. senators from farm states have actually called for more oversight of biofuel feedstocks, saying federal agencies must be as extensive in validating imports as they are auditing domestic supply chains.

"The Biden administration has created energetic standards to validate, not just trust, American manufacturers, and it is vital that the very same scrutiny is applied to imported feedstocks," six U.S. senators, led by Roger Marshall and Sherrod Brown, wrote in a June 20 letter to federal companies.

Another letter from 15 senators to the Treasury Department on July 30 prompted the administration to exclude imported feedstocks like UCO from an additional clean fuel tax credit program passed in the Inflation Reduction Act. (Reporting by Leah Douglas in Washington Editing by Richard Valdmanis and Matthew Lewis)