The American Fuel & Petrochemical Manufacturers filed comments opposing the US Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) proposed rule Regulation of Fuels and Fuel Additives: 2013 Renewable Fuel Standard (RFS).
“I have long asserted that the RFS is broken and is harmful to countless parties, but nothing has been done to address the problems it has created,” said AFPM President Charles T. Drevna in a statement. Keep reading →
DOE’s Clean Energy Manufacturing Initiative would accelerate manufacturing of clean energy products and strengthen competitiveness of the U.S. clean energy sector in the global energy market.
On March 26, 2013, the Department of Energy (DOE) announced a new program – the Clean Energy Manufacturing Initiative – to support manufacturing of clean energy products in the U.S. The DOE announced the initiative at the opening of its Oak Ridge Carbon Fiber Technology Facility in Tennessee. The facility manufactures cost-efficient and lightweight carbon fiber used in electric vehicles, energy storage components, and wind turbines. According to the DOE, carbon fiber can reduce the weight of a passenger car by 50% and enhance fuel efficiency by approximately 35%. DOE estimates that the material could cut the weight of vehicles by up to 750 pounds by 2020. Keep reading →
It’s been a long road, but the government-backed ZeaChem cellulosic ethanol demonstration plant in Oregon is finally turning out fuel.
The company announced the step this week, calling the Boardman plant “among the first operational cellulosic biorefineries in the world.” It’s a bit of good news in the seemingly illusory realm of ethanol made from non-food feedstocks, which have been slow to fulfill their promise of extricating the industry from the food vs. fuels debate. Keep reading →
The Renewable Fuel Standard (RFS), a federal policy requiring that ethanol be blended into the U.S. gasoline supply at annually increasing amounts, has been touted by the biofuels industry as the solution to a myriad of energy woes. But in the seven years since the policy was enacted, the RFS has failed to meet its goals of protecting the environment and reducing dependence on foreign oil. It has and is forcing Americans to pay more for fuel, and it has raised food prices around the world. And yet, ethanol lobbying groups continue to argue on behalf of the policy, armed with an array of invalid claims:
Myth: “Oil is the cause of casualties abroad and economic volatility at home.” Keep reading →
There is a contentious debate underway regarding mandated ethanol blending into gasoline that touches on issues like food versus fuel and the sanctity of free markets. The severe drought that hit the US this past summer reduced corn crop yields – a major ethanol feedstock – and sparked calls for a waiver of the Renewable Fuels Standard that reportedly uses some 40% of the US corn crop to produce ethanol.
When Breaking Energy recently sat down with two industry analysts and asked them about mandated ethanol blending, we received decidedly anti-RFS viewpoints. In this video, David Rewcastle, Senior Energy Analyst with Source Capital Group and Michael Lynch, President and Director of Global Petroleum Service with Strategic Energy Economic Research explain why government-mandated ethanol blending into gasoline is flawed and suggest how the system might be improved. Keep reading →
The wind power industry wasn’t the only renewable energy winner in the fiscal cliff deal that cleared Congress late Tuesday – the legislation also showered taxpayer largess on the producers of various categories of biofuels.
The bill [PDF] included tax credits and depreciation rules that support cellulosic ethanol and revived, retroactively, a biodiesel tax credit that had expired at the end of 2011. Algae also won a spot as a favored biofuel. Keep reading →
EA-6B Prowler from the Salty Dogs of Air Test and Evaluation Squadron 23 flies September 16, 2011 over Southern Maryland. The plane uses a biofuel blend of JP-5 aviation fuel and camelina oil.
Growing demand in huge emerging economies like China and India will drive up world oil prices no matter what the US does, so it’s crucial for the US to develop energy alternatives that will keep it from being hurt by those nations’ successes, says Adm. (Ret.) Dennis Blair, former director of national intelligence. Keep reading →
The American Petroleum Institute recently renewed its attack on the US government’s Renewable Fuels Standard after the Environmental Protection Agency said it would not waive the requirement that uses some 40 percent of the US corn crop to make ethanol.
The main oil and gas trade association said the RFS, which is designed to blend increasing amounts of ethanol with gasoline, is “increasingly unrealistic and unworkable” because it has been adopted without regard for its compatibility with some vehicles, and if fully implemented would exceed what API says is the maximum safe limit of 10 percent in gasoline. Keep reading →
The theme of this year’s recent Advanced Biofuels Leadership Conference was “Go Big, Stay Strong,” an allusion to the move of biofuels out of the lab and into commercialization.
But the theme emerging from the remarks of the more than 100 biofuel executives who spoke at the conference was that biofuel companies should execute this “go big” strategy in carefully considered steps rather than in giant leaps and that the key to staying strong is to hedge their bets at every opportunity, including by increasing the range of feedstock, product and financing options. Keep reading →
It’s the 1 million barrel per day question.
By 2035, US petroleum imports could drop as low as one in every four barrels consumed, but achieving that much import reduction depends heavily on raising vehicle mileage standards. Keep reading →
Jared Anderson
Conway Irwin
Peter Gardett