Questions And Answers On The Renewable Fuel Standard Program

RENEWABLE FUEL STANDARD: Program Unlikely to Meet Its Targets for Reducing Greenhouse Gas Emissions

Federal policy has played a key role in the emergence of the U.S. biofuels industry. Policy measures include minimum renewable fuel usage requirements, blending and production tax credits, an import tariff, loans, and research grants. This report focuses on the mandated minimum usage requirements, the RFS, whereby a minimum volume of biofuels is to be used in the national transport. fuel supply each year. It describes the general nature of the RFS mandate and its implementation, and outlines some emerging issues related to the sustainability of the continued growth in U.S. biofuels production needed to fulfill the expanding RFS mandate, as well as the emergence of potential unintended consequences of this rapid expansion. A print on demand report.

The Renewable Fuel Standard (RFS) establishes minimum volumes of various types of renewable fuels that must be included in the U.S.'s supply of fuel for transportation. Those volumes -- as defined by the Energy Independence and Security Act of 2007 (EISA) -- are intended to grow each year through 2022. Recently, the requirements of the RFS have been met largely by blending gasoline with ethanol made from cornstarch. In the future, EISA requires the use of increasingly large amounts of "advanced biofuels," which include diesel made from biomass (such as soybean oil or animal fat), ethanol made from sugarcane, and cellulosic biofuels (made from converting the cellulose in plant materials into fuel). A main goal of the Renewable Fuel Standard is to reduce U.S. emissions of greenhouse gases, which contribute to climate change. Policymakers and analysts have raised concerns about the RFS, particularly about the feasibility of complying with the standard, whether it will increase prices for food and transportation fuels, and whether it will lead to the intended reductions in greenhouse gas emissions. This analysis evaluates how much the supply of various types of renewable fuels would have to increase over the next several years to comply with the RFS. It also examines how food prices, fuel prices, and emissions would vary in an illustrative year, 2017, under three scenarios for the Renewable Fuel Standard. Figures and tables. This is a print on demand report.

The fed. gov¿t. supports the use of biofuels -- transportation fuels produced from renewable plant matter, such as corn -- in the pursuit of energy, environ., and agr. policy goals. Tax credits (TC) encourage the prod¿n. and sale of biofuels in the U.S., lowering the costs of producing biofuels, such as ethanol or biodiesel, relative to the costs of producing their substitutes -- gasoline and diesel fuel. Fed. mandates require the use of specified minimum amounts and types of biofuel. This study assesses the incentives provided by the TC for producing different types of biofuels and analyzes whether they favor one type of biofuel over others. Estimates the cost to consumers of reducing the use of petroleum fuels and emissions of greenhouse gases through those TC. Illus.

Biofuels examines prospects for large-scale production of affordable, sustainable transportation fuels. Made from biomass or other alternatives to oil, such fuels would not add greenhouse gases to Earth’s atmosphere or compete with food crops. Concise and authoritative, avoiding the hyperbole that surrounds so many energy technology proposals, Biofuels concentrates on essentials: • How technological innovation actually takes place, not only through research but in response to market forces and business decisions. • The dynamics of the global oil industry, which on the one hand supplies billions of people with relatively low-cost energy and on the other imperils many of these same people through climate change. • Prospects for “drop-in” alternatives to petroleum that can be burned in existing vehicles and equipment, avoiding the need to turn over a fleet that in the United States alone numbers some 250 million cars and trucks. • U.S. government policies for fostering innovation, in energy and more broadly, and the strengths of the Defense Department relative to other agencies in supporting technological advance and scale-up of alternative fuels.