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A U-S Circuit Court of Appeals ruling has reversed a Trump-era rule that had expanded the use of E-15 fuel blends year-round. The decision is a blow to Nebraska ethanol producers who were already dealing with bad news last month.
The ruling by the U-S Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia rolls-back ethanol rules that had allowed the year-round sale of gasoline with 15% ethanol since 2019. The ruling late last week said the EPA over-reached in allowing the waiver to sell E-15 in the summer. Petrochemical manufacturers had sued to block the use of E-15 year-round.
Jan Tenbensel is the chairman of the Nebraska Ethanol Board and said he’s more worried about the long-term effects of the ruling.
“A retailer that sees this sort of gamesmanship or messing around, they’re not going to want to make the investment to make the change in their business models to move to E-15,” Tensensel said. “That’s what I’m really concerned about. It’s not the current retailers because they’re going to be okay, but it’s adding additional retailers.”
He said it’s been a constant battle with the petrochemical industry that sees electric vehicles taking more of the market share.
“They do not want to lose that 10% or 15% or 30% of the possible liquid fuel market to renewable fuels,” Tenbensel said. “It’s foolhardy because ethanol could de-carbonize gasoline, lower the carbon intensity of gasoline, make gasoline a more friendly transition fuel as we move to electric in the future.”
The appeals court ruling comes on the heels of a Supreme Court decision last month that allows waivers for some smaller refiners who don’t want to add ethanol to their product. Nebraska has around 26 ethanol plants that produce approximately 2.4 billion gallons of ethanol a year.