The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency is reportedly set to double the exemptions allowing oil refineries to opt out of the amount of renewable fuels required to be blended into gas.
The Executive Director of the Iowa Biodiesel Board, says the move could cost U.S. soybean farmers about one billion dollars in lost revenue. Grant Kimberly says the industry has just started recovering after two down years that saw some Iowa biodiesel plants slow or stop production. “We just have to make sure that the Trump administration realizes what a challenging time it’s really been for farmers and biofuel producers like biodiesel producers, and we’re barely just starting to see them get back on their feet here, and let’s not have something like this knock them right back off their feet,” Kimberly says.
The news comes after the Trump administration sharply increased the mandated amount of renewable fuels to be blended into the nation’s gas supply in 2026 and 2027. Kimberly says the Small Refinery Exemptions or SREs would have a big impact. “These SREs would effectively, if they went forward as the rumors have been indicating, it would destroy, it would destroy roughly 500 million gallons of biomass-based diesel demand. And the estimates out there is that it would cost US soybean farmers about a billion dollars in lost revenue,” he says”
Several ag groups and members of Iowa’s Congressional delegation are speaking out against doubling the exemptions. The oil and gas industry has opposed renewable fuel blending requirements and lobbied for the exemptions.
(By Meghan McKinney, Iowa Public Radio.)