It’s been almost five years since the Trump Administration announced the year-round availability of E15. It was a victory that was celebrated throughout the ag and biofuels industry. It was not a mandate that E15 had to be used in every vehicle, it was just allowing for the availability of the product for those who wanted it without needing a summer-time waiver.
Then, enter the oil industry and their use of the D.C. Circuit Court to get the ruling overturned, because it cut into their billion-dollar monopoly of the fuel supply in the summer. The Biden Administration has promised to make things right and get the EPA to reallow E15 year-round. However, they have done nothing but patch jobs using the Presidential waiver, not making a permanent decision.
Last year, Governor Kim Reynolds of Iowa led a bipartisan effort of Midwestern Governors to use a provision in the Clean Air Act to let states petition the EPA to allow the year-round sales themselves. When that letter was sent, the EPA had 90 days to investigate the request and decide. The investigation was done, but we are a year later, and the EPA hasn’t ruled. That means they are only about 275 days overdue to decide.
Governor Reynolds says that she and Iowa Attorney General Brenna Bird considered sending another letter to the EPA, trying to urge them to move. However, they decided that EPA in the past few administrations responded better to court decisions than letters through the proper channels. Therefore they joined with the state of Nebraska and sued the EPA for not following their own guidelines.
It seems that in the past few years, you don’t want to be holding your breath while the federal government decides anything in a timely manner. Also, it seems that Ag is at the bottom of the list of priorities unless it means more mandates and overreach of the Federal Authority. Then they are more than interested in what you are doing.
