Going in search of demand for our Iowa Agricultural products. Specifically, increasing the consumption of renewable fuels to increase commodity prices as well as additional revenue streams for producers. There’s a big push right now for E15 sales to be made legal year round nationwide with the growth energy and the Renewable Fuels Association leading that effort where Goeff Cooper is the CEO:
“If you are truly serious about reducing carbon emissions and doing it at the lowest cost possible for consumers and doing it in a way that does’t compromise or sacrifice vehicle range and convenience. This is what we have got to be looking at.”
As opposed to electric vehicles, where Cooper says sales certainly have been slow or less than automaker expectations:
“They, in most cases do not deliver the range that was advertised. They have problems in extremely hot weather or extremely cold weather. You know that there are are problems with finding places to charge these vehicles.”
Now to that end, in addition to making E15 available to more consumers by making it nationwide and for sale year round, he’s also encouraging EPA to look at slowing tailpipe emissions in order to finalize a “technology standard that is readily achievable.”
That’s on the consumer side/increasing commodity prices side of things. On the additional revenue streams side, Sustainable Aviation Fuel (SAF) certainly is creating quite a buzz as well. It certainly will create increased demand for renewable fuels while at the same time some of those dollars and cents would trickle down directly to producers at the farm level. That’ll be through emissions scoring, which is where ADM comes into the picture where Theo Gunther says year number two of their re:generations emissions scoring program will be open to farmers soon:
“So we have a good range of information about our different business offers of farmers and our different programs. Quite a range of things covered tonight including farm direct fertilizer, origination and the re:generations program as well.”
Gunther and his ADM counterparts, hosting a series of producer meetings not only in Eastern Iowa but around the state, and really around the Midwest to help raise awareness of these offerings, as he says he’s noticed moods are changing regarding emission scoring:
“I think that people are getting more information, so there’s more buzz out there. People are learning more about how they can score their farm, how they can get that information about the crops they produce. Then once you’re armed with that information, you’re in a better position to make decisions. So that’s what this meeting was about, telling people about what our program offers, why we’re offering it and then, you know, putting the farmer in the driver’s seat for making those decisions.”
He says www.admadvantage.com is where producers can learn more about emissions scoring which will be key in helping get sustainable aviation fuel to a carbon intensity score of less than 50. At this time that appears to be a key metric in order to make SAF competitive in the airline industry.
