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RFA on working with Biden administration

The Renewable Fuels Association says it looks forward to working with the Biden administration to ensure a strong and growing market for ethanol and other low-carbon renewable fuels. 

RFA president and CEO Geoff Cooper tells Brownfield Ag News they would have been pleased with either election outcome but they have had continued struggles with Trump’s EPA over the Renewable Fuels Standard, “We know that the challenges we’ve faced the last several years have been at the EPA. And there has been an obvious disconnect between the White House and EPA when it comes to renewable fuels.”

Cooper says Biden committed on the campaign trail to put an end to the Trump Administration’s EPA small refinery waivers on day one.

Cooper says while some other ag groups are waiting for more assurances over the election results, his group wanted to proceed, based on the outcome, “We decided that it was prudent to move forward and begin our outreach and correspondence and communication with the Biden folks.” Cooper says he expects as more certainty and assurances are gained, others in the ag sector will weigh in with their thoughts and priorities.

While he’s hopeful the EPA will reject pending small refinery waivers and publish 2021 RFS volumes during the Lame Duck session, Cooper says, “I think the most likely course of action is going to be that EPA continues to kick the can on these decisions and actions and sort of leaves the mess they’ve created for the next administration to clean up.”