1 US EPA Says it is Auditing Biofuel Producers' Pre-owned Cooking Oil Supply

Paige Waltman edited this page 2025-01-13 15:42:46 +08:00

By Leah Douglas

Aug 7 (Reuters) - The U.S. Epa has actually launched investigations into the supply chains of at least two eco-friendly fuel producers amidst industry issues that some may be using deceitful feedstocks for biodiesel to protect lucrative federal government aids.

EPA spokesperson Jeffrey Landis told Reuters that the firm has actually released audits over the previous year, but declined to recognize the business targeted since the investigations are ongoing.

The production of biodiesel from sustainable components, like used cooking oil, can earn refiners a slew of state and federal ecological and climate subsidies, including tradable credits under a program administered by the EPA called the Renewable Fuel Standard. But worries have actually been installing that some supplies labeled as utilized are actually cheaper and less sustainable virgin palm oil, a product that is associated with logging and other ecological damage.

The concern came into focus following a surge in utilized cooking oil exports from Asia over the last few years that analysts have stated includes unrealistically high volumes relative to the amount of cooking oil used and recovered in the region. The European Union is also examining feedstocks over the fraud issues.

The EPA audits started after the company upgraded domestic supply-chain accounting requirements in July 2023 for eco-friendly fuel producers seeking to make credits under the RFS, he said.

"EPA has actually carried out audits of eco-friendly fuel producers given that July 2023 that includes, to name a few things, an examination of the areas that used cooking oil utilized in renewable fuel production was gathered," he said. "These examinations, however, are continuous and we are unable to go over continuous enforcement examinations."

U.S. senators from farm states have actually called for more oversight of biofuel feedstocks, saying federal agencies ought to be as rigorous in validating imports as they are auditing domestic supply chains.

"The Biden administration has produced energetic requirements to confirm, not just trust, American manufacturers, and it is necessary that the exact same examination is applied to imported feedstocks," six U.S. senators, led by Roger Marshall and Sherrod Brown, wrote in a June 20 letter to federal agencies.

Another letter from 15 senators to the Treasury Department on July 30 urged the administration to exclude imported feedstocks like UCO from an additional tidy fuel tax credit program passed in the Inflation Reduction Act. (Reporting by Leah Douglas in Washington Editing by Richard Valdmanis and Matthew Lewis)