On behalf of the Energy Future Coalition, the Urban Air Initiative, and the Governors’ Biofuels Coalition, Boyden Gray & Associates filed a Request for Correction of Information asking EPA to revise its outdated and flawed analysis of the emissions of ethanol and gasoline throughout their production and use. EPA continues to rely on its 2010 lifecycle analysis in rules related to the Renewable Fuel Standard, despite major improvements in the efficiency of corn agriculture and ethanol production, and the oil industry’s reliance on increasingly carbon-intensive sources of “tight oil.”
In its Request for Correction, BG&A demonstrated that the best available evidence, including an updated model by Department of Energy scientists, shows that blending ethanol into gasoline significantly reduces lifecycle emissions of greenhouse gas and other air pollutants. Ethanol’s emissions benefits will continue to grow as ethanol production gets cleaner and gasoline production gets dirtier.
EPA has committed to respond to the Request for Correction by August 11, 2016.