JOHNSTON ? Senator Chuck Grassley and 13 other co-sponsors, including Sen. Joni Ernst, today introduced a bill that would modify the $1.00 per gallon biodiesel blenders? tax credit to a producers? credit and extend it for three years. Iowa Renewable Fuels Association (IRFA) Executive Director Monte Shaw released the following statement regarding the legislation:
?We applaud Sen. Grassley for leading the charge, and his colleagues, like Sen. Joni Ernst, for working on this common sense modification and extension that will support American jobs and energy security. Just yesterday, the Energy Information Administration released its latest estimates showing that U.S. biodiesel production could actually take a step backwards this year. This is due to the latest Department of Commerce numbers showing biodiesel imports are surging, reaching a two-and-a-half-year high in May and currently making up about one-third of the U.S. biodiesel market. These soaring imports, coupled with the EPA?s lackluster Renewable Fuel Standard proposal, demonstrate the need to modify the credit to a domestic producers? incentive and provide some longer-term certainty for the U.S. biodiesel industry.?
After being reinstated in late 2015, the federal biodiesel tax incentive is set to expire again onDecember 31, 2016.
Earlier this week, the Iowa Renewable Fuels Association (IRFA) submitted comments on the proposed Renewable Fuel Standard (RFS) volumes, urging the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to enforce the law as Congress intended and set the final targets at 15 billion gallons for corn-based ethanol in 2017 and at least 2.5 billion gallons for biomass-based diesel in 2018.
To read IRFA?s full comments, please click here
