Forrest Laws of the Southeast Farm Press is reporting that three Midwestern senators have produced legislation that would effectively “prevent EPA from penalizing U.S. corn and soybean growers for land use changes or potential land clearing for increased biofuel production in other countries.”Last spring, as part of their rulemaking for the implementation of the Renewable Fuel Standard (RFS2), the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) issued a rule that would require ethanol and biodiesel producers to meet higher green-house-gas (GHG) emission standards because, in the EPA’s opinion, the use of corn and soybeans in fuel production leads to potentially increased GHG “emissions from land-clearing for increased corn and soybean plantings in the U.S. and other countries.”
Naturally, this rule drew concern from Midwestern lawmakers whose constituents produce corn and soy for ethanol and biodiesel in addition to the many other uses of these crops. Thus, the triumvirate of Sens. Tom Harkin and Charles Grassley, both of Iowa, and Senator Ben Nelson of Nebraska came forward with their legislation—a proposed amendment to the Senate Interior-Environment Appropriations bill. The legislation “would prohibit the EPA, for one year, from spending funds to include international indirect land use change emissions in the implementation of the RFS.”
Simply put, the senators are concerned the rule would punish domestic soybean and corn growers for other countries’ land use decisions. Additionally, the senators are concerned the rule “would limit the U.S. production and use of biofuels required in the energy bill passed by Congress in 2007.”
A statement released by the senators said the following, ‘“At this time, the data and analytic methodologies for credibly calculating international indirect land use change emissions do not exist . . . Because of this, including these international emissions in the EPA’s rule would put an unjust burden on the biofuels industry.”’ It is worth noting that it was the 2007 energy bill that called for the inclusion of indirect emissions, “such as those associated with land use changes.”
However, it looks like the senators do not think this year is a good time to implement such a policy. As former Senate Agriculture Committee chair Senator Harking stated, ‘“To put it bluntly, including international indirect emissions at this time is bad policy.”’
For his part, Senator Grassley feels the EPA just got it wrong:
“The model the EPA cobbled together to measure indirect land use is far from
scientific, it’s controversial and isn’t supported by the facts. EPA’s analysis
for its rulemaking on RFS2 contained calculations for international indirect
land use changes. However, nowhere in the statute is the EPA required to
calculate international effects. . . It defies common sense that the EPA would
try to blame an Iowa farmer for the actions of Brazilian farmers and
developers.”
Though the comment period is open for one more day, the EPA is indicating it is standing by its rule “that increasing production of biofuels in the United States has a significant impact on land use changes in other countries [.]” As Mr. Laws points out in his article for the Southeast Farm Press, “[o]n March 2, 100 of the nation’s top scientists, including members of the National Academy of Sciences, wrote a letter warning that it would be a mistake to enforce a new and highly uncertain category of carbon emissions—indirect or market-mediated effects—against only biofuels . . . all fuels have indirect carbon effects and . . . these effects are not well understood or readily quantifiable.”
To see the article from the Southeast Farm Press click here.
Posted: 09/24/09
