Oil Industry Continues Efforts To Repeal The Renewable Fuel Standard

On Tuesday, October 8, 2013, the American Petroleum Institute (API) filed a lawsuit with the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit (D.C. Circuit Court) challenging the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency's (EPA) final rule setting the 2013 renewable volume obligations (RVO) under the federal Renewable Fuel Standard (RFS). While the petition for review lacks details about the lawsuit as such petitions are for notice purposes only, it is reported that API's main arguments against the rule will be that it was issued too late to be effective and that the 2013 cellulosic RVO set at six million gallons is higher than cellulosic gallons available on the market.

Under the RFS, EPA must issue the following year's RVOs by November 30. EPA did not release its final 2013 RFS rule setting all of this year's RVOs until August 6, 2013. Earlier this year, the D.C. Circuit Court directed EPA to set the cellulosic gallon requirement to levels of actual production expected based on company and other information. The court stated that EPA could not set the volumes at the maximum level of production possible to drive production.

API has been advocating for the full repeal of the RFS on legislative, regulatory, and legal levels. It also challenged EPA's 2011 and 2012 final RFS rules in court. In August 2013, API, along with the American Fuel & Petrochemical Manufacturers (AFPM), petitioned EPA to grant a partial waiver of the yet-to-be-proposed 2014 RFS RVOs.

Several biofuel trade groups have responded to this latest legal challenge. Growth Energy and the Renewable Fuels Association (RFA) denounced the lawsuit. In its press release, available online, RFA called it a "lawsuit in search of a problem."