EPA undermines our national security and the intent of the RFS
Posted by Dobrien 6 years, 6 months ago to Government
Jack Lipinski CEO of CVR refinery
As I’ve said, many, many times before, RINs continue to be an egregious tax on independent merchant refiners and small fuel retailers. RINs prices have been extremely volatile this year, which further proves the fact that the RINs market is manipulated. RINs were intended to be a compliance mechanism, not a contrived trading platform. EPA continues to ignore this. I was also disappointed when EPA failed to address consumer demand in setting the preliminary RVO obligations for 2018. They have ignored the fact that more than 5 billion gallons of E0 are sold, that’s gasoline without ethanol and large part because certain consumers simply do not want to purchase ethanol-blended gasoline. However, EPA allows imported biodiesel to generate RINs in order to meet their unrealistic goals. This undermines our national security and the intent of the RFS, which leads to reduced U.S. dependence on foreign energy sources. (I am adding this from the EPA web site:, Congress created the renewable fuel standard (RFS) program to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and expand the nation’s renewable fuels sector while reducing reliance on imported oil.)
Foreign biodiesel now accounts for 40% of the biodiesel blended in the U.S. Cellulosic RINs are another mandated failure. Only through the magic of EPA engineering can methane captured from landfill be used to generate a cellulosic RIN. The EPA set cellulosic goals even though the supply sources have never been fully developed. In my 45 years in the business, I have yet to figure out how to defy the laws of chemistry and physics to blend methane into gasoline. It’s time for EPA to act.
07-23-17
RVO = Combined production/import of gasoline & diesel x annual percent standard set for. Exporters of renewable ... Total Obligated Party RVOs are reported to EPA by Obligated Parties annually. For more information ...
Cellulosic ethanol is ethanol (ethyl alcohol) produced from cellulose (the stringy fiber of a plant) rather than from the plant's seeds or fruit. It is a biofuel produced from grasses, wood, algae, or other plants.
It totally killed the paper and wood products industry.
Wind power is a tax credit rip off at the producers and consumers level.
Same with housing. The end comes when only imported paper and power are used to push out the stream of regulations.
"The EPA wasting $160 million on public relations dwarfs our recent exposure of their high-end furniture purchases ($92 million)," he said. "Nothing is emblematic of government excess like an army of highly compensated PR agents sitting in their easy chairs. It’s simply waste."
Open the Books also found the EPA spent $261,456 on badges and insignia, millions on gym equipment, and $17,820 on "Games, Toys and Wheeled Goods."
The agency spent $23,884 for awards and trophies for the EPA Office of Research and Development (ORD) ceremony in 2012 and 2013.
"The EPA culture of wasteful spending extended into their own award ceremonies," said Andrzejewski. "Tagging the awards as ‘athletic and sporting equipment’ in their checkbook, they spent hundreds of thousands of dollars to pat themselves on their own backs."
Andrzejewski noted that the EPA also has given $144 million in performance bonuses since 2007. "It’s an imbedded culture that gave $4 million in additional awards, badges, and trophies to themselves paid for at taxpayer expense," he said.
The report found that the EPA has spent 35.2 percent more on contracts during the first six years of the Obama administration than in the Bush administration, an increase of $2.5 billion.
The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) spent over $15 million on outside public relations consultants despite employing nearly 200 full-time in house PR workers.
A new report on EPA spending released by Open the Books, a nonprofit organization dedicated to transparency, found numerous examples of questionable expenditures within the agency.
Among them, the EPA spent over $15.1 million on outside public relations consultants between 2000 and 2014. The funding was on top of the $141.496 million in salaries and $1.5 million in bonuses on full-time public affairs officers the EPA has spent since 2007. As of 2012, the EPA employed 198 public affairs employees. The average EPA employee salary is $111,165.
Renewable fuel producers and importers generate RINs based on the volume of compliant renewable fuel they make available. RINs can then be traded, carried over to the following year, and used by petroleum refiners and importers (“obligated parties”) to show compliance with their volume obligations.This flexibility was requested by the petroleum industry so they would have the option of using an actual gallon or over-complying in a certain market and applying that "extra credit" to another area of the country. As for the marketability of the RINs, if for example an obligated party is required to use 1,000 gallons and used 1,200 then the first thousand RINs are "retired" as they are turned in to demonstrate compliance. The remaining 200 credits are available to be traded, sold, or held for another time.
This utter stupidity is why fuel costs are as high as they have been and why my diesel truck has more garbage hanging off of it than my 1978 Ford LTD had. It's also why the truck goes into the shop every 6 months for some "pluming" issue of a sensor or something getting clogged by diesel exhaust.
The EPA admits that the reason they started standards for diesel was not because of any real chemistry, it was all about the evil black smoke (pure carbon and water) the smell that libtard Prius owners find offensive.