1 US EPA Says it is Auditing Biofuel Producers' Pre-owned Cooking Oil Supply

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By Leah Douglas

Aug 7 (Reuters) - The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency has actually released examinations into the supply chains of at least 2 sustainable fuel manufacturers amid industry concerns that some might be using fraudulent feedstocks for biodiesel to protect profitable federal government subsidies.

EPA spokesperson Jeffrey Landis informed Reuters that the agency has released audits over the past year, however decreased to identify the companies targeted because the examinations are continuous.

The production of biodiesel from sustainable ingredients, like utilized cooking oil, can earn refiners a slew of state and federal ecological and environment aids, including tradable credits under a program administered by the EPA called the Renewable Fuel Standard. But fears have been mounting that some supplies labeled as utilized cooking oil are in fact more affordable and less sustainable virgin palm oil, an item that is associated with deforestation and other ecological damage.

The issue entered focus following a surge in used cooking oil exports from Asia over the last few years that analysts have actually said includes unrealistically high volumes relative to the amount of cooking and recovered in the region. The European Union is likewise investigating feedstocks over the scams concerns.

The EPA audits started after the company upgraded domestic supply-chain accounting requirements in July 2023 for sustainable fuel manufacturers looking for to make credits under the RFS, he stated.

"EPA has performed audits of sustainable fuel producers considering that July 2023 that includes, to name a few things, an examination of the locations that used cooking oil used in renewable fuel production was collected," he said. "These examinations, however, are ongoing and we are unable to talk about continuous enforcement investigations."

U.S. senators from farm states have called for more oversight of biofuel feedstocks, saying federal firms must be as rigorous in verifying imports as they are auditing domestic supply chains.

"The Biden administration has created energetic standards to confirm, not simply trust, American manufacturers, and it is important that the very same scrutiny is applied to imported feedstocks," six U.S. senators, led by Roger Marshall and Sherrod Brown, wrote in a June 20 letter to federal companies.

Another letter from 15 senators to the Treasury Department on July 30 prompted the administration to omit imported feedstocks like UCO from an extra clean fuel tax credit program passed in the Inflation Reduction Act. (Reporting by Leah Douglas in Washington Editing by Richard Valdmanis and Matthew Lewis)