“To amend the Clean Air Act to reform the Renewable Fuel Standard, and for other purposes.”
No CRS summary available for this bill.
This section reforms the Renewable Fuel Standard (RFS) by (1) capping applicable volumes of renewable fuel that is not advanced biofuel (i.e., primarily conventional corn ethanol) at the projected annual domestic consumption of ethanol-blended fuel in the most recent Energy Information Administration Annual Energy Outlook, beginning the first calendar year after enactment; (2) allowing renewable identification numbers (RINs) generated in calendar years 2020 through 2022 to demonstrate compliance in any of the five calendar years following enactment (limited to 20% of a person's annual compliance obligation) and prohibiting the EPA from requiring electric credits (e-RINs) in implementing regulations; and (3) expanding small refinery exemptions from RFS requirements for disproportionate economic hardship to refineries with average daily throughput not exceeding 10,000 barrels that began production on or after January 1, 2007 (treating such exemptions as extensions under existing procedures); revising economic hardship factors (effective one year after enactment) to include holding company credit costs relative to revenue, potential loss of efficiency gains or refinery viability (per 2011 Department of Energy study), exceptional state regulations, and biofuel blending infrastructure plans; automatically granting exemption extension petitions if the EPA fails to provide a legal denial basis within 90 days; requiring approval of petitions if the Energy Secretary determines a refinery's disproportionate impacts or viability index (per the 2011 study) is at least 1; and limiting approvals for holding company-controlled refineries to exempted volumes not exceeding 75,000 barrels per day or 50% of the holding company's total refinery production (whichever is greater) or the small refineries' combined capacity. (As background, the RFS requires specified annual volumes of renewable fuels in transportation fuel, with EPA setting volumes and administering RINs for compliance; small refineries previously could petition for exemptions or extensions based on economic hardship.)