E15 is currently available at more than 2,000 gas stations across the country
By Diego Flammini
Staff Writer
Farms.com
President Biden is allowing the sale of E15 during the summer months to help offset rising fuel costs brought on by inflation.
The “Environmental Protection Agency is planning to issue an emergency waiver to allow E15 gasoline that uses more ethanol from homegrown crops to be sold across the United States this summer (from June 1 to Sept. 15) in order to increase fuel supply,” the president said while visiting POET Bioprocessing in Menlo, Iowa on April 12.
The EPA’s waiver will come closer to June.
Under the Clean Air Act, E15 is typically banned during the summer because of air pollution concerns.
Allowing the summer sale of E15, often marketed as Unleaded 88, could help families save 10 cents per gallon on average compared to E10.
E15 is available at 2,300 gas stations across 30 states, the U.S. Department of Energy says.
This waiver has the potential to affect crop markets.
But E15 would likely have to become available year-round, said Moe Agostino, chief commodity strategist with Farms.com Risk Management.
“It can add an additional 13 million bushels of demand,” he said. “It’s a modest and friendly news headline, but how can we make it permanent?”
President Biden’s announcement received praise from members of the U.S. ag industry.
“Corn growers thank President Biden for ensuring drivers continue to have access to a lower-cost fuel choice and acknowledging how renewable ethanol helps reduce prices, lower emissions and improve our nation’s energy security,” Chris Edgington, president of the National Corn Growers Association, who attended the announcement, said in an April 12 statement.
“As our nation copes with energy price inflation and strives to enhance energy security and diversity, we salute President Biden for turning to America’s farmers and biofuel producers for ingenuity and solutions,” Geoff Cooper, president and CEO of the Renewable Fuels Association, said in an April 12 statement.
He too attended the event in Iowa.
The American oil industry, however, isn’t on board with the E15 waiver.
The summer waiver isn’t a permanent solution, said Ron Chittim, a spokesperson for the American Petroleum Institute.
“Americans are looking for long-term solutions, not short-term political fixes (to high fuel prices),” he said, Reuters reported.