Biofuels Protection Bill Introduced

House Ag Committee Chairman Collin Peterson (D-MN) and Ranking Member Frank Lucas (R-OK) introduced the Renewable Fuel Standard Improvement Act (H.R. 2409) to address concerns with overly restrictive biofuels language, USAgNet reports. The bill would modify Renewable Fuel Standard revisions enacted by the Energy Independence and Security Act of 2007 (EISA), which were recently brought to the forefront following the announcement of proposed rulemaking by the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA).

As directed by EISA, the proposed EPA rulemaking requires the use of indirect land use change to be considered in greenhouse gas (GHG) threshold determinations for biofuels. Land use change is largely considered to be the result of planting increased acreage to produce feedstocks for biofuels, which many believe requires the plowing of new fields, domestically and internationally, to produce these feedstocks for food. H.R. 2409 would remove the requirement for indirect land use change to be utilized in GHG threshold determinations.