New Campaign Urges President Biden to Get RFS Costs Under Control
Renewable Fuel Standard (RFS) compliance costs are higher in 2021 than they have ever been.Year-to-date Argus RIN pricing data suggests that if an RFS course correction isnt made by President Biden and EPA Administrator Regan, costs across the refining sector this year could easily near $30 billion.
Washington, D.C., July 13, 2021 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- The American Fuel & Petrochemical Manufacturers (AFPM) is going live today with a six-figure, multi-channel ad campaign spotlighting the surging costs and unprecedented impact of biofuel mandates on America’s refineries and the need for immediate action from the President to get these costs under control. The campaign is anchored by a TV buy in Pennsylvania, Delaware, Maryland, and Washington, D.C., and also includes digital and billboard components.
See the video here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a37zJLoaoIc
Renewable Fuel Standard (RFS) compliance costs are higher in 2021 than they have ever been. Year-to-date Argus RIN pricing data suggests that if an RFS course correction isn’t made by President Biden and EPA Administrator Regan, costs across the refining sector this year could easily near $30 billion. Two years ago, costs were $3.6 billion.
AFPM president and CEO Chet Thompson stressed why Renewable Fuel Standard (RFS) costs need to be treated with much more urgency:
“What is happening in the RIN market is not normal or sustainable. Washington has gotten so desensitized to soaring RFS prices that policymakers are not paying attention to the very real impacts on U.S. refineries of all sizes and the thousands of men and women—many of whom are unionized workers—employed at these facilities. RFS costs are putting critical U.S. petroleum refining capacity at risk when we can’t afford to lose any more.
“President Biden and Administrator Regan have tools to provide relief and keep RFS compliance from becoming an even bigger crisis. Through this campaign, we hope to show why their action and leadership are needed.”
2021 has been filled with RFS price volatility.
- RIN prices set new highs 46 times this year, eclipsing by 27% the previous all-time D6 RIN record from 2013 ($1.44 to $1.98 per Argus).
- Ethanol gallons have outpriced wholesale gasoline in 21 out of 27 weeks this year (New York Harbor spot prices).
- Amid these prices, some individual refineries faced quarter one (2021) RFS obligations exceeding their entire annual RFS bills from prior years. One Pennsylvania facility had a 2019 RFS bill of $58 million. In just the first three months of 2021, reports say they amassed a $350 million RFS liability.
Even with RIN prices recently dipping from the new highs, the RFS program remains on a trajectory to amass the single-largest annual cost burden in the program’s history, roughly double the five-year program high set in 2016. Undergirding all of this is the fact that we could soon run out of RINs, uncharted territory for the RFS.
Video available here.
Media American Fuel & Petrochemical Manufacturers 202-457-0480 [email protected]