The Renewable Fuels Standard (RFS) in the
Friends of the Earth was instrumental in implementing strong safeguards in the RFS against global warming pollution from biofuels production, including:
Friends of the Earth supports the calculation of greenhouse gas emissions that quantifies both direct and indirect emissions from the land converted to biofuels production, as such conversion could result in massive amounts of greenhouse gas emissions. However, the law exempts almost all of the 15 billion gallons of corn ethanol from meeting these emissions standards.
As of now, there are no standards to eliminate, or at least reduce, the agricultural impact that increased biofuels production will undoubtedly have on our water and soil quality. Massive amounts of water are necessary to produce biofuels. It has been estimated that for each gallon of ethanol produced, four gallons of water are needed. Corn also requires large quantities of nitrogen fertilizer, which causes severe adverse impacts on water quality and biodiversity when leeched from corn fields. The "dead zone" in the Gulf of Mexico is attributed to nitrogen run off from the Corn Belt and down the Mississippi river. By ignoring these significant environmental impacts, the RFS will likely extenuate extreme ecological devastation from biofuels production.
Below are links and updates on the different actions that Friends of the Earth has taken to try and prevent environmental damage from the Renewable Fuel Standard.
Senator Amy Klobuchar has released a fine piece of legislation promoted by the corn ethanol community. Among other things, it categorizes corn ethanol as an "advanced" biofuel, meaning it will be considered as one of the "cleaner" biofuels. It also removes critical components of the global warming lifecycle account, such as indirect land use change. Why would Klobuchar put together a bill like this? Maybe she just wants to impose her corn country interests upon the rest of the US.
FoE Letter Opposing Klobuchar | Community Letter Opposing Klobuchar
Senators Baucus, Tester, and Crapo have proposed a bill (S. 3381), which would eliminate critical forest and land safeguards for biomass production. They have proposed to eliminate the Biomass Definition from the Renewable Fuel Standard expanded in 2007, which contained environmental safeguards and forest protections, to instead implement the Farm Bill definition, which does not contain any safeguards. Friends of the Earth, along with twenty other clean energy and environmental organizations, wrote to the Senate in opposition to this bill.
The Clean Air Task Force and Friends of the Earth filed a lawsuit and petitioned the EPA regarding weak Renewable Fuel Standard (RFS) regulations based on ignoring science and using outdated data. The particular items addressed by CATF and FOE include land use and emissions regulations for biofuels.
FOE Release | CATF Release | Law Suit | Petition
Bioenergy, including biofuels and bioelectricity, has long been touted as sustainable, ecologically beneficial, and carbon-neutral. Unfortunately it has become clear that bioenergy has the potential to cause ecological damage through unsustainable agricultural practices. It also creates competition with other land uses such as food production, forests, and natural carbon sinks. The draft American Power Act contains several provisions that encourage unsustainable bioenergy production while also weakening current law to prevent unsustainable bioenergy production. In doing so, the draft American Power Act, if enacted, would encourage deforestation and ecosystem destruction, resulting in global warming pollution and biodiversity loss.
Factsheet on Bioenergy in American Power Act
In early February 2010, the Environmental Protection Agency released their final rules on the Ren
ewable Fuels Standard. Happily, despite pressure from the biofuels industry, EPA abided by law and accounted for these emissions in their final tally. However, contrary to previous scientific analysis, EPA found that corn ethanol produced at facilities that were not powered by coal had a net benefit in greenhouse gas emissions as compared to gasoline even when indirect land use change is accounted for. Friends of the Earth looks forward to digging further into the data in order to figure out how this miraculously pro-corn outcome occurred.
The Renewable Fuels Standard, as passed in the 2007
Environmental Communtiy Comments | CATF and FoE Comments
Senator Harkin, along with Senators Grassley and Nelson, attempted to scrap funding for EPA to finish thier lifecycle analysis of global warming pollution in the 2010 Senate Appropriations Bill. The
Letter from Enviros | Letter from Hunger Groups | Letter from Broad Coalition
Congressional Leadership rewarded Representative Peterson for throwing a temper tantrum by eviscerating the climate and forest safeguards from the biofuels mandate in order to buy a handful of votes to pass the already flawed Climate Bill in the House. Environmental champions Chairmen Waxman and Markey caved to Peterson when threatened to hold key democratic votes from the climate bill. If the Senate passes something similar and this becomes law, biofuels that produce more global warming pollution than gasoline will be used to fulfill the biofuels mandate. Recap: In order to pass a "climate bill", provisions that help reduce global warming pollution were cut at the behest of corporate agribusiness.
Letter Against Peterson Proposal | Letter Supporting ILUC from Hunger Groups | Factsheet: Biofuels and Land Use Change Emissions
The 2010 House Interior Appropriations Bill passed with a narrow win for biofuels. An amendment introduced by Rep. Emerson was a broad attack on science. While the amendment may have had little regulatory impact, but still would have prevented the EPA from merely examining and better understanding the broad range and types of emissions that biofuels contribute to global warming.
Anti-Emerson Amendment Letter to Committee | Letter to Full House on Biofuels Amend't in Interior Approps Factsheet: Biofuels and Land Use Change Emissions
The last week’s deliberations on climate legislation in the House of Representatives 
did not leave environmental safeguards from biofuels unscathed. The bill containes severely compromised language on forest protections for the Renewable Fuels Standard’s biofuels mandate. While several amendments to further weaken forest protections were introduced, they fortunately failed to get enough votes in committee voting.
The biggest looming threat, however, is increasingly noisy calls to hold the climate bill hostage if the global warming protections in the Renewable Fuels Standard are not significantly weakened. While amendments to weaken this provison did not pass in committee, these global warmng provisions are still under attack by the powerful agricultural committee.
Letter on ILUC to House | Letter against Terry ILUC Amendment | Letter against Ross Biomass Amendment
Letter against Peterson ILUC Bill Proposal
The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) released draft rules for the Renewable Fuels Standard. Included in this life cycle emission accounting are the emissions from indirect land use change. Indirect land use change emissions result from increased agricultural land being converted to biofuels production, which leads to global warming pollution as a result of deforestation and loss of wetlands and grasslands. The biofuels and agribusiness industry lobbied EPA intensely, asking that EPA ignore the law and not include these potent emissions in the life cycle calculations. But, thankfully, EPA did not cave to industry demands and included the emissions from indirect land use change in their analysis. EPA also included in the analysis a gimmick, which would allow biofuels that are bad for the climate to squeak through the reduction requirements by averaging the emissions from indirect land use change over the course of 100 years.
Rep.
Letter to the House | Letter to the Senate
The biofuels lobby is again urging the EPA to ignore emissions from indirect land use change in EPA's accounting of global warming pollution from biofuels. EPA is due to release their calculations of what these emissions would be any day now. Over the past year, scientists and economists have warned that the emission figures from deforestation and habitat destruction that occur as a result of increased biofuel production are significant, potentially causing biofuels to emit twice as much global warming pollution as gasoline.
Environmental Organization's Letter to EPA | Environmental CEO's Letter to EPA
Biofuel industry groups wrote to the EPA and asked that they ignore the law and exclude "indirect land use change" emissions from EPA’s modeling of total greenhouse gas emissions from biofuels for the Renewable Fuels Standard (RFS). Friends of the Earth, with others, wrote to EPA, expressing our discontent with the industry's argument and encouraged EPA to uphold the law. A week later, more environmental groups chimed in, also encouraging EPA to uphold the law.
First Letter to EPA from Environmental Groups | Second Letter to EPA from Environmental Groups | Letter to EPA from Industry | Response Letter from Scientists to EPA| Press Release
The EPA denied Governor Perry of Texas' petition to temporarily waive the federal mandate requiring large biofuel production. In refusing the waiver, the EPA ensures widespread environmental degradation from a five-fold increase in biofuels production. Friends of the Earth, along with
Press Release | Group Comments | About the Mandate
Friends of the Earth and other environmental groups sent a letter to the Senate Environmental and Public Works Committee encouraging the suspension of the Renewable Fuels Standard.
Letter to Environment and Public Works Committee | Joint Press Release
Friends of the Earth, with several other environmental groups, provided comments to the EPA calling to suspend the biofuels mandate, citing the severe environmental harms, including immense greenhouse gas emissions from land use change, that will result from this policy.
Friends of the Earth, along with several leading environmental groups, urged Rep. Boucher (D-VA) to reconsider the biofuels production mandates passed in last year’s federal
Joint Press Release and Open Letter | Open Letter (pdf)
Representative Herseth (D-SD) introduced legislation that would open up public lands for biofuel sourcing. This would severely threaten our public forests, which also provide numerous ecosystem benefits.
Friends of the Earth Statement on Herseth’s Bill
In order to thwart attempts to undermine the few environmental protections in the Renewable Fuels Standard, a coalition of environmental groups wrote to key Senators and Representatives, thanking them for their roll in including those provisions.
Friends of the Earth worked to improve the Renewable Fuels Standard before it was enacted in the
Fact sheet on Biofuels Imports | Our Joint Letter to Speaker Nancy Pelosi
Since President Bush’s 2007 State of the Union speech, congress has promoted biofuels voraciously. Unfortunately, these mandates have not always recognized the severe environmental impact that biofuels could have both here in the
Press Statement on Senators Domenici and Bingaman Biofuels Bill
