comparing original RFS volumes with revised volumes (some perspective)

Today the EPA released revised mandated amounts of biofuel to be blended under the RFS legislation.

To put these numbers in perspective I have taken the original requirements for cellulosic in the 2007 law and compared to the revised amounts for each year (as a % of the original).

RFS mandated volumes of biofuel (in millions of gallons)
		2009	2010	2011	2012	2013
original
	conventional		12,000	12,600	13,200	13,800
	advanced	600	950	1,350	2,000	2,750
	cellulosic		100	250	500	1,000
	biodiesel	500	650	800	1,000
	advanced other		200	300	500
revised
	conventional		12,000	12,600	13,200	13,800
	advanced	600	950	1,350	2,000	2,750
	cellulosic		6.50	6.60	8.65	14
	biodiesel	*	1150*	800	1,000	1,280
	advanced other			543	991	1,456
cellulosic % of original requirement			7%	3%	2%	1%
actual volumes (not ethanol equivalent)
* This was a combined requirement for 2009 and 2010
empty cells did not have a requirement defined
Recall that cellulosic and biodiesel are nested within “Advanced”.

As you can see, we are not “catching up” to our original targets, but as a %, the mandates are revised further and further downward each year.  Furthermore, we aren’t even producing enough to fulfill the revised mandates.  While the 2012 mandate was 8,650,000 gallons, 12,069 gallons were produced (thats 0.1%).  As I’ve discussed before, there are plenty of excess RINs so these are being used to fulfill the mandate instead of cellulosic fuel – this was part of the flexibility built into the law.  While there are excess RINs now, there will not be in future years as predicted by CARD here.  I believe this will all come to a big battle in court, which has already started here.  My point is not to knock on the mandate, the EPA, or anyone else, but to emphasize that we were too optimistic in the original bill, and we probably won’t achieve the targets set for 2022, since they more than double year over year between now and 2022:

Year	Cellulosic	cellulosic % increase over previous year
2011	250	250%
2012	500	200%
2013	1000	200%
2014	1750	175%
2015	3000	171%
2016	4250	142%
2017	5500	129%
2018	7000	127%
2019	8500	121%
2020	10500	124%
2021	13500	129%
2022	16000	119%

Of course there may be a technological breakthrough (which is why we do what we do everyday), and financing and construction may ramp up now that the recession is ending.. but I think it would be highly unlikely, especially since natural gas is now competing with bioenergy.

About these ads