We’ve heard a lot of the national numbers in the Environmental Protection Agency’s proposal to cut the amount of ethanol and biodiesel going into the country’s fuel supply… cellulosic biofuels at 17 million gallons, biomass-based diesel at 1.28 billion gallons, advanced biofuels at 2.20 billion gallons and renewable fuels at 15.21 billion. But outside of all these national numbers is the impact it will have on the small rural communities that have finally come out of economic depressions to host these biofuels operations, through direct jobs at the refineries and the boost to the farmers and their locally grown crops that serve as feedstocks for biodiesel and ethanol.
In this edition of the Domestic Fuel Cast, we speak with several people who are already seeing the impacts that just this proposal is presenting, including Iowa Governor Terry Branstad; Mark Beemer with Aventine REI; President and CEO of ethanol producer East Kansas Agri-Energy Jeff Oestmann; and Rick Schwarck, who serves as the president of Iowa Renewable Fuels Association and Absolute Energy, an ethanol producer on the Iowa-Minnesota border.
It’s a perspective of where the rubber meets the road, and you can hear more of it in the latest Domestic Fuel Cast: Domestic Fuel Cast - EPA Proposal More Than Just Numbers