The head of the nation’s biggest biodiesel lobbying group is renewing his call for Washington to retroactively reinstate the federal biodiesel tax incentive … and it’s unacceptable how long the industry and country has had to go with the credit.
Joe Jobe, CEO of the National Biodiesel Board told energy leaders at the Alternative Fuels and Vehicles Institute national conference in Las Vegas that Congress and the Obama Administration need to show how truly dedicated they are to green jobs by renewing the $1-a-gallon federal incentive:
Jobe explained that the biodiesel tax credit, in just five short years since its enactment, has resulted in the construction of over 150 renewable refineries in 44 states, 23,000 jobs, billions of dollars of net tax revenue to the U.S. Treasury, and the displacement of billions of gallons of petroleum. Congress allowed the biodiesel tax credit to lapse on December 31, along with all other expiring tax provisions.
Jobe also pointed out the critical environmental benefits of biodiesel that could be lost if the tax incentive is not reinstated immediately.
Produced from a wide variety of abundant and regionally-diverse by-products from crop and livestock production, biodiesel cuts carbon pollution by as much as 86 percent, according to the U.S. EPA. It is less toxic than table salt and biodegrades as fast as sugar.
“As we all wait in dread for the Gulf oil slick to wreak devastation on some of the nation’s most sensitive wetland habitats, Congress’s inaction has left America’s nontoxic, biodegradable biofuel at risk of collapse,” he said.
Jobe says the inaction by the two chambers of Congress to reconcile their two versions of the bill that would save the nation’s first successful advanced biofuel is causing the loss of jobs every day.