The Renewable Fuels Association has filed petitions in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit challenging two rounds of small refinery exemptions (SREs) granted by the Environmental Protection Agency last month.
On August 3, EPA granted SREs for the 2023 and 2024 RFS compliance years totaling 160 million RINs. Then on August 31, EPA granted 29 more SREs for the 2025 compliance year, exempting 1.76 billion RINs, which is the second-highest exempted volume in the RFS program’s history.
“These exemptions are unjustified and based on flawed analysis by the Department of Energy,” said RFA President and CEO Geoff Cooper. “We intend to challenge these decisions vigorously. EPA’s own analyses show that RIN compliance costs are passed through to wholesale fuel buyers, meaning small refineries are not bearing a disproportionate burden. Congress never intended the SRE program to be a permanent entitlement for highly profitable oil refining companies.”
This action follows RFA’s ongoing challenge to two rounds of SREs granted in August and November 2025. Briefing in those consolidated cases is underway and involves the same core legal issues, including EPA’s methodology for evaluating disproportionate economic hardship under of the Clean Air Act. “The D.C. Circuit is already considering these same legal questions in the case regarding SREs granted in late 2025,” said Cooper. “Our new filing ensures the August 2026 exemptions are properly preserved for judicial review while allowing the court to resolve the fundamental legal issues first.”
RFA notes that while EPA announced in August its intent to propose reallocating 100 percent of the newly exempted 2025 SRE volumes into the 2026 and 2027 renewable volume obligations, that proposal has not yet been published. In addition, the March 2026 final RFS rule, which addressed the earlier rounds of 2023–2025 exemptions, reallocated only 70 percent of those exempted volumes. Cooper said RFA continues to believe that full reallocation is needed to prevent net demand destruction for renewable fuels and that the SRE program requires fundamental reform.