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California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger received at least two more letters this week protesting the state’s proposed Low Carbon Fuel Standard (LCFS).

Over 65 retired members of the U.S. armed forces and intelligence community wrote to the governor about their concerns that applying the LCFS in its current state would penalize renewable fuels to the benefit of petroleum and other fossil fuel.

This is not simply a scientific or environmental matter. It is a matter of national security, which is threatened by our reliance on oil and the effects of climate change. That is why we, as former members of the United States armed forces and intelligence services are writing to you on this important subject. Biofuels play a critical role in breaking our dependence on oil and mitigating the impact of climate change. The links between national security, fossil fuels, and climate change are many and they are severe.

The letter, which came through the Truman National Security Project, concluded, “We are calling on the state of California to lend us a hand in keeping America safe by enacting a fuel regulation that is unbiased and does not enforce indirect carbon effects against only one type of fuel.”

Meanwhile, the president of the American Farm Bureau Federation also wrote to Gov. Schwarzenegger this week, calling for a “level playing field” in the development of that state’s Low Carbon Fuel Standard (LCFS).

AFBF president Bob Stallman noted that the agricultural community is eager to play a central role in the increased use of biofuels, but warned, “If adopted as currently proposed, the LCFS will uniformly dissuade the production and use of all forms of biofuels that utilize land and undercut what is a tremendous opportunity to spur economic growth in agricultural communities and reduce carbon emissions with American farming.”

Senators from ethanol producing states are asking the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) not to propose regulations assuming that greater U.S. biofuels use would increase carbon dioxide emissions.

Senator Charles Grassley (R-IA) spoke on the Senate floor about the issue on Monday, following a letter sent by 12 senators to EPA administrator Lisa Jackson last week.

Grassley expressed fears that EPA is “going down a path of blaming our biofuels producers for land use changes around the globe.”

I’m afraid the climate folks at the EPA are heading in the wrong direction on this. I don’t think they’re bad people, but I’m afraid they don’t understand how American agriculture works. I don’t think they’re aware of the significant crop yield improvements we’ve seen in recent years or the great potential over the next 20 years. I also don’t think they fully understand the benefit of valuable ethanol byproducts, which further reduce the effective land used for fuels production. It defies common sense that the EPA would publish a proposed rulemaking with harmful conclusions for biofuels based on incomplete science and inaccurate assumptions.

Grassley is urging President Obama to take an active role in the issue and keep a close eye on what EPA is doing with regard to indirect land use calculations.