Refining, Biofuel Groups Implore Trump to Resolve E15, SRE Uncertainty

A coalition of groups representing the refining, renewable fuel and fuel retail industries implored President Trump in a Thursday letter to offer “long-term policy certainty” on issues central to their members, including year-round access to E15 at the pump and the oft-controversial small refinery exemption (SRE) program under the Renewable Fuel Standard.

In the letter, the American Petroleum Institute (API), the Renewable Fuels Association, Growth Energy, NATSO, SIGMA, and the National Association of Convenience Stores, said the president should support legislation “that brings lasting certainty to these fuels issues and supports a stable, efficient marketplace.”

The outreach comes after California became the last state to sign E15 access into law in October, which was long seen as one of the largest impediments to finally ensuring access year-round nationwide. And yet, an even larger barrier remains — as the Clean Air Act still forbids blending of E15 at most pumps throughout the country during the summer driving period that spans June 1 to Sept. 15. That provisional carveout has survived a litany of efforts from members of Congress and the White House over the years to nix it from the law, but the votes have never been robust enough to do so via a standalone bill.

Other efforts to attach E15 summertime access to omnibus legislation have been more successful in recent years, yet budget constraints have often resulted in those provisions being cleaved from the larger omnibus before reaching the president’s desk.

The groups warned the president in their letter against continued failure to offer permanent year-round access, noting that “unpredictable short term waivers, seasonal and geographic restrictions, and regionally unique summer gasoline specifications in the Midwest have created a shifting regulatory environment that complicates planning and investment.”

Short-term waivers have essentially become the norm for E15 access in recent years, as the federal government offered a series of 20-day waivers throughout the summer driving period in 2022, 2023, 2024 and 2025 under the rationale that fuel supplies had been constrained by the ongoing conflicts in Ukraine and the Middle East.

But those temporary waivers have often confounded investment and compliance planning for their industries, the groups said.

“Legislation allowing the year-round, nationwide sale of E15 would improve fungibility and substantially reduce many of the complexities that arise for our industries as we operate in a national marketplace,” the groups said.

The groups also asked that the president resolve issues with the small refinery exemption (SRE) program, which has long been a bane for their industries.

“The current SRE structure has encouraged a system of winners and losers that distorts the marketplace, creates instability, and ultimately, hurts consumers,” the groups said. “A more consistent and narrowly applied SRE structure would create a far more predictable regulatory environment.”

The EPA, which is tasked with administering the SRE program, recently cleared a significant accumulation of prior-year waiver petitions from their books in August, while also offering a new framework for determining petitions.

But that new framework offered fresh uncertainty for stakeholders, as the agency said it would consider offering partial exemptions and indicated that it would seek to reallocate certain waived volumes in a future rule. The agency issued its proposal for that subsequent rule in September, in which EPA said it intends on reallocating volumes waived through 56 approved SRE’s for the 2023 and 2024 compliance years across the 2026 and 2027 RVOs.

While the groups did not touch on the topic of reallocation, they seemed to indicate that the president should reduce the number of SREs granted altogether and offer “a more consistent and narrowly applied SRE structure…” to the program that “would create a far more predictable regulatory environment.”

Addressing both issues through clear legislation, the groups said, “would provide a more coherent and durable policy foundation, reduce volatility, and enhance confidence for all participants in the transportation fuel sector.”

Notably, the American Fuel & Petrochemical Manufacturers (AFPM), which has at times differed with API over the issue of SREs, did not sign on to the Thursday letter. OPIS reached out to AFPM for comment on Thursday but did not hear back by time of publish.

–Reporting by Patrick Newkumet, pnewkumet@opisnet.com