By Stephanie Kelly and Jarrett Renshaw
NEW YORK (Reuters) - America's biggest biofuel companies plan to ask President-elect Joe Biden to impose a nationwide standard to reduce carbon emissions from transport fuels, according to five sources familiar with the matter, and hope to preserve a role for products like ethanol amid the fight against climate change.
The planned push from the biofuel industry reflects its increasing concern about the future as Biden prepares measures to slash emissions that could upend traditional energy markets, and as the federal regulation that has underpinned growth in the biofuel market for more than a decade - the Renewable Fuel Standard - nears expiry in its current form.
Officials from biofuel companies and trade groups like POET LLC, Pacific Ethanol, and the Renewable Fuels Association teamed up with representatives from the agriculture, autos, and electricity industries to draft a letter to Biden urging a nationwide "clean fuel standard," the sources said.
It was not clear which groups had signed the final letter.
Such a rule would require reductions in the amount of greenhouse gas emissions emitted through the production, transport and combustion of fuels, but would allow for flexibility for how those goals are achieved - including through the purchase of carbon credits generated by companies like electrical vehicle producers.
"A federal clean fuels policy is crucial to provide a durable price signal for clean fuels deployment, including electricity, hydrogen, biofuels, and others, across the country," the letter, seen by Reuters, said. The group planned to send the letter soon, the sources said.
Biofuel producers claim the carbon intensity of their fuels is low, mainly because they are produced from renewable crops like corn and other organic materials.
Transportation is the largest source of greenhouse gas emissions in the United States, ahead of the power industry, and will be a target for Biden as he seeks to deliver on a campaign promise to bring the country to net-zero emissions by 2050.
California already has a Low Carbon Fuel Standard, and the head of the state's environmental body overseeing the program, Mary Nichols, is on Biden's short list to run the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency.
"There is growing consensus among the biofuel community that there is a lot of promise for ethanol and other renewable fuels in a national LCFS (Low Carbon Fuel Standard) program that is truly tech- and fuel-neutral," one source familiar with the industry's deliberations said.