Biofuels, once touted by environmentalists as a way to cut pollution, are now seeing support fade as the Renewable Fuel Standard (RFS), a program that puts renewable fuels in cars, has been linked by some to higher-than-expected carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions and reduced wildlife habitat.
More than 10 years after conservationists helped persuade Congress to require adding corn-based ethanol and other biofuels to gasoline, some groups now say the resulting agricultural runoff in waterways and conversion of prairies to cropland have dampened their enthusiasm for the program.
"The big green groups that got invested in biofuels are tacitly realizing the blunder," said John DeCicco, a research professor at the University of Michigan Energy Institute. He previously focused on automotive strategies at the Environmental Defense Fund (EDF). "It’s really hard for the people who really -- shall we say -- hate oil viscerally, to think that this alternative that we’ve been promoting is today worse than oil." That statement is staunchly opposed by RFS supporters, who say naysayers cherry-pick their observations.
The backlash from environmental groups could boost long-stalled congressional efforts to overhaul the RFS, including proposals to limit the amount of traditional, corn-based ethanol that counts toward the mandate, as environmentalists side with anti-hunger groups and the oil industry in calling for change.
The RFS forces refiners to blend steadily increasing amounts of biofuel into the gas supply. Most of the mandate is currently met by corn-based ethanol, which makes up nearly 10% of US gasoline and provides oxygen that helps the fuel burn cleaner.
The Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC) said in a 2004 report that increased use of biofuels would slash global warming emissions, improve air quality and increase wildlife habitat.
Instead, RFS opponents now allege, farmers converted millions of acres of prairie grasses to grow corn for making ethanol, with fertilizer runoff contributing to a dead zone in the Gulf of Mexico. Scientists found that CO2 emissions associated with corn-based ethanol were higher than expected. And alternatives using switchgrass, algae and other non-edible plant materials have yet to see broad commercial viability.
"The ethanol policy was sold to environmentalists as something that was going to clean up the environment, and it’s done anything but," said Rep. Peter Welch, D-Vt., who is co-sponsoring legislation to revamp the RFS. "It’s truly been a flop. The environmental promise has been transformed into an environmental detriment."
Collin O’Mara, president of the National Wildlife Federation (NWF), told a House committee last month that the RFS program, created with "good intentions," has instead wreaked "severe, unintended consequences," including the loss of prairie land and water-supply damage that threatens wildlife.
Even the NRDC which once strongly supported the RFS now acknowledges "the bulk of today’s conventional corn ethanol carries grave risks to the climate, wildlife, waterways and food security."
NRDC spokesman Ed Chen said the group continues to monitor the RFS "because low-carbon cellulosic biofuels can play an important role in reducing transportation pollution,” but added that the organization is "far more focused" on other carbon-cutting strategies with more immediate climate payoffs.
Biofuel industry groups counter that alternative sources of fuel are still clearly worse for the environment. "In the absence of ethanol, your next barrel of transportation fuel is going to be coming from petroleum from fracking or tar sands or deep-water drilling," Bob Dinneen, president of the Renewable Fuels Association (RFA), said in a phone interview with Bloomberg. "So you sort of have to assess ethanol in the context of what its replacement would be, and quite frankly, by that measurement we are the stone-cold winner."