California Anti-Ethanol Suit Brings Responses

August 15, 2001

California filed a lawsuit Friday against the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency requesting that the agency waive regulations requiring the addition of ethanol to the state's gasoline supply. State officials contend that the requirement will do more harm than good, raising gasoline prices and increasing air pollution. The action brought sharp responses from two pro-ethanol groups.

A 1999 National Academies' report concluded that the use of MTBE or ethanol in reformulated gasoline has little impact on reducing smog, and that ethanol blends can actually increase ozone-forming vehicle emissions.

However, Bob Dinneen, president of the Renewable Fuels Association, said the challenge is "an exercise in futility. The forces attempting to undermine the oxygen standard lost with the Clinton EPA, lost with the Bush EPA, lost in the Congress, and will now lose in federal court. No amount of posturing and rhetoric can change the fact that the science supports maintaining the oxygen standard."

The decision to file the lawsuit was based on "state politics, not its legal or technical merits," Dinneen added. "With this lawsuit, the state of California is asking the court to overturn the technical and scientific conclusions of EPA experts. That is something courts have almost never done. This lawsuit will only discourage the very real opportunities for ethanol production within California and inject further uncertainty into the marketplace that hurts California consumers."

National Corn Grower Association (NCGA) leaders said they were "disappointed" by the lawsuit. "California's request for special exemption from the law has been rejected on three fronts," noted Lee Klein, president of NCGA and a farmer from Battle Creek, Neb. "The Clinton Administration didn't grant the waiver; the U.S. EPA under the Bush Administration denied the waiver request because it lacked the scientific basis; and the will of the people of the United States, as expressed in the recent House of Representatives vote of 300 to 125, rejected the request for exemption from the law."

Klein added, "We expect that Californians will recognize the environmental and economic benefits of the renewable energy source, ethanol. Corn growers produce the major raw material of ethanol, corn, and own much of the ethanol production. In these roles we are committed to providing a key component of energy security for the entire United States."