Government Seeks MTBE End

March 21, 2000

The Environmental Protection Agency wants the use of MTBE in gasoline either significantly reduced or eliminated. EPA will take two approaches: one is regulatory, the other is legislative to accomplish that goal. But the end result does not guarantee ethanol will be the sole replacement for MTBE which has been branded a pollutant.

EPA Administrator Carol Browner Monday said the agency will issue an advanced notice of proposed rulemaking to ban MTBE from gasoline. "This is the best tool legally available (to EPA) for eliminating the use of MTBE," she said.Along with that, EPA will send Congress legislation to amend the Clean Air Act to eliminate or significantly reduce MTBE use and ask Congress to strengthen the Clean Air Act to "guarantee that the clean air benefits from the cleaner fuels program are preserved," said Browner.

Congress also will be asked to remove the oxygenate requirement from the Clean Air Act and replace it with a "flexible national standard for the use of ethanol and other renewables in our gasoline," Browner added.EPA's action does not address the waiver from the oxygenate requirement sought by California. Browner said that is a separate issue that is being  dealt with apart from either the regulatory or congressional approach to MTBE.

Agriculture Secretary Dan Glickman, appearing with Browner at a news conference, said he believed that approach would mean that ethanol production "would be equal to or greater than the growth that would come if ethanol simply replaced MTBE."Using ethanol as the MTBE replacement has been a goal of ethanol industry supporters. "The most effective means of protecting both air and water quality would be to preserve the existing reformulated gasoline standards and replace MTBE with ethanol nationwide," said Renewable Fuels Association President Eric Vaughn. "The ethanol industry stands ready to ease the transition from MTBE to ethanol," Vaughn continued. "Let me make this absolutely clear: ethanol can supply the entire RFG market and ensure both clean air and clean water."

However, Glickman made it clear that other farm product additives would get a chance to complete for the RFG market. USDA will provide up to $400 million in fiscal years 2000-02 to expand production of biobased fuels, he said. "We need to look at the current challenge as an opportunity and provide a comprehensive proactive solution that will provide a stronger framework for ethanol and renewable fuels use." A national renewable fuel average, said Glickman, would begin at the current level of ethanol use and "encourage substantial new production in the future." Kansas Farm Bureau President Stan Ahlerich said in a statement issued Monday,  "Ethanol is a proven commodity, and if we don't reduce our need for foreign oil, the U.S. economy, including the agriculture economy, is at the mercy of foreign suppliers." He said he would work in Congress to achieve increased ethanol use.