Ethanol Group Asks U.S. Supreme Court To Allow Year-Round Sale Of E15

Growth Energy has filed an appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court, asking the Court to review a D.C. Circuit opinion (American Fuel & Petrochemical Manufacturers, et al. vs. EPA) in which the D.C. Circuit overturned a 2019 Trump era rule allowing year-round sales of E15.

The federal Clean Air Act prohibits the summertime sale of gasoline whose volatility, measured in Reid Vapor Pressure, exceeds 9 pounds per square inch. Blending ethanol into gasoline increases volatility.

In order to allow the sale of E10 year-round, the Clean Air Act includes an ethanol waiver that increases the summertime volatility limit by 1 pound per square inch for fuel blends containing gasoline blended with 10 percent ethanol.

However, the statutory language clearly limits the one-pound waiver to E10 maximum blends, as lower courts have previously ruled.

Growth Energy is asking the Court to determine whether EPA may interpret the RVP waiver provisions to apply to E10.

The D.C. Circuit decision overturned EPA’s interpretation of a provision of the Clean Air Act that extended a waiver of limits on RVP, a measure of fuel volatility, to E15.

Growth Energy argues that the decision did not give proper deference to EPA, contradicted Congressional intent in promoting renewable fuels, and would suppress the expansion of higher-blend renewable fuels in the future.

The Supreme Court has yet to decide whether they will hear the case.

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