The Biogenic CO2 Coalition

In Washington, a coalition of major agricultural groups petitioned the Environmental Protection Agency on October 14, 2016 to reconsider its proposed Aircraft Rule with respect to the Agency’s treatment of biogenic carbon dioxide emissions from short-cycle annual herbaceous crops.

The Biogenic CO2 Coalition objects to EPA’s failure to acknowledge the science of life cycle analysis, which shows that emissions of crop-derived CO2from bioenergy or processing of farm products do not contribute to elevated atmospheric concentrations of greenhouse gases.

In contrast to CO2 added to the atmosphere by burning fossil fuels, farmers capture CO2 from the atmosphere when growing the crops used in bioenergy and bioproducts.

EPA’s recent rulemaking is a first step in imposing greenhouse gas emissions limits on aircraft engines under Section 231 of the federal Clean Air Act, but the agency has refused to acknowledge greenhouse gas reductions achieved by the use of agricultural biofuels.  The Coalition’s petition for reconsideration focuses on two critical flaws in the Aircraft Rule:
1.       EPA’s Treatment of Biogenic Emissions – Because EPA has refused to recognize the fundamental distinction between crop-derived biogenic emissions and fossil fuel emissions, the Aircraft Rule is illegal to the extent that EPA has adopted default treatment of crop-derived CO2 which penalizes biogenic emissions by considering these emissions to be equivalent to fossil fuel emissions. EPA is putting regulation before science, and as a result the rule is arbitrary and capricious.
2.       EPA’s Regulation of Farm Practices –   In its Clean Power Plan, which regulates CO2 from electric power plants, EPA announced its intention to regulate “sustainable” practices on the farm field, as a condition to qualifying agricultural bioenergy.  To the extent that the approach EPA has intimated in the Clean Power Plan is extended to the Aircraft Rule, such an approach would be similarly unacceptable.  EPA has no legal authority to regulate American farm production under the federal Clean Air Act or impose a national sustainability program for farm products.

The Coalition specifically requested that EPA take the following actions on a priority basis: (1) categorically exclude from the Aircraft Rule endangerment and cause and contribute finding those CO2 emissions resulting from the combustion of biofuels derived from annual herbaceous crops; and (2) expressly confirm that such exclusion prevents any standard of performance for aircraft resulting from any endangerment or cause or contribute finding from making such CO2 “a pollutant subject to regulation” for purposes of the PSD and Title V permitting programs under the Clean Air Act.  In the event that EPA is unwilling to exclude such CO2 emissions categorically, the Coalition requests that EPA: (1) complete the development of its Biogenic Accounting Framework; (2) establish a default Biogenic Accounting Factor (BAF) of zero for such CO2 emissions; and (3) incorporate that BAF into any findings or standards under the Aircraft Rule.