The biofuel and airline industries continue to wait on the Treasury Department to issue some critical guidance that will determine which feedstocks can qualify for a new tax credit for sustainable aviation fuel. But an Energy Department official confirmed that the GREET model favored by the biofuel industry will be one of the options.
Speaking at an SAF conference Houston on Monday, DOE’s Jim Spaeth said the industry will have an option of the GREET model and a model developed by the International Civil Aviation Organization that is considered less favorable to agriculture.
“Both models will be options to use, whichever works best for your particular pathway,” said Spaeth, manager of the System Development and Integration Program in DOE’s Bioenergy Technologies Office.
By the way: The guidance was supposed to be released Sept. 15. But industry representatives say it now may be the end of the year at the earliest.
CR includes ‘clean’ ADUFA reauthorization
Congress approved over the weekend five-year reauthorizations for Animal Drug User Fee Act (ADUFA) and the Animal Generic Drug User Fee Act (AGDUFA) as part of the short-term spending bills that kept the government from shutting down. ADUFA allows FDA’s Center for Veterinary Medicine to collect fees from animal health companies, which fund the agency’s review and approval process for new animal drugs.
The National Cattlemen’s Beef Association welcomed the "clean" reauthorization of ADUFA. “Incredible veterinary drug innovations are happening every day, and ADUFA ensures that the FDA has the resources it needs to review these new technologies for safety and efficacy and to bring them to market for cattle producers,” says NCBA Chief Veterinarian Dr. Kathy Simmons.
The House’s ADUFA reauthorization legislation did not include the Senate’s approved Innovative FEED Act amendment, which was sought by many in the animal agriculture industry as a crucial way to enhance feed labeling claims that can explain environmental or dietary benefits of feed ingredients. Leah Wilkinson, American Feed Industry Association’s vice president of public policy and education, says the organizations will continue to seek other legislative vehicles for moving that forward this fall.
Denial of petition seeking testing of pesticide formulations criticized
The Center for Food Safety criticized EPA’s decision Friday declining to conduct testing on the risks of pesticide formulations and mixtures.
The denial of the 2017 petition “means the agency will instead continue to focus pesticide testing and data narrowly on ‘active’ ingredients while ignoring the real-world impacts of pesticide formulations and interactions,” CFS said.
In a statement, EPA’s Office of Pesticide Programs said additional testing “would not in general provide a better picture of the risks of a pesticide product.” The official response also cited the costs to applicant and registrant of testing 18,000 formulations.
The response also cited costs associated with using of animals for toxicity testing. “It is estimated that the testing battery would result in testing on approximately 5,000-7,000 animals per formulation for the requested human health toxicity testing, and around 9,000 animals for both human health and ecological toxicity testing,” EPA said.
Baldwin, Capito praise STB reciprocal switching proposal
Sens. Tammy Baldwin, D-Wis., and Shelley Moore Capito, R-W.V., on Monday praised a recent reciprocal switching proposal from the Surface Transportation Board, calling it “an appropriate next step that will improve rail service.”
The two senators said in a letter to Surface Transportation Board Chair Martin Oberman that the rule, which would allow shippers facing inadequate rail service to use a competitor on their typical provider’s tracks, was “long overdue,” noting their concerns about service challenges that shippers have faced on rail networks in recent years.
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“We simply cannot afford to have widespread rail service disruptions upending operations for thousands of rail shippers,” they wrote. “Given the recent trends of poor rail service, now is the time for the board to move toward a final rule."
Seafood groups ask lawmakers for more inclusion in USDA programs
A number of groups across the seafood industry are urging Congress to give the Agriculture Department a stronger role in overseeing programs that impact them, saying their sector “faces challenges similar to those that confront American farmers and ranchers.”
The groups, in a letter to leaders of the House and Senate Agriculture Committees, said the U.S. seafood supply chain is feeling the weight of “crushing market shifts, cost burdens, supply chain vulnerabilities and foreign market access challenges.” They said U.S. seafood producers “too often ‘slip through the cracks’ of federal policy support.”
They called for lawmakers to create an Office of Seafood Policy and Program Integration in USDA’s office of the Chief Economist, push the agency to utilize more seafood in nutrition programs, and make fishermen and seafood producers eligible for USDA grant and loan programs.
He said it. “We all want to decarbonize. The challenge is no one really wants to pay the costs for it.” – Aaron Robinson, vice president for sustainable aviation fuel-U.S., with the International Airlines Group, which owns British Airways and several other European airlines. He was talking at a SAF conference in Houston about the industry’s challenge in paying for reducing greenhouse gas emissions.
Correction: Agri-Pulse previous reported that a USMCA panel had been formed to rule on the U.S.-Mexico dispute over genetically modified corn. An administration official says the panel will be formed, but there are procedural delays.
Philip Brasher, Jacqui Fatka, Steve Davies and Noah Wicks contributed to this report. Questions, comments, tips? Email bill@agri-pulse.com
