BioFuelsDigest.com:
Jim Lane
EIA forecasts paints gloomy fuel price projection: $8.68 gasoline, $268 crude oil by 2040.
Despite more pain at the pump, EIA cuts back sharply on projections for flex-fuel and all-electric vehicles. Where are the alternatives?
When six press releases arrive from the biofuels community in the space of two hours, offering perspective and caution on the US Energy Information Administration’s annual energy outlook (through 2040) – you can figure that there’s a grenade in there aimed at biofuels.
Here in Digestville, we’d rather not work off yesterday’s 16-page early release, but wait for the final release in the springtime of the EIA’s case. But Washington rarely waits for the final data to come in to get a dogfight going — so let’s look at the controversies, and other elements in the report.
Bombshell #1
The report’s executive summary gets right into it:
“The AEO2013 projection is less optimistic than AEO2012 about the ability of advanced biofuels to capture a rapidly growing share of the liquid fuels market. As a result, biomass use in AEO2013 totals 4.2 quadrillion Btu in 2035 (compared to 5.4 quadrillion Btu in AEO2012) and 4.9 quadrillion Btu in 2040, up from 2.7 quadrillion Btu in 2011.”
The EIA adds: “While total liquid fuels consumption falls, consumption of domestically produced biofuels increases significantly, from 1.3 quadrillion Btu in 2011 to 2.1 quadrillion Btu in 2040, and its share of total U.S. liquid fuels consumption grows from 3.5 percent in 2011 to 5.8 percent in 2040. The increases are much smaller than those in AEO2012, however, as a result of diminished FFV penetration, a smaller motor gasoline pool for blending ethanol, and reduced production of cellulosic biofuels, which to date has been well under the targets set by the EISA. (EPA issued waivers that substantially reduced the cellulosic biofuels obligation under the RFS for 2010, 2011, and 2012.) In addition, the production tax credit for cellulosic biofuels is scheduled to expire at the end of 2012.”
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Jim Lane
EIA forecasts paints gloomy fuel price projection: $8.68 gasoline, $268 crude oil by 2040.
Despite more pain at the pump, EIA cuts back sharply on projections for flex-fuel and all-electric vehicles. Where are the alternatives?
When six press releases arrive from the biofuels community in the space of two hours, offering perspective and caution on the US Energy Information Administration’s annual energy outlook (through 2040) – you can figure that there’s a grenade in there aimed at biofuels.
Here in Digestville, we’d rather not work off yesterday’s 16-page early release, but wait for the final release in the springtime of the EIA’s case. But Washington rarely waits for the final data to come in to get a dogfight going — so let’s look at the controversies, and other elements in the report.
Bombshell #1
The report’s executive summary gets right into it:
“The AEO2013 projection is less optimistic than AEO2012 about the ability of advanced biofuels to capture a rapidly growing share of the liquid fuels market. As a result, biomass use in AEO2013 totals 4.2 quadrillion Btu in 2035 (compared to 5.4 quadrillion Btu in AEO2012) and 4.9 quadrillion Btu in 2040, up from 2.7 quadrillion Btu in 2011.”
The EIA adds: “While total liquid fuels consumption falls, consumption of domestically produced biofuels increases significantly, from 1.3 quadrillion Btu in 2011 to 2.1 quadrillion Btu in 2040, and its share of total U.S. liquid fuels consumption grows from 3.5 percent in 2011 to 5.8 percent in 2040. The increases are much smaller than those in AEO2012, however, as a result of diminished FFV penetration, a smaller motor gasoline pool for blending ethanol, and reduced production of cellulosic biofuels, which to date has been well under the targets set by the EISA. (EPA issued waivers that substantially reduced the cellulosic biofuels obligation under the RFS for 2010, 2011, and 2012.) In addition, the production tax credit for cellulosic biofuels is scheduled to expire at the end of 2012.”
MORE