ACE highlights importance of GHG credits

The American Coalition for Ethanol (ACE) sent a letter to members of the Sustainable Aviation Fuels (SAF) Interagency Working Group (IWG) regarding the Greenhouse Gases, Regulated Emissions, and Energy Use in Technologies (GREET) Model for SAF Lifecycle Greenhouse Gas (GHG) Emissions under Section 40B of the Inflation Reduction Act.
Accompanying ACE’s letter was an analysis prepared by Ron Alverson of the ACE board of directors comparing modeled estimates of land use change (LUC) to what has occurred in the real world.
ACE’s letter was sent to United States Department of Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack, Department of Energy Secretary Jennifer Granholm, Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Michael Regan, Federal Aviation Administration Administrator Michael Whitaker, and Department of Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen.
These officials compromise the SAF Interagency Working Group.
ACE’s letter cautions President Biden’s pledge that farmers would be providing 95% of SAF in the next 20 years could go unfulfilled if 40B GREET artificially inflates LUC and fails to properly value climate-smart agriculture practices.
“As the much-anticipated deadline nears for 40B GREET for SAF, I stress the importance of GHG credits for climate-smart agriculture practices and a final methodology based on real-world observations of land use change instead of inflated assumptions generated from unreliable economic models,” Jennings wrote.
“ACE believes carbon credits for climate-smart agriculture are essential because they incentivise on-farm practices, which can reduce or even prevent land use change-related emissions,” Jennings stated in the letter.
The ACE letter also references a recent USDA decision to provide $25 million (€23 million) for a Regional Conservation Partnership Programme (RCPP) led by ACE.
The funding will help farmers adopt reduced tillage, nutrient management and cover crops on nearly 100,000 acres across 167 counties surrounding 13 ethanol facilities partnering with ACE in a 10-state region of Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, Minnesota, Missouri, Nebraska, Ohio, South Dakota and Wisconsin.