By Leah Douglas

Aug 7 (Reuters) - The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency has actually released investigations into the supply chains of a minimum of two renewable amid market concerns that some might be using deceptive feedstocks for biodiesel to secure lucrative government aids.

EPA representative Jeffrey Landis informed Reuters that the agency has actually released audits over the previous year, however declined to identify the business targeted due to the fact that the investigations are ongoing.

The production of biodiesel from sustainable ingredients, like utilized cooking oil, can earn refiners a variety of state and federal environmental and climate aids, including tradable credits under a program administered by the EPA called the Renewable Fuel Standard. But worries have actually been mounting that some materials identified as used cooking oil are actually less expensive and less sustainable virgin palm oil, a product that is connected with logging and other ecological damage.

The issue entered into focus following a surge in utilized cooking oil exports from Asia recently that experts have actually stated includes unrealistically high volumes relative to the quantity of cooking oil used and recuperated in the area. The European Union is likewise investigating feedstocks over the scams concerns.

The EPA audits began after the agency upgraded domestic supply-chain accounting requirements in July 2023 for eco-friendly fuel producers looking for to earn credits under the RFS, he said.

“EPA has actually carried out audits of eco-friendly fuel manufacturers given that July 2023 that includes, among other things, an assessment of the places that used cooking oil used in sustainable fuel production was gathered,” he stated. “These investigations, however, are continuous and we are unable to talk about continuous enforcement examinations.”

U.S. senators from farm states have actually required more oversight of biofuel feedstocks, stating federal firms ought to be as strenuous in validating imports as they are auditing domestic supply chains.

“The Biden administration has actually developed energetic standards to validate, not simply trust, American producers, and it is essential that the very same analysis is applied to imported feedstocks,” 6 U.S. senators, led by Roger Marshall and Sherrod Brown, composed in a June 20 letter to federal companies.

Another letter from 15 senators to the Treasury Department on July 30 advised the administration to exclude imported feedstocks like UCO from an additional tidy fuel tax credit program passed in the Inflation Reduction Act. (Reporting by Leah Douglas in Washington Editing by Richard Valdmanis and Matthew Lewis)