Renewable fuel groups have asked the nation’s highest bench to rule that a federal appeals court in Washington is the exclusive venue for legal battles over biofuels blending.
In a Supreme Court petition filed Monday, Growth Energy and the Renewable Fuels Association wrote that a recent victory for small refineries in the Louisiana-based 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals “will have serious deleterious consequences” for the Clean Air Act’s Renewable Fuel Program and other federal environmental programs.
“Local review of such actions will produce duplicative efforts and potentially inconsistent results, undermining Congress’s substantive objectives, whipsawing EPA, and leaving regulated entities subject to different rules solely because of the circuit in which they happened to be located,” the groups wrote.
The petition, obtained by POLITICO, came in response to a 2-1 ruling last year from the 5th Circuit that found EPA unlawfully rejected exemptions for small refineries that said they would face economic hardship if they were required to meet federal biofuel blending requirements.
