Backdoor Gas Tax Called Green Energy “Investment”

CAGW | July 29, 2012 

Imagine if the government passed a law requiring you to purchase either a specified number of pink elephants or government-issued “pink elephant credits.”  This is, in essence, what the government is doing to oil companies, explains CAGW Intern Maddie Eldridge on CAGW’s “Swine Line” blog.  The seeds of this nonsensical policy were sown in the 2007 Energy Independence and Security Act, which required oil companies, starting in 2010, to purchase a specified volume of cellulosic biofuels, or fuel made from non-food crops and plant matter.  The fuels were intended to be mixed with conventional gasoline, thereby ostensibly reducing environmental pollution.  The only problem is, despite more than $1 billion in taxpayer handouts to date, not a single gallon of cellulosic biofuel has been brought to market due to “significant hurdles [that] must be overcome before commercial-scale production can occur,” according to the Congressional Research Service.   As a result, oil companies have been forced to purchase Environmental Protection Agency-issued “waiver credits” in lieu of the actual fuels – a cost that is ultimately borne by American consumers at the pump.  Read more about the cellulosic biofuel mandate’s unintended consequences.


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