 One group backing the RFS, Fuels America, announced last week it was launching a
“seven-figure TV and digital ad campaign” pressuring the Obama administration to
enforce the standard as written.
A group firmly opposed to the RFS, Smarter Fuel Future, has started “a
significant ad buy” in Washington D.C., Ohio, Massachusetts, Vermont and New
Hampshire.
This group wants the president to ditch the standard.
A source told Watchdog.org the Smarter Fuel Future media effort represents “a
multi-million dollar campaign.”
The hardest-hitting video ads are found in D.C. taxis. In the ads, the Americans
for Energy Security and Innovation — a staunch supporter of the RFS — calls
Obama a hypocrite.
Watchdog.org asked Jim Talent, AESI’s chairman and a former Republican senator
from Missouri, whether his group had second thoughts about going after Obama
with such fervor.
Talent, in response, doubled down.
“Americans for Energy Security and Innovation will not hesitate to call out
President Obama and his administration’s hypocritical efforts to gut the RFS,”
Talent said in an email.
“President Obama once called the RFS a key part our national energy strategy but
now he wants to weaken it. President Obama says that he wants to make greenhouse
gas emission reductions a key part of his legacy but now he is letting his EPA
roll back a successful policy that has displaced fossil fuels with clean-burning
biofuels. His hypocrisy is stunning.”
AESI hasn’t revealed its budget for the taxi-cab spots.
On the other end of the spectrum, Smarter Fuel Future is running its own
commercial, referencing Obama and invoking Al Gore:
The RFS has been around since 2005, passed by Congress and signed into law by
then-President George W. Bush as a way to reduce the country’s reliance on oil
and promote biofuels.
The standard requires the blending of ethanol into the nation’s gasoline supply.
That’s why you commonly see a sticker at gas pumps declaring the presence of E10
— meaning the gas there contains 10 percent ethanol.
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 In the law’s 10 years, RFS supporters say, it has fulfilled many
of its goals, helped the environment and is on its way to helping
advanced biofuels get foothold in the nation’s fuel mix.
Conversely, opponents say it has developed into a big-government
giveaway to the Corn Belt — most ethanol produced is corn-based —
and distorts energy markets. They insist anticipated breakthroughs
in advanced biofuels are a mirage.
Critics say the RFS is losing support from environmental groups;
supporters say their opponents are funded by big oil companies that
don’t want competition.
But why the media push now?
Two big reasons:
First, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency in a little more
than three weeks must decide on the amount of ethanol placed in the
nation’s gasoline supply for 2016.
EPA is expected to reduce the amount from 22.25 billion gallons to
17.4 billion gallons.
That ticks off the RFS supporters, who are trying their best to
pressure the Obama administration to restore the level.
But RFS opponents want the standard eliminated — or, at least
significantly reformed.
Second, Obama is heading to the international climate talks in
Paris, set Nov. 30-Dec. 11, and both sides on the RFS fight are
pushing their agendas ahead of the meeting.
Hence the flurry of TV ads.
“RFS advocates frequently point to air quality and greenhouse gas
benefits of corn ethanol vis-à-vis gasoline, although the majority
of scientific studies don’t support that claim,” David Banks,
executive vice president of the American Council for Capital
Formation, and a member of Smarter Fuel Future, told the Oil Price
Information Service.
“We hope to shed light on this fact, as the administration prepares
for the international climate meeting in Paris. If President Obama
is serious about reducing U.S. greenhouse gas emissions, he should
support reform or repeal of the RFS.”
The 30-second commercial from the pro-RFS Fuels America group also
features Obama, but it’s not nearly as critical as the AESI spot:
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