EPA Should Recognize Roles of Biomass, Biotechnology in Mitigating Global Warming, BIO Says

The Environmental Protection Agency should recognize that carbon emissions from renewable biomass are fundamentally different from those of fossil fuels and that biotechnology can and must play a key role in mitigating fossil carbon emissions, the Biotechnology Industry Organization (BIO) noted today in response to the agency’s Carbon Pollution Emission Guidelines for Existing Stationary Sources: Electric Utility Generating Units. That recognition should carry through to the Proposed Standards of Performance for Greenhouse Gas Emissions from New Stationary Sources.

Brent Erickson, executive vice president of BIO’s Industrial & Environmental Section, stated, “EPA is missing an opportunity to give industry clear guidance that using sustainable biomass in energy generation mitigates greenhouse gas emissions by recycling atmospheric carbon. This is fundamentally different from the use of fossil resources that continuously add carbon to the atmosphere. Industrial biotechnology also provides tools – such as biological conversion of CO2 to fuels, chemicals and products - that can reuse waste CO2 emissions, and these tools should also be incorporated as a viable compliance option to reduce GHG emissions.”