IN COMMUNICATIONS

Growth Energy Launches E15 Year-Round Action Center

Last Friday, Growth Energy launched our E15 year-round action center, where you can submit a comment to EPA in support of its proposed rule to allow year-round sales of E15. Filling out the form to send a comment to EPA only takes 30 seconds, and is a huge part of making sure our voice is heard in the rulemaking process!

The deadline to comment is April 29, 2019, so we need your help in getting the word out. Sharing on your social media profile is made easy with our social media toolkit, found here. Our toolkit includes graphics and suggested social media posts to help get E15 year-round across the finish line.

Growth Energy's Social Media Toolkit makes posting on your own channels easy. Check out how our members have helped spread the word above or by following #E15YearRound on twitter, where you can retweet other members.

Growth Energy to Testify Before EPA on E15 Year-Round

Tomorrow, Growth Energy CEO Emily Skor and Vice President of Regulatory Affairs Chris Bliley will be in Ypsilanti, MI, to comment before EPA on the proposed rule. Growth Energy will be on site with key industry stakeholders expressing support for lifting summertime RVP restrictions for E15. Stay tuned next week for a recap of events.

For more details, contact Vice President of Communications and Public Affairs, Elizabeth Funderburk.

IN REGULATIONS

State-level Ethanol Updates:

For more details, contact Vice President of Regulatory Affairs, Chris Bliley.

AT THE PUMP

Last year, Growth Energy embarked on a mission, alongside our retail partners, to understand consumer sentiment around E15, with a collective goal of selling more E15. With that goal in mind, Growth Energy established the best practices to optimize sales of E15 fuel by creating a marketing guide and brand for E15 fuel. E15, like any consumer product, needed a cohesive marketing strategy, and, after extensive consumer research and in-market testing, Growth Energy and Prime the Pump retail partners embraced a new identity for E15 at the pump—Unleaded 88.

Before this change, E15 had many different names from retailer to retailer and didn’t clearly embody what consumers look for when purchasing fuel. When we began to engage with consumers directly on how to best market E15, they told us to treat it like any other fuel at the pump. As a result, our association arrived at Unleaded 88 as a way to communicate the octane of the fuel in the way consumers are used to seeing it and are comfortable purchasing.

To learn more about how Growth Energy worked with Prime the Pump to establish a national identity for E15 fuel, read the full story from Growth Energy's Mike O'Brien in EPM here.

For more details, contact Vice President of Market Development, Mike O'Brien.

IN OUR ASSOCIATION

Formed in 2015, the Wisconsin Biofuels Association represents members of the Wisconsin renewable fuels industry within the state. The association focuses on promoting the acceptance and use of ethanol, biodiesel, and their co-products in the state of Wisconsin and is comprised of both producer and associate members.

This past week, the Wisconsin Biofuels Association ran a 60 second radio ad on the Bill Michaels sports talk show on 107.5FM 'The Fan'. But, in a surprise turn of events, Michaels didn't just plug the Wisconsin Biofuels Association, he went off script to convey a personal story about the benefits of higher ethanol blends like E15 and E85, and how he turns false claims into teachable moments on biofuels:

We applaud the work of the Wisconsin Biofuels Association for continuing to advocate for biofuels in the state of Wisconsin and for their work in promoting education around higher blends of ethanol like E15.

To learn more about the Wisconsin Biofuels Association, visit their website here. To listen to the full radio segment from Bill Michaels, visit the Growth Energy website here.

This week, we are excited to highlight the efforts of two members’ charitable organizations: Archer Daniels Midland (ADM)’s ADM Cares and POET’s Seeds of Change. They have partnered with Project Gaia to bring the economic and environmental benefits of ethanol as a cooking fuel to some of the most underdeveloped and in-need communities in the world.

Project Gaia is a U.S. non-governmental, non-profit organization that promotes clean, safe, and efficient ethanol stoves in areas like Haiti, Nigeria, Ethiopia, and more. ADM Cares and Seeds of Change recognized the value of ethanol as a cooking fuel alternative to kerosene and solid fuels, which are more commonly used but are both dirtier and more expensive. Both members have been instrumental in helping Project Gaia establish ethanol as a more accessible, environmentally friendly fueling option in Nigeria and Haiti.

ADM Cares volunteers provide packed lunches, disaster relief, financing, education, and much more to support communities around the globe.

The 'ADM Cares' program has been the company's leading edge in supporting communities around the globe and advancing sustainable agriculture; increasing food security by supporting hunger relief; and investing in education. Through the ADM Cares programs, the company donated 23,000 liters of ethanol to ethanol-fuel startups in Nigeria, bringing cleaner, more affordable fuel to communities there and helping to establish the market viability of ethanol as a cooking fuel.

POET partnered with the local Haitian startup Novogaz to help foster ethanol as a cooking fuel in the country.

Similarly, POET's Seeds of Change 'Mission Breathe' initiative has driven consumer engagement with ethanol stoves, and by providing two isotanks of fuel to initiate the project, in Haiti. POET's Miranda Broin has seen first-hand how ethanol stoves can help improve lives and living conditions in developing nations:

"Project Gaia played an important role in helping to initiate the current ethanol cookstove program in Haiti, and we were proud to support their mission through both POET and Seeds of Change in previous years," Broin said. "That program is now managed through a Seeds of Change initiative called ‘Mission Breathe’, which is dedicated to improving the health and living conditions of families in developing nations by eliminating indoor air pollution with the implementation of ethanol cookstoves."

Project Gaia representative Harry Stokes hailed ethanol as the cooking fuel solution for underdeveloped nations, stating that "cooking energy is a market where not enough fuel energy is available. The supply of woody fuels, including charcoal, is declining in many locations, and fuelwood and charcoal use for cooking is driving deforestation, even desertification. Kerosene is too dirty and dangerous to burn. The World Health Organization now discourages its use for cooking. LPG is a good fuel, but it is generally too costly for most consumers and quite unwieldy to move at low cost in bulk supply to remote areas. The solution is thus ethanol, an easily moved, energy dense fuel that one day will go all over the world for cooking."

To learn more about how ADM and POET contribute to their communities, visit the ADM Cares website here, and the POET Seeds of Change website here.

For more details, contact Vice President of Development, Kelly Manning.

The Weekly Rundown is the weekly newsletter for Growth Energy's members. It is published 51 times a year by the communications staff at Growth Energy. For more information, email team@growthenergy.org or visit our website GrowthEnergy.org. 

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