WASHINGTON— The D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled today that the Environmental Protection Agency and the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service unlawfully discounted the harms to threatened and endangered wildlife of the EPA’s 2023-2025 renewable fuel standards.

The court held that the Fish and Wildlife Service’s conclusion that the renewable fuel standards had “no effect” on endangered species was arbitrary. The EPA had predicted significant land conversion resulting from the rule and had predicted potential harms to numerous threatened and endangered species.

The court sent the 2023-2025 rule back to the federal agencies for further analysis to ensure that it fully accounts for potential harms to imperiled species.

“This is a big win for people and wildlife over the misguided, damaging renewable fuel standard,” said Maggie Coulter, an attorney at the Center for Biological Diversity’s Climate Law Institute. “The court agreed that the government’s shoddy analysis cannot stand. The EPA and Fish and Wildlife Service need to fully assess the renewable fuels program’s harms to protected species and the places they live.”

The 2023-2025 renewable fuel standards were the first years the EPA could set biofuel targets at any level it deemed appropriate. Despite this flexibility, the EPA ignored the serious environmental harm from ever-growing biofuel requirements. It mandated 15 billion gallons of conventional corn ethanol for each of the next three years, plus 5.9 billion gallons of advanced biofuels in 2023, 6.5 billion gallons of advanced biofuels in 2024, and 7.3 billion gallons in 2025.

When corn is grown for fuel, there are fewer restrictions on the use of pesticides and fertilizers, which run off into nearby streams and rivers. This pollution harms endangered species such as the pallid sturgeon in the Mississippi River. It also worsens ocean dead zones, harming endangered sea turtles and other species.

“For decades, the EPA has incentivized growing corn and soybeans for fuel, ignoring or discounting this program’s harms to wildlife,” said Coulter. “The EPA and federal agencies finally have to consider serious harms, including the loss of native wetland and grassland habitats, increased water pollution from pesticide runoff, and worsening dead zone conditions in the Gulf of Mexico.”