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### Sutton, Tia

From: Ervin Pickell <ervin.pickell@weaver.com> Sent: Monday, October 27, 2014 12:14 PM To: Herzog, Jeff; Sutton, Tia; Brunner, Christine Cc: Kodish, Jeff; Thompson, Christopher Subject: A nit on pentane blending Attachments: removed.txt

I don’t remember if I mentioned this before—and per haps it’s on your radar regardless. 80.1270 says b utane blenders can’t generate benzene credits (should be clarified to say butane blenders using the provisions of 80. 82). But 80.1270 doesn’t mention pentane blenders.

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### Ervin Pickell Weaver

Director Energy Compliance Services

D: 832.320.3205 ervin.pickell@weaver.com 24 Greenway Plaza, Suite 1800 Houston, TX 77046 P: 713.850.8787 F: 713.850.1673 View Bio and VCard

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### Sutton, Tia

From: Ervin Pickell <ervin.pickell@weaver.com> Sent: Friday, June 06, 2014 4:08 PM To: Brunner, Christine; Sutton, Tia; Herzog, Jeff Cc: Kodish, Jeff Subject: some typos in 80.1650 Attachments: removed.txt

Hi all,

80.1650(a)(4) has incomplete sentence. 80.1650(g) is about oxy blenders but paragraph 3 is about prod ucers.

Erv

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### Ervin Pickell Weaver

Director Energy Compliance Services

D: 832-320-3205 ervin.pickell@weaver.com 24 Greenway Plaza, Suite 1800 Houston, TX 77046 P: 713.850.8787 F: 713.850.1673 Download vCard | View Bio

Locations Throughout Texas | weaver.com An Independent Member of Baker Tilly International

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### Sutton, Tia

From: Ervin Pickell <ervin.pickell@weaver.com> Sent: Friday, March 28, 2014 5:37 PM To: Herzog, Jeff; Brunner, Christine; Sutton, Tia Cc: Kodish, Jeff Subject: RE: Final Newest Tier 3 list Attachments: removed.txt

Follow Up Flag: Follow up Flag Status: Flagged

Really. These comments deal with the use of the 5 ppm sulfur content assumption for ethanol added dow nstream to RBOB and CBOB.

1. I think the assumption approach is an excellent id ea. Actual testing is unworkable and with the requ irements for denaturant manufacturers and oxygenate producer s, the actual sulfur content of ethanol can be expe cted to be predictable. However, the different treatment o f benzene (benzene content of ethanol must still be tested), there is a reporting problem. How does the refiner report a batch of gasoline for purposes of the sulf ur rule and the benzene rule? For sulfur you make a calculatio n and report the entire volume of conventional gaso line or RFG as a batch with the volume and properties of th e ethanol calculated into the batch. (see 2 nd comment). But with benzene apparently you must report two batches for conventional gasoline— one for the CBOB and another for the ethanol. How is that to be reconciled on t he reports? One solution would be to calculate th e tested value of the ethanol benzene, and the volume of the ethanol, into the conventional each gasoline sulfu r batch.
2. My colleague, Vance Kopp believes, based on long e xperience assisting the regulated industry with rep orting, that many reporters will mess up the calculations o f the batch sulfur content and volume based on the assumption approach. I suggest that to alleviate t his problem the regulation, and the reporting forms , NEED TO INCLUDE FORMULAE for calculating the volume and the sulfur content of the combined product for each ba tch so that the calculation is relatively fail safe.

Thanks for considering my random, rambling thoughts

,

Erv

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### Ervin Pickell Weaver

Director Energy Compliance Services

D: 832-320-3205 ervin.pickell@weaver.com 24 Greenway Plaza, Suite 1800 Houston, TX 77046 P: 713.850.8787 F: 713.850.1673 Download vCard | View Bio

Locations Throughout Texas | weaver.com An Independent Member of Baker Tilly International2 From: Ervin Pickell Sent: Thursday, March 27, 2014 11:46 AM To: 'Herzog, Jeff'; 'Brunner, Christine'; Sutton.Tia@e pa.gov Cc: Kodish.jeff@epa.gov Subject: Newest Tier 3 list

See bottom of list:

1. Registration section: 80.1650: For each of the ca tegories it says you have to register at the beginn ing of the program or when you start making fuel, oxygenate, e tc., WHICHEVER IS EARLIER. This makes no sense. If you start up in a later year you would have to be clair voyant. Jeff Herzog going to draft amendment to ch ange language to account for this but to also account fo r people who wish to register early.
2. Not sure what is intended for ethanol producer repo rting. The regulations at § 80.1652(c) say they mu st file batch reports. Preamble says they just need to att est that they complied (I don’t think this is refer ring to an “attest audit”). Perhaps they meant to say file ba tch reports if you test your own ethanol but you do n’t have to file batch reports if you purchase your denaturant from a certified denaturant producer. I’ve asked O TAQ to clarify. 3. Preamble says refineries that have been shut down i n 2012 to get small refinery status. Regs (80.1620 (d)) say
2011. 4. I find the small refiner credit provisions to be a bit confusing since they are complex. Some example s from EPA would be nice.
5. Testing requirements for ethanol: 80.1642(c)(3) ha s typos; needs editing. Section 80.1611 should per haps be more clear—Makes more sense to say “330 ppm or less ” instead of “330 ppm”. Section 80.1611(C)(1) has an extra period. 6. Section 80.1613(b) should be more clear that the ad ditive blender (truck loading terminals) cannot exc eed the max treat rate provided by the additive manufacture r. 7. Section 80.1640(a)(2), which pertains to producing gasoline by blending blendstocks to PCG, refers to (a)(5). Shouldn’t it instead refer to (a)(1)?
8. Section 80.1609, pertaining to oxygenate blender re quirements, refers to 80.1603(d)(4), which doesn’t exist. 9. Section 80.65(e)(1), concerning RFG test requiremen ts, seems to indicate that you don’t have to measur e RVP for winter RFG but then goes on to say that for win te r RFG you do have to measure RVP and do it on every batch basis? Section 80.101reiterates requirement for CG. See § 80.65(e)(4). The regulations still have no requirement to test summer CG RVP for every batch. 10. Section 80.46 incorporation by referenc e lists the revised test methods by year, but 80.46 substantive provisions do not. Seems like it would be more clear if the s ubstantive paragraphs listed the methods with years

. 11. Exports: The preamble says exports must be docume nted by designation and by PTDs and must be segrega ted from domestic products. I found the first 2 requir ements in the regs but I didn’t find a segregation requirement. There is a segregation requirement fo r racing fuel, etc. Exports needs to have its own segregation requirement because it’s only a segregation from do mestic fuels.

Note, RFS could use clarification in this area as w ell. But I’m not sure the issue is exactly the sam e. With RFS it’s about whether the volume is yours, not whether you can do cument the parameters of the exported vs domestic p roduct. For example, what if you produce a batch of gas using t he PCG approach or the blendstock is a batch approa ch—are you prohibited from excluding any portion of that batch from your RVO? Seems like you should be able to p roportion out the export to account for the mixture of PCG and bl endstock, which is what I am hearing is industry pr actice.

12. The Tier 3 rulemaking benzene amendment at § 80.123 8 states that the benzene content of ethanol must b e measured using the method in 80.46 until 80.47 kick s in. The only method stated in 80.46 is ASTM D360 6. I have been told by a number of people that ASTM D 36 06 doesn’t work for testing benzene in ethanol. Ga soline containing ethanol is one thing (the reg admits the re are interference issues even there); pure ethano l is another. I had a brief conversation with Tom Woods ide of EPA Ann Arbor and he agreed that 3606 probab ly won’t work well. I have been told by one refiner t hat ASTM D5769 does work.3

13. Section 80.1610(d) talks about batches of ethanol p roduced by ethanol producers for Tier 3 testing/recordkeeping/reporting purposes. Shouldn’ t the batch definition here be synced with the RFS defns? (sale/shipment or production both OK?)
14. Section 80.1652(c) should not refer to oxygenate producers as oxygenate “refiner s”.
15. Section 80.1643: Is there any reason to make ethan ol producers retain samples from each batch when th ey are using the sulfur assumption based on the certified denaturant producer’s test results? Since the etha nol producer gets to assume it’s contribution is zero, what’s the point? 16. Section 80.1642(c)(2) seems to say when using the s ulfur assumption the oxygen producer can assume the ethanol prior to denaturant has zero sulfur but then goes on to say you can use some alternativ e value if you can support it. Why in the world would anyone use a va lue greater than zero? Am I missing something?
17. Early credits: 2012-2013 Tier 2/early Tier 3 credi ts: Sections 80.1615 and 80.1616 are confusing beca use they discuss 2012 and 2013 credits separately from 2014- 2016 early credits; but 2012 and 2013 early credits are handled exactly like 2014 credits (they have a life of 5 years AFTER the year they are generated. So a 2012 credit is good through 2017—i.e., it can be used for Tier 2 through 2016 or it can be used for Tier 3 in 2017 . A 2013 credit can be used for Tier 2 or it can be used for Tier 3 in 2017 or 2018. Early credits generated i n 2015 and 2016 are essentially the same except their lives ar e cut short of 5 years because all early credits ex pire at the end of 2019. 18. There are strange and inconsistent dates for small refiner and small volume refinery applications. The date for domestic small refiners and small volume refiners i s more stringent than for foreign refiners or for h ardship refiners. Also, the preamble says June 1, 2016 for domestic small refiner status application whereas the regulation, at § 80.1622, says it’s Jan. 1, 2015. See Preamble, V.E.1. 19. Section 80.82(b)(2)(i) says that off spec butane ca n be blended if the gasoline meets all standards an d specifically cites EEP standards of 80.101(g)(3). Is that needed at this point? Only approved small refiners have a standard for toxics and it ends Jan. 1, 2015. Th ey probably wouldn’t be doing “butane blending” und er 80.82 anyway. If it has to be mentioned for the rest of 2014, it should at least be clear that this only ap plies if you have a complex model standard (most butane blenders do not) and no matter who you are, you don’t have to show compliance with EEP complex model standards af ter Jan. 1, 2015. Also, it should be that it has to meet all applicable standards under this part not just CG st andards (sulfur and benzene are not CG standards—th ey cross the CG/RFG pool. EEP also mentioned in (h)(1)— I guess in this context it really is a possibility that a small refiner could be involved so this could be valid until the end of 2014. But instead could just say all applic able standards? 20. Section 80.82(i) requires even commercial grade but ane is subject to the QA requirements just like non

commercial grade. It looks like there is now essen tially no difference between commercial and non-com mercial grade. If that’s the case there is no incentive fo r anyone to obtain or supply commercial grade butan e. 21. The pentane requirements (§ 80.85(c)) say that summ er RVP testing has to ensure compliance with 80.27 or with applicable SIP requirements. Seems like § 80. 82 should also add the SIP clause.
22. Section 80.85(i) refers to “a” refiner but then use s the pronoun “they”. Should be “it” I think. 23. Section 80.86(c): Shouldn’t there be a requirement for the pentane supplier to include its EPA registr ation number on its PTD to the refiner?
24. Section 80.85 bounces back and forth between “refin ery” and “refiner”. Early on, in the last phrase o f (a), “refiner” seems more appropriate than “refinery”. 25. Section 80.87. Need one of these for butane? If a distributor mixes pentane from different pentane p roducers, make him show on PTDs all the suppliers’ registrati on. Seems like you need to be able to track and al so demonstrate whether it’s all commercial grade or no t. Distributors are not going to care all that muc h. 26. I see that 80.1653(i) has recordkeeping requirement s for additive blenders. I don’t understand the ne ed for this at least for detergents. This is already covered b y the detergent regs and it’s confusing me whether this is creating some new requirement. I don’t think autom ated terminals can keep records for individual batc hes of gasoline—that’s why EPA allows VAR recordkeeping, r ight? Do you want to create a VAR requirement for all types of additives (aren’t most gasoline additives included in the detergent additive package?)
27. Does exceeding the max concentration rate by an add itive blender consititute a violation? If so, it’s not clear. The prohibitions (80.1660(e)) only prohibit exceeding the 3 ppm contribution.4 The linked image cannot be displayed. The file may have been moved, renamed, or deleted. Verify that the link points to the correct file and location.



### Ervin Pickell Weaver

Director Energy Compliance Services

D: 832-320-3205 ervin.pickell@weaver.com 24 Greenway Plaza, Suite 1800 Houston, TX 77046 P: 713.850.8787 F: 713.850.1673 Download vCard | View Bio

Locations Throughout Texas | weaver.com An Independent Member of Baker Tilly International

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