Keep on Going

Allen Schaeffer
46 minutes ago
4 min read

The lyrics of a popular 20-year-old country-music song provide guidance to help navigate the pit of uncertainty and tumult.

It’s been a challenging year for anyone hoping for clarity on vehicle and fuels policy in the U.S. 2025 has been a bit of a rollercoaster ride of elation and disappointment with sudden stops that leaves us hanging.

The prevailing uncertainty has left a certain kind of feeling best captured in a popular No. 1 country song, “If You’re Going Through Hell,” by Rodney Atkins from 20 years ago. Those lyrics—“If you’re goin’ through hell, keep on going. Don’t slow down, if you’re scared don’t show it…”—fit pretty well with where we are and what we have to do.

When that song came out in 2006, the U.S. biodiesel industry was producing about 250 million gallons of fatty acid methyl esters. Today, the industry is producing well over 3 billion gallons of biobased diesel. In that year, the vision of the then-National Biodiesel Board was “by 2015, biodiesel will be viewed as an integral component of a national energy policy, which increasingly relies on clean, domestic, renewable fuels. Positive market dynamics coupled with federal counter-cyclical policy will support a significant and stable market. Sales, primarily in the form of low-level biodiesel blends, will replace 5 percent of diesel demand by 2015. Energy security and environmentally driven uses, such as B20, remain a significant and visible source of demand. Grassroots involvement remains a strong and vital strength of the industry.”

The biodiesel industry delivered on its 2015 vision and then some. Some would say you crushed it (no pun intended).

Fast forward to now, and the federal slate has been wiped clean of any remnants of decarbonization policy. Electrification of cars and trucks has been left largely now in the hands of the private sector. Carbon is not even a topic acceptable for public discussion in certain policy circles.

All of this has cast a shadow of unease and uncertainty for how renewable fuels might fare under the second Trump administration but, as it turns out, unleashing American energy includes not only oil and gas but also a growth-oriented renewable fuels sector. The U.S. EPA’s Set 2 proposed rule for the Renewable Fuel Standard seemed to deliver all the industry wanted—a robust projected 5.61 billion gallons of biomass-based diesel (BBD) in 2026. But as of this writing and the calendar edging closer to the end of 2025, uncertainty prevails with no signs yet of a final rule for 2026 BBD volumes or clarity on the implementation of new 45Z production tax credit.

New trade policies announced in late spring 2025 delivered a gut punch to American soybean producers, resulting initially in no orders for U.S. soybeans from the biggest consumer: China. In 2024, China purchased nearly 27 million metric tons of U.S. soybeans. The most recent interim trade deal resolved some issues and since then China committed to purchase 12 million metric tons of soybeans by the end of 2025, with additional targets through 2028.

Engine, vehicle and equipment manufacturers are faring equally unwell, with pervasive policy uncertainty leading to major questions about future product plans and emissions requirements. President Donald Trump’s revocation of three landmark vehicle-emissions and greenhouse-gas (GHG) rules impacting cars and commercial trucks and the revocation of California’s emissions waivers have sent fleets and their new equipment-purchase plans into a long holding pattern.

All of these rules were driving cleaner or more efficient versions of cars and heavy-duty trucks and to some extent increased use of low-carbon renewable fuels as well. Legal challenges to all these rules are now pending in various courts, leaving heavy-duty truck and automakers—and most importantly their customers—in a state of (you guessed it) uncertainty.

And then there is the potential repeal of the endangerment finding for GHG emissions. This finding underpins all policies centered on reducing carbon emissions. It is the most closely watched EPA action this year and will itself be subject to legal challenges creating more time of uncertainty until final rulings are made.

Certainty is the foundation for any business success. Knowing that milestones and legal requirements are solid and in place makes for confident planning and investment today and for tomorrow. Industry knows what emissions targets it must hit and when, and the implications of not hitting the targets.

Uncertainty is the opposite, leaving business leaders wondering how to navigate shifting economic, trade and energy policy while planning for future production. Stopgap trends we can see emerging include states regulating vehicles indirectly through targeting emissions associated with warehousing including truck and rail traffic, as we are already seeing in California.

Surely the policy pendulum will swing back at some point. Until then there are plenty of motivating interests to use more renewable biofuels to meet corporate sustainability and other goals. All we need is some clarity on policy and a renewed supply of determination and grit, which the biodiesel sector practices every day.

We know what we have to do: “…Keep on going. Don’t slow down, if you’re scared don’t show it.”

Author: Allen Schaeffer