Suspicions of Fake China Cooking Oil Alarm US Biofuel Industry
- Executives increasingly call for Biden administration to act
- Tainted oil may be taking advantage of renewables incentives
Liquid extracted from recycled cooking oil at a facility in Fuqing, China.
Photographer: Qilai Shen/BloombergThis article is for subscribers only.
China is flooding the US with used cooking oil that the biofuel industry says may be tainted, hurting American farmers and President Joe Biden’s push to promote climate-friendly energy.
US imports of used cooking oil, an ingredient to make renewable diesel, more than tripled in 2023 from a year earlier, with more than 50% coming from China, according to the US International Trade Commission. American industry groups and biofuel executives are becoming increasingly worried that a significant amount of those supplies are fraudulent, and are urging the government to tighten scrutiny on the imports.