 Good afternoon and welcome back to the 2020 Congressional Renewable Energy and Energy Efficiency Expo. I'm Dan Brissette, the Executive Director of the Environmental and Energy Study Institute, and we are just about to start our fifth panel of the day, Sustainable Transportation. EESI was founded in 1984 to provide nonpartisan information on environmental energy and climate issues to policymakers on Capitol Hill and to the public. We do this in different ways, including by holding briefings, which we archive online, writing fact sheets, write web articles, covering the environmental news of the day, and I encourage everyone to visit us online at www.esi.org and sign up for our biweekly newsletter, Climate Change Solutions. That is the best way to keep abreast of everything that we do. Each of the members of Congress who lead the House and Senate Renewable Energy and Energy Efficiency Caucuses are helping us welcome our panelists and introduce our panel topics. We would not be here today without their support and the support of their excellent staff. And to help us introduce this panel, it is my privilege to introduce United States Representative Dave Lobsack from the great state of Iowa. Good afternoon, folks, and thank you all so much for taking the time to join us virtually today. I sincerely want to thank the folks at EESI for putting on this fantastic event again this year. Like the difficult and unusual circumstances we are all facing. As co-chair of the House Renewable Energy and Energy Efficiency Caucus, I am truly privileged to get to work with these talented folks on some of the most important issues facing our country, and I appreciate their dedication to tackling and solving the challenges of our time. I also want to thank all the businesses, stakeholders, agencies, and trade associations who are participating this event again this year, and those who are joining us for the first time. We depend on all of you to make this day as constructive and beneficial as it can be, and I appreciate you all for joining us today. There is no doubt that we are facing serious challenges in our country today when it comes to addressing the effects of climate change and protecting our environment for the future. My home state of Iowa is a leader in renewable energy, and I am very proud of the example we set for the rest of the nation. For our nation to move toward energy independence, we need to prioritize clean energy, like wind power and renewable fuels. And speaking of renewable fuels, I am particularly pleased to have the opportunity to open up the panel on sustainable transportation and want to just quickly highlight the importance of this industry, and in particular the biofuels industry, to my home state of Iowa. Iowa is the nation's leading producer of clean burning biofuels, including ethanol and biodiesel. This industry is a key economic driver, districts like mine, and across the Midwest, bringing good paying jobs to our rural communities and providing added value to our corn and soybean farmers and even our livestock producers. The renewable fuel standard has worked incredibly well for rural America, but unfortunately the biofuels industry has been under considerable strain for quite some time, due to ongoing trade disputes, harmful small refinery waivers, and of course most recently the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic on fuel demand. I am particularly pleased to see Chris Blyly from Growth Energy is joining us for this panel. The team at Growth Energy have been invaluable partners to my office and to the rest of the Congressional Biofuels Caucus, in our efforts to advance the production of biofuels which decrease harmful emissions, lower the price of the pump, and reduce our dependence on foreign oil. You folks understand better than anyone, and we have a great opportunity here in Congress to fight for the policies that help you, the industry innovators, succeed. I will continue to do everything I can to ensure that our federal policies support and strengthen the expansion of renewable energy and energy efficient technologies. Thank you again to all for joining us virtually today, and here's to another successful Clean Energy Expo. Great, thanks to Representative Lobsack and his fantastic staff. If you have not had the opportunity to work with him and his staff, they are pure delights, and we could not be here today without their support. So thank them. I thank them very sincerely. As moderator for today, the fifth of six panels, or six panels, is when you might start to think it starts to feel like one of those old Jerry Lewis telethons, and not funny and fresh Jerry Lewis right off the bat. I'm talking about Lucentai, oh my God, where is his Cumberbund, middle of the night Jerry Lewis? But in fact, that is not at all the case because the fifth panel, sustainable transportation, and this panel, and these panelists in particular, will knock your socks off. If you joined us for our previous panel, you heard me admit that I am a buildings guy, and that is true enough. But the transportation sector is something I think about a lot, and not just because the technologies are cool, but I'm really intrigued about how human behavior affects and influences our ability to reduce emissions and our preferences. The world has become smaller and smaller as we've been able to move around faster and faster, which has been really nice. The future of that trend will be set, I think, at the nexus of our preferences for mobility and the ability of innovators and technology to keep up and do so in a sustainable way. And by the way, buildings and transportation are pretty closely linked. Where we live and work has a lot to do with how we get around, and how far we have to go has a big impact on our individual carbon footprint. As building to grid connectivity increases, electric vehicle adoption, energy storage, and biofuels have real transformational potential. Before I introduce our panelists, let me tell you about how you can submit questions. Please follow ESI on Twitter at ESI online and send in your questions that way. You may also send us an email, esi at esi.org. We will draw from your questions submissions after we hear from our panelists. And now on to them. We have four. Genevieve Cullen of the Electric Drive Transportation Association, Jordan Solomon of EcoStrat, Art Guzzetti of the American Public Transportation Association. And you've already heard a plug for Chris Bliley of Growth Energy. For full biographies of all of our panelists, visit us online, www.esi.org. Genevieve, you're going to kick off our panel. Thanks for joining us today, and I'm really looking forward to your presentation. Thank you so much, Dan. I really appreciate the opportunity to be here and be part of this conversation with this distinguished group of folks to talk about what sustainable transportation is, and for my part, what role electric mobility plays in a sustainable transportation sector. Just briefly, I am the president of the Electric Drive Transportation Association. My members represent the value chain of electric transportation. They are vehicle and component manufacturers, electric utilities, companies who are deploying infrastructure and others, essentially all working together in order to accelerate the electrification of the sector. And so as we start, and since I get to be the first speaker, I think I'll take this opportunity to just lay down the givens on this conversation. Right? Maybe this is old news to the folks who are tuning in. But it's worth just reiterating that first, the transportation sector is the largest source of greenhouse gas emissions in the United States. And second, in addition to greenhouse gas emissions, it is also a major source of the local air pollution, which is a chronic and acute public health challenge in the United States. Which leads us to the second given is we need technologies and options to change and make the transportation sector cleaner and more sustainable. And we need to be able to scale them fast. So I am really, this panel is extremely timely, and I'm looking forward to the questions from the folks who are listening in. So just to zero in on the electric drive element of a sustainable transportation sector. You know, when I talk about we need cleaner technology options, electric drive fits in that mold because what's electric drive in a plug-in vehicle, in a fuel cell or in a traditional hybrid vehicle, essentially what that does is it uses, it replaces engines with more efficient motors, which reduce energy consumption and displaces oil with the use of electricity. And the end game is that for that is you get a more efficient and a cleaner vehicle, specifically for plug-in vehicles. No matter where you plug in and drive them in the United States, a plug-in vehicle has less well to wheel emissions than an average internal combustion engine. Those benefits only increase as the grid gets cleaner. And so that, you know, in a nutshell, that's the heart of why electrification is an essential part of the 21st century sustainable transportation sector. And I guess the question as we stand here is, so where are we with that? Now, as an industry, what does it look like? Can we get to scale? And I would point out a couple of facts that might be useful, giving you perspective on the growth of our industry. Now, in 2010, there were two plug-in vehicles on the market. And now just barely 10 years later, there are more than 50 vehicle, light duty vehicle models for sale and with a wave of electric trucks and buses reaching the market between now and 2025. Total light duty vehicle sales exceeded 1.5 million in 2019. And at the same time, charging infrastructure is expanding all over the country. There are close to 30,000 public charging stations. And there are the technology that delivers electricity to plug-in vehicles is also changing rapidly. So we're seeing increasingly fast charge. We're seeing smarter charging, which goes to Dan's point about integrating storage and buildings into our transportation sector planning. We're looking at state, local and even national efforts to expand infrastructure in a comprehensive way that are all contributing to the growth of this industry and the very bullish outlooks for electric transportation. Bloomberg, for instance, predicts that sales of plug-in vehicles will exceed internal combustion engine vehicles globally by 2040. But the fact of the matter is we are growing and it looks promising, but we are small and we are still, even before the massive disruption of this pandemic, we're facing some market hurdles as all new technology does. And so we are working across the supply chain to not only address our challenges as an emerging industry, but to address the challenges of a major market disruption creates on emerging industries. And that's in supply chain, in demand destruction, hitting the ability of companies and governments to invest in the infrastructure that will speed electrification of the sector. So as we find our way through this uncertain time, I think we've all agreed to call it that, policy leadership is more and more essential. And I think that this is the moment as we look to rebuild the economy. We should certainly be looking at a way to ensure that we are moving towards sustainability and that involves investing in research and development, helping consumers and businesses invest in new technology and helping state and local governments invest in infrastructure. And so that is how I see sustainable transportation going forward. And I'm looking forward to your question. Thank you, Genevieve. You're just the latest panelist to mention the need to spend more time thinking about the supply chain for all of this. And so I think as we're thinking about next year's expo and our cross-cutting panels, maybe one on supply chain would be a fun one to put together. It's probably not getting enough attention and we can fix that. Next up, we have Jordan, we go straight. Jordan, welcome to the expo and it's great to see you. And I'm looking forward to your presentation. Thank you. Yeah, thank you, everyone, for for attending. I would also like to at the outset, I think, lay down a given. And really, you're all hearing it every day and the headlines and the headlines are simple. Covid's crushed the economy. We're in the economic equivalent of a war. And like any war, we need to use all the ammunition to win it. And it just so happens that we, in point of fact, have over a billion billion tons of unused ammunition. It's our buy that with the proper incentives can fuel the recovery, create new jobs, economic stability and really, really do wonders for accelerating sustainable transportation. So I'm, of course, talking about our biomass. I'm talking about our corn stover. I'm talking about our woody biomass. I'm talking about our wheat straw, our switch grass, our food waste, even our R.R.W. And we use it to make transportation fuel and sustainable aviation fuel. It's a job creation engine. And I think it's one that that's really in danger of or not gaining as much attention as I think it merits. It merits in terms of both the economic recovery and the ability to to really, really drive sustainable, sustainable transportation. So I'm going to talk about a way of leveraging in the next seven or eight minutes that million tons of ammunition, that million tons of biomass that we have around this country through the Opportunity Zone Program. So many of you, if not most of you will be familiar with the Federal Opportunity Zone Program, which is a tax incentive program to drive economic development in almost 9000 design opportunity zones and what makes an opportunity zone an opportunity zone amongst other things, but mainly can be designated if 20 percent of the population or more are above the poverty level. So, for example, downtown Detroit is an opportunity zone. There are 84 of them in Iowa, for example, if one the engine of the Opportunity Zone Program is a tax incentive program, which enables which enables if you take one of those factories in downtown Detroit that's burned out and make it into a new factory or an apartment building, for example, it enables the investor to gain certain tax advantages, specifically a deferral of the capital gains tax and a potential elimination of capital gains tax on the appreciation of that asset in the Opportunity Zone. In the Opportunity Zone Program in the Opportunity Zone area. So, for example, if that old factory that you invest in in the Opportunity Zone in downtown Detroit becomes an apartment building and that apartment building appreciates in value, the investor can pay no capital gains tax on that investment. And because of that tax incentive program, the Opportunity Zone Program has done wonders, in fact, for unlocking billions of dollars investment and driving that investment into areas where it probably would never have taken a second look. Areas that need that investment, rural areas, areas that economic development. So, the program's been a fabulous success. However, it's been mostly a fabulous success for real estate. And there are, one is to invest in an Opportunity Zone. It must be done through what's called a QOF, a Qualified Opportunity Fund, of which there are approximately 600, maybe more, in the United States today. So, there's 600 qualified Opportunity Zone funds cost in the United States, but only one, maybe two of them are set up to invest fuels, biochemicals or sustainable transportation fuels. So, why is that? It's, there's a number of different reasons which we'll get into in a second, but the point I really do want to make is this is a huge missed opportunity in the Opportunity Zone Program. The opportunity, this is its ability to unlock investment into real estate, but not unlock investment into bio. Fails to harness the power of bio to create jobs. And I want to talk to you a second about the kind of jobs that making wood fiber and corn stover and wheat straw and food waste into transportation fuels to drive a school bus to power our trucks across the nation can be. These figures are according to the U.S. Department of Energy figures, say, put the economic benefits of transportation fuels at 1.1 million, 1.1 million jobs and over $259 billion. So, important to let that figure sink in for a second, 1.1 million jobs and $2.59 billion by harnessing the biomass which is available around the country and can and is already being used to make transportation fuels. That's the impact on me. Now, here's the good news. The good news is that of those almost 9000 opportunity zones in the country that have been so affected in driving investment, billions of dollars investment into real estate, the good news is that there's a subset of those opportunity zones that are biomass rich, that are in fact biomass investment ready, that have around or in-van surpluses of corn stover, surpluses of food waste, surpluses of wheat stalks, surpluses of the various feedstocks that can be used to address one of the biggest barriers in putting up more facilities that make transportation fuels across this country and that's feedstock risk. So, we believe that there are almost 1,000 opportunity zones out of, again, almost 9000 opportunity zones around the country that are essentially investment ready for bio-based development, but right now the Opportunity Zone program doesn't have a way of communicating that fact to investors and the upshot of the inability of the Opportunity Zone program to communicate which Opportunity Zone are biomass investment ready for plants that produce transportation fuel is a big issue. So, I'm going to talk to you about an answer in a second. The answer that is what we call the BDO Zone program, Bio-Economy Development Opportunity Zone program, which enables designation of those Opportunity Zones that have a surplus of biomass, that have strong anchor suppliers to deliver it and are close to infrastructures to support and operate as those three pillars, surplus of biomass, strong anchor suppliers to deliver it and close to infrastructure and again we have these these sticks in Opportunity all over the country today, the Moons should be designated as and certified as Bio-Economy Development Zones. Where they overlap with Opportunity Zones, we call them BDO Zones, Bio-Economy Development Opportunity Zones, right? Designating by highlighting Investment Ready Opportunity Zones as AA or A-rated where project development is low risk, we really start to give the market something very powerful. We give them those incredibly powerful capital gains deferrals and and eliminates that come along with investing in any Opportunity Zone in the country which already exists as well as the huge advantage of low biomass feed stock risk. So if we want to make the transportation sector cleaner, if we want to make the transportation sector greener, then we must address one of the biggest problems facing the developers and the investors of our precious that produce these transportation fuels. Our airlines are calling for them, Delta's calling for it, American Airlines is calling for it. This program is endorsed by Kathy, Kathy's calling for it. We need to harness our biomass in service of the recovery, in service of more plants that create transportation around this country. What happens when you designate an area and Opportunity Zone as a BDO? Well, what happens is we create a tool for economic development agencies, local agencies, state agencies, and federal agencies. I'm talking about the ED. We give them a tool to promote those areas, to promote those areas to the developers of these kind of facilities. Manufacturing clean transportation fuels using our biomass, employing people and communities so from this pandemic that need jobs that can't have a source that need per jobs. That's what designating a BDO zone gives our economic development agencies the tools they need to drive transportation development, to drive economic development in transportation fuel. So I do want to say, because the question may come up, and then I think it will, I may be running out of time here, that it's very, that the designation of these areas be used on an acceptable standard. And that standard has been funded by the U.S. Department of Energy over the past three years, five years, they should say. We've led the development of that along with Los Alamos and Idaho National Labs and 150 rod-based industry state coalitions. But the fact of the matter is, there is today for the biomass supply chain risks funded by the U.S. federal government development, developing conjunction with Los Alamos National Lab again in Idaho National Lab and endure a huge sector of investors, a $50 billion investment committee made up of the biggest country to drive intran fuels and other bio-based materials and chemicals across this country using, by leveraging the Opportunity Zone Program. And the BDO Zone Program is a very innovative and we think powerful way of doing that. Thank you. Great. Thanks, Jordan. Thanks for highlighting that. I didn't really thought of that as a way to do it. For those of us who are in the platform, I just want to assure you that there was a little bit of a connection problem. In Jordan, you might have picked up on the connection problem, too. That was not making its way through the live stream, apparently. So I just wanted to assure everybody to the extent that there's something happening here. It's actually being broadcast out to the world and it sounds and looks just fine. Art, we're going to turn to you. Thank you so much for joining us today and take it away. Yes, thanks. I'm certainly a longtime fan of EESI and the programs it convenes and the information it disseminates. So great to be part of the program today. I'm going to make two points today. First, as did Genevieve. I'm going to mention some statistics that sort of paint the picture of public transportation's role in the overall situation of achieving our clean energy and greenhouse gas reduction goals. And I'm going to talk about the current pandemic and public transportation in the context of the times. One statistic about public transportation might die some. It might not surprise others. And that's the technology element here. And let me give a few statistics. In 1998, fewer than 7% of buses, transit buses, were what we would designate as clean fuel. Fuels diesel. The number today is over 60%. That means that 20%, 21% are hybrid electrics. We have CNGs have gone from 5% in 1998 to over 20%. We have biofuel buses about 7%. Certainly, there's hydrogen bus in there too. Pura buses. Many transit systems around the country are set as a goal to go to zero. And certainly, the trend is heading that way. Over 60%. Think of that. Now, the fuel on the automobile side is, as I understand it, 2%. 2% of automobile fleet is electric power or hybrid. And transit sector is over 60%. I know I'm giving ourselves a little pat on the back, but it's to underscore a commitment to sustainable transportation and to public transportation as a strategy for making cities and regions more sustainable in their own right. Now, let me say this. It's not just the vehicle and the fuel source. Public transportation. A, displaces automobile trips. Energy benefit come from that. And also, it's the community you create. You create an energy efficient community built around public transportation. In fact, when you crunch the numbers, that is the biggest energy benefit of all. Now, let me mention COVID. It's created challenges for public transportation. The economy for a good period of time is shut down. What was shut down, it's emerging from that. Only the transit systems themselves had service reductions and capacity limits. Beyond that, this sales tax revenues that support many of our transit systems and other revenues, funding sources were down. And because of the ridership issues that we're going to work our way through, the fare box revenues were temporarily down. So we have some challenges to work through. During that period, though, we've taken essential workers to their jobs. We've helped cities continue to function during a time when many things were shut down. And we provided the help when it was needed. So we're very proud of that. We underscored another reason public transportation is needed in addition to the health, economic, and the energy reasons. Now, final point of underscore, we're going to come back stronger. It's an opportunity to rebuild cities, build back with more environmentally oriented. We're going to have mobility systems that sort of put together non-automobile options for clean and efficient travel. We're going to make sure streets are there for the people. The curb is there for the pedestrians and the transit. Build back a more in all its ways. So we can achieve many goals, the pandemic in a way to look at it in a favorable light. It's an opportunity to get things right. So I'll pause there and we'll have more discussion. Thanks, Art. And thanks for the nice words about ESI as well. Our fourth panelist is Chris. Nice shout out from Representative Lobsack. Thanks for joining us today. Look forward to your perspective. Thanks, Dan. And thanks for having me on the panel. And I also appreciate the comments of all my previous speakers. It's always hard to bed and clean up here. So I'll try not to repeat some of the good points that everybody made and certainly appreciate the kind words and congressional spirit. So I hate myself with the remarks from the gentlemen from Iowa. For those who don't know, growth energy represents 100 of the 200 bio refineries across the United States. We produce 16 billion gallons of ethanol. We use about 14 and a half billion gallons here in the U.S. where 98% of every gallon of gasoline is blended with 10% ethanol today. We export roughly about a billion and a half gallons and as more and more countries bring ethanol on to their transportation fuel mix. And Art touched on COVID and I'll jump in here a little bit. One of the things that people don't recognize about our domestic ethanol industry is that, yes, we produce transportation fuel and certainly that's where my remarks will be focused today. But we produce a variety of co-products. We produce 38 million tons of distillers grains that goes to feed our animal supply system and in response to COVID, because ethanol is used in hand sanitizer, many of our producers are today making significant investments to supply the hand sanitizer market. They met the need, met the needs of their local first responders in response to the virus. Additionally, many of our plants actually capture carbon dioxide and use for refrigeration. We saw that with some of the meat supply issues as well as some of the water quality issues as well. But so those are just some of the things that a little bit highlighted here in the air of COVID. But talking on the transportation fuel side, as I mentioned, we are blended in virtually every gallon of gasoline used today in across the United States. E10 is our 10% ethanol is our de facto fuel used in internal combustion engines. We now have approval for E15 and for all 2001 and newer vehicles. So it's really been two decades since a car was made in the U.S. that isn't for use with E15. However, we only have about just over 2,000 stations in 29 states that offer the fuel. So we have a long way to go towards higher blends. I think a lot of the previous speakers, Genevieve, talked about some of the metrics. Regardless of electrification or where you see things, liquid fuels are going to be here for a long while. And I think we have to look at solutions that improve the sustainability of those fuels. And on the ethanol side, wells to wheels, we are 39% better on greenhouse gas emissions compared to gasoline. So with every drop of ethanol, you're replacing, you're lowering that carbon dioxide footprint. We are also a high octane fuel. So as you look towards the future of fuel economy standards, a lot of people have pointed to a high octane mid-level ethanol blend that reduces greenhouse gas emissions. But it also allows automakers to make a really small supercharged engine that significantly improves fuel economy, at the same time offering consumers a very high octane fuel at a low cost. So that's really what the future looks like. We think that, again, we are very, we're blended significantly across the US today. We have 200 biorefineries. But we're just starting to scratch the surface on E15 that really can be used in nearly all vehicles today, 95% of the vehicle miles traveled or 2001 and newer vehicles. And looking further into the future, again, we can look at the fuel economy standards and sort of high octane fuels or really consumers can take advantage of this. I think one of the other things, in addition to climate and greenhouse gas strategies, a lot of communities are looking at air quality issues. And COVID has really highlighted this. With ethanol, not only is it a drop in CO2, but you dramatically reduce carbon monoxide, you reduce benzene, toluene, some of the most harmful air toxics. We also, frankly, EPA took comment on particulate emissions. We provided comments on some of the things and biofuels benefits there. So not only, I think you have to take a holistic view of not just sort of carbon policies, but some of the other environmental issues well, including just a broader look at air quality and some of the benefits that biofuels provide. And so with that, I'll pause there and look forward to the questions. Great. Thanks, Chris. And as a reminder for those of us, or for those of us, for those of you in our audience, you are able to ask us questions. We have to collect them using either Twitter. You can send your questions to at ESI online or you can send an email to esi.esi at esi.org. I had to think about that for a second. It's only like the thousandth time I've said that today. Let's go ahead and get started with Q&A. I'm going to, so Gordon touched on sort of some very specific structural and policy ideas that would sort of improve our ability to make this transportation sector more sustainable. I like that. And I'd like to sort of give, we'll start with you, Genevieve. I'd like to give the others as well sort of an opportunity to think about, you know, what are the most structural, most important structural initiatives out there that would increase the production and consumption of clean transportation fuels? And given the urgency of these emissions reductions, what could, what is sort of available now to policymakers to do differently? Jordan, we'll come back to you at the end because I'd like to also know what you, I want to make sure you have a chance to address that specific question. But let's go to Genevieve Art and Chris first to hear a little bit about your thoughts on that. Thanks, Dan. I think that it's, it's exactly the right question. What we need to be looking at for all of these fuels and technologies is intentional and comprehensive policy. And there are supply chain issues, but I think we need to, the immediate issue is infrastructure and that we need a national policy that supports investing in next generation infrastructure and contemplates all of them. For instance, the changes in public transport and the different ways from micro mobility to transit to shared mobility. And what is the infrastructure that serves them? And to make sure that that infrastructure serves all of the diverse communities that transportation must. So that how we move people and goods and what, what's the infrastructure we need? And we need to support state and local efforts, but we need a comprehensive vision for that. Thanks. Art? Yeah, I'll offer, I rephrase the question. It's like we promote most of alternate fuels into the future. And I would say that we should embrace that. But it's, I'm going to go beyond that and say that's part of a broader policy that includes other things. I think that it can converting automobiles, for example, to electric. Yeah, certainly, we need infrastructure to accomplish that. But I think it's going to, it's going to require more than that. We need policies that embrace alternatives. A combination of transit, biking and walking, for example, that would have implications on the way we build cities, the way we fund transportation, you know, perhaps a vehicle mouse travel tax in the future is a possibility and more. So there's a few thoughts on advocating for a broader set of policies with a certainly a strong fuels program at the core. Chris? Yeah, I'll, I, Representative Lobsack touched on it a little bit. So I think partially ensuring the integrity or enforcement of current laws on the books, we're seeing that with the renewable fuel standard that calls for increased biofuel blending. However, if you don't stick to what was prescribed in the statute, you know, you're really undercutting the investment and really undercutting the benefits that you would have with biofuels and, and frankly, with other advanced biofuel development. I think additionally, you know, I would certainly agree with the things that were said previously. I think as I touched on in my opening, I think as you look at any sort of, you know, climate discussion, you know, whether that's a state of locality or at the federal level, and you talk about, you know, moving to electrification or any of these different things, I think you also need to recognize making the current fuel mix more sustainable. And I think that's really an important role for us as, as biofuel producers. But I think that's one of the things that you can't overlook. And I think the addition, the other point I would make, too, is, you know, predictable tax policy. Certainly we have a, you know, biodiesel taxes. I don't do biodiesel, but I'm involved indirectly. I think the other is on next generation cellulosic biofuels. You know, when you have tax policy that kind of is there and then goes away and then comes back, you know, it really makes investment really difficult. So I think those are some of the key things that we look to. Jordan, let's go back to you, but you described sort of the policy, but I'm wondering if you could just explain a little bit more about what would need to happen in your opinion for that to actually be occurring at, you know, a rate that you would find, you know, even remotely accessible. Sure. You know, in terms of policy, I would just like to say one thing before I address your very good question. There are two kinds of policies, right? There's policies that create demand market, that create market pull. So we can, we could go to E20, we could, and these are all fantastic policies, but policy creation that accelerates demand for biofuels and biodiesels, etc., etc., are fantastic, but if we don't have the facilities, then we're never going to reach our goals. So, you know, we really need to put in place a policy that helps create a platform that help drive production, drive creation of the plants that create sustainable transportation fuel. We can't only be market, market, market focused. So if you have a question, you ask what would need to take place sort of structurally in order to create sufficient supply, change of transportation fuels across this country. Look, what we like about this program is simple. Number one, it's plug and play. We don't have time to reinvent the wheel of 20 million Americans without jobs today. Many of those jobs are never, never coming back. It's imperative that we replace those jobs, it's imperative that we replace those jobs in with, with part of them at least with new economy jobs. So what we again like about the BDO Zone Program, the Bioeconomy Development Opportunity Zone Program, is it uses existing things that exist in this country today. It uses the ammunition we have to fight this war. Number one, the billion tons of biomass that we have. Number two, the most powerful tax incentive program this country has ever seen been in place for, for two and a half years now, the Opportunity Zone Program. And number three, are validated standards, are biomass supply chain risk standards that can be used to identify the subset of opportunity zones that are right for placement and development of plants that produce biodiesel and a sustainable aviation fuel and other kinds of, of transportation. So, you know, what needs to happen? Look, state economic development organizations need to get on board. We're in deep discussions with Maine. We're in deep discussions with, with state economic development in North Carolina, in Oregon, and in Representative Lowsack's state, of course, of Iowa. In fact, we're in the deepest discussions with Iowa right now. And I can say, and I will say, that many of the local economic development organizations, and I will say on this panel Fort Dodge right now, has a fantastic, they call it an agricultural park. They want to attract bio-based business to that agricultural park. That agricultural park happened located right near a million tons of corn stover, which can be used for the development of transportation fuel. This is, this has the three pillars of a BDO zone. It's an Opportunity Zone, near, it's not anyone, it's near one. It's got excess, a fantastic biomass that can be used to feed a transportation fuel plant. And it's got fantastic infrastructure. Why isn't there a transportation fuel plant there? And by the way, why isn't there, there are a dozen? And over the next years, a hundred plants like that all over this country creating employment, creating new economy jobs, again, jobs that cannot be outsourced, cannot source trucking, cannot outsource harvesting of wheat straw or corn stover, or would these jobs are here to stay once we create them? I think that's what we need. I was going to say EcoStrike has its work cut out for it, for sure, with all those Opportunity Zones. We have a few more minutes and I kind of wanted to ask a question. So this is a great panel because it's attacking this issue of sustainable transportation from so many different angles and all of your different technologies have a role to play. And I like to think of things being trade-ups, not trade-offs. And I like to think about how a biofuels offering can exist alongside an electric vehicle and structure and changing over fleets. And I'm a former Metro user, haven't used it for a while, not so much a bus person because of where I live. But I miss public transportation. I miss not being able to access it and the hassle of having to drive everywhere. I wonder, Genevieve, maybe we'll start with you and we'll go around again, kind of like what we did last time. Help our audience put all of your different technologies and sectors into the scheme of things. What's your vision for how alternative fuels can work together to lower emissions, contribute to improve public health, and also improve affordability and equity? Thanks, Jan. I think this goes back to your original point about integration of segments and technologies and having an understanding of the transportation sector as a system and how to integrate that system into the power sector, into communications, and make them work seamlessly and efficiently together in modulating energy supply and demand and how to, forgive me, plug in the right energy resources to any given demand. So at the micro level, as we talked about, if you're using a biofuel and a hybrid bus, you are getting a really, really efficient bus. And if you are using energy storage, which is able to be from distributed or even at utility scale, then you're bringing all different sorts of power supply into the transportation sector and making them serve each other. So I think that there is absolutely, the transportation sector in itself has so many diverse needs. And again, how we move people in goods is changing and just having a better sense where that's headed and how we serve it most efficiently and sustainably and comprehensively. So everyone has access to clean options and clean air are absolutely questions that our transportation planners and our policymakers need to be looking at. Thanks. Other perspectives from around the panel? Sure. I agree. I mean, I think, you know, Genevieve touched on it and I touched on it earlier. I mean, a lot of the places you see higher biofuel blends being offered, there's an electric charging station, you know, we, there are a number of public transportation fleets that are flex fuel vehicles, for example, that you know, E85. And so, you know, it really is a mix and it's going to take a lot of different things to make our transportation system more sustainable. There are things that we can do in the near term with higher biofuel blends. You know, there's certainly things on electrification and on the transit and public public transportation side as well. You know, there are, and I should get back to an earlier question, Genevieve touched on infrastructure. Similarly, we have some of the same questions. You know, we have seen a couple programs from USDA on infrastructure, but we have a, you know, we think we can use a lot of the infrastructure that's in place. So that is a benefit, I think on the cost side, but they're in addition, there are, you know, there are some things on the pump and dispensing side that we would need to see for even higher biofuel blends. Thanks. Yeah, please. Because I think, first of all, transit systems, as I mentioned earlier, they're 60% clean fuel now and the trend is going to only increase and go up from there. But let me mention beyond that, because I think there was a little context to COVID and in the question. And, you know, let's say this, it's led, at least for now, it's led people to drive because they think they're safer in their own car. We need to make sure that's not viewed as the only safe option. We're going, you know, transit system, get that customer confidence, which will come, you know, because, you know, new habits, we can't let them kick in. Yeah, we don't want a driving oriented society and a communities that are designed around that, that will be energy inefficient. Again, we want automobiles as part of that, you know, certainly efficient fueled. But, you know, the policy context goes beyond that. And we are at a critical time in that. So I'll put a marker down for that. There's a policy fix for that. I think things like, you know, I would contend that there are parking cities, you know, parking minimums and many development plans. There are a lot of policies in place that encourage driving when I think other solutions might be more energy efficient. Yeah, great. Thank you so much. We are at, in like three seconds, two, oh, there it is, 325. That is the end of our panel. And I would, I kind of wish we could keep going, but we have to turn our attention to new frontiers and renewable research and development at 330. Maybe you'll be able to join us. I would like to say thank you to Genevieve Jordan, Art and Chris. This was a great panel, really great discussion. And I really appreciated sort of how all of your comments came together and sort of really presented a nice holistic picture of the sustainable transportation. So thank you all for making yourselves available today. I really appreciate that. That will conclude the panel of our day. Oh, thank you. If for our online audience, two things. One is if you would like to continue watching and carry over into new frontiers and research and development, you're welcome to, but you'll need to either refresh or reopen your browser. You won't be able to use this, the link that you're currently using won't allow you to do that. So sorry about the inconvenience. Hopefully it's not too much and hopefully you'll be able to join us back in a few minutes. The second is we are always interested in what our audience thinks about our briefings. And if you have two minutes, we would really appreciate you taking your survey, helping us understand how we can prove not just in terms of sort of the briefings themselves, but the topics and making sure that we're providing relevant information to policy makers in the public. So we really appreciate it. We read everything and we do our best to incorporate the feedback into our next set of briefings and webinars and webcasts. We will go ahead and end there. Thank you very much again to the panel and hope to see everybody soon for new frontiers in research and development.