Carbon Intensity
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CASE STUDY
Client Snapshot:
A fuel-grade and high-grade ethanol producer operating multiple U.S. production facilities, seeking defensible, product-level carbon intensity data to support federal tax incentive compliance and customer sustainability requests.
THE CLIENT’S CHALLENGE
As the 45Z Clean Fuel Production Credit moved toward implementation, ethanol producers faced growing pressure to establish defensible, product-specific carbon intensity figures rather than a single corporate-wide number. The client needed to quantify the carbon footprint of two distinct products, fuel-grade and high-grade ethanol, across multiple facilities, using a methodology that would hold up to regulatory review, independent critical review, and increasing customer requests for verifiable sustainability data.
Compounding the challenge, publicly available benchmarks for high-grade industrial ethanol proved sparse and inconsistent. Existing published studies covered adjacent products, such as beverage-grade spirits or transportation fuel ethanol, with materially different process boundaries, making direct comparison unreliable without careful evaluation.
OUR APPROACH
Conducted an ISO 14067-aligned, cradle-to-gate product carbon footprint study covering corn cultivation, transportation, and ethanol production at each facility.
Delivered facility- and product-specific results for fuel-grade and high-grade ethanol separately, rather than a single blended company-wide figure.
Evaluated co-product allocation methodology approaches to determine the most defensible basis for each product.
Conducted extensive external benchmark research to contextualize results, carefully screening candidate studies for boundary and process comparability before selecting the closest available reference points.
Engaged an independent, Ph.D.-level third-party reviewer to critically review methodology and results ahead of client and regulatory use.
Documented scope limitations explicitly within the final report, so the client's team and any downstream reviewers understood precisely what the study could, and could not, support.
RESULTS & IMPACT
Client received a defensible, facility- and product-specific carbon intensity result, structured to support 45Z tax credit compliance.
Study findings positioned the client to respond confidently to customer requests for product-level environmental data.
Client gained a repeatable methodology, informed by its ongoing corporate GHG inventory, that can be updated as production data and regulatory guidance evolve.
Independent third-party critical review added a further layer of confidence for both regulatory and customer-facing use of the results.