For much of the past two years, Section 45Z has been discussed as a future opportunity: what a lower carbon intensity score might be worth, which facilities would qualify, how credits would be calculated and whether planned carbon-reduction projects would generate an acceptable return.
The second-quarter 2026 earnings season is beginning to replace those estimates with actual numbers.
Green Plains, The Andersons and Aemetis are now reporting tens of millions of dollars of benefit from the Clean Fuel Production Credit. Other producers are recognizing 45Z income, arranging transactions to monetize future credits and investing additional capital specifically to lower the carbon intensity of their fuel.
The significance for the biofuel industry goes beyond another federal incentive. Carbon intensity is starting to become an operating and financial variable that can materially change plant earnings.
Green Plains: $58.7 million of 45Z value in one quarter
Green Plains provides one of the clearest examples.
The company reported $67.1 million of net income in the second quarter of 2026, compared with a $72.2 million loss during the same quarter last year. Adjusted EBITDA reached $93.3 million. Included in that figure was $58.7 million of 45Z production tax credit value, net of discounts and other costs. (BusinessWire)
For the first six months of 2026, Green Plains reported $113.9 million of 45Z value after discounts, other costs and related selling and administrative expenses. The company has also changed its accounting treatment so that the credits are recognized as a reduction in the cost of producing low-carbon fuel rather than as an income-tax benefit. (BusinessWire)
That distinction matters when comparing producers. 45Z will not necessarily appear on every income statement as "revenue," even when it is making a substantial contribution to operating earnings.
Green Plains' results also show why investors are increasingly paying attention to CI reduction alongside traditional ethanol crush margins. The company has carbon capture operating at three Nebraska facilities and has positioned lower-carbon production as a core part of its operating strategy. (SEC)
The Andersons has already recorded $50 million in 2026
The Andersons reported a similar pattern.
Its Renewables segment generated a record second quarter, with adjusted pretax income of $88 million, compared with $15 million in the prior-year quarter. The company attributed $24 million of its second-quarter results to 45Z producer tax credits. (The Andersons)
That follows another $26 million of 45Z tax credits recognized during the first quarter, bringing the company's reported 2026 total through June to approximately $50 million. (SEC)
The Andersons is not treating that benefit as static. Management said it continues to evaluate additional opportunities to reduce the carbon intensity of its ethanol operations in order to increase future 45Z value, including advancement of a Class VI carbon sequestration well permit. (The Andersons)
That is an important shift in how decarbonization projects can be evaluated. A lower-CI investment is no longer supported only by a sustainability objective. If it changes the facility's 45Z emissions rate, the resulting tax-credit value can become part of the project's financial return.
Aemetis shows how the tax credit turns into cash
Aemetis provides a different view of the same market because it has moved beyond recognizing credits on its financial statements and has begun selling them.
The company reported second-quarter 2026 revenue of $62.7 million, up 20% from the prior-year period. That included $8.6 million of Section 45Z tax credits generated by its California ethanol and dairy renewable natural gas businesses. Of that amount, $6.5 million came from California ethanol and $2.1 million from dairy RNG. (SEC)
More importantly from a capital-markets perspective, Aemetis announced in July that its subsidiaries had completed sales of $18 million of 45Z credits generated from 2025 and 2026 production. Those transactions produced approximately $14.5 million of net cash proceeds after transaction costs. (GlobeNewswire)
The transaction illustrates an important feature of the credit. Section 45Z is among the federal clean-energy credits eligible for transfer under Section 6418, allowing an eligible producer to sell all or part of a credit to an unrelated buyer for cash. (IRS)
That creates a direct connection between CI performance and liquidity. A producer does not necessarily need sufficient federal tax liability to capture the economic value itself; qualifying credits can become assets that are monetized in the tax-credit market.
Aemetis reported that its 2026 credits represented approximately $0.33 per gallon of ethanol and $15.20 per MMBtu of RNG, illustrating just how different the economics can be across fuel pathways and carbon intensities. (Aemetis)
Other producers are seeing the same effect
The trend is broader than those three companies.
REX American Resources recognized $7.5 million of 45Z production tax credit income during its fiscal first quarter of 2026. The company's net income increased to $21.7 million from $10.7 million in the comparable prior-year period, with stronger operating results and 45Z both contributing to the improvement. (SEC)
Alto Ingredients also specifically identified incremental Section 45Z earnings as one of the factors behind its return to profitability during the first quarter. Management said the company intends to continue increasing the value captured from 45Z while pursuing projects that lower the carbon footprint of its facilities. (SEC)
In renewable natural gas, OPAL Fuels reported a positive 45Z contribution to first-quarter results and disclosed that it had entered into a $100 million master agreement to monetize Section 45Z production tax credits. (SEC)
ADM is another company worth watching. Its second-quarter results showed a 22% year-over-year increase in operating profit within Carbohydrate Solutions, where the company said stronger North American ethanol margins benefited from policy incentives. Operating profit at Vantage Corn Processors, its dry-milling ethanol business, increased from $33 million to $85 million. (SEC)
Quantum Commodity Intelligence subsequently reported that ADM had increased its expected 2026 benefit from biofuel production tax credits by $100 million compared with its previous estimate. (Quantum Commodity Intelligence)
ADM's public earnings release does not separately attribute that entire increase to 45Z, so it should not be treated as directly comparable with the explicitly reported Green Plains or Andersons figures. It does, however, reinforce the broader direction of the market: federal biofuel policy is becoming increasingly visible in producer earnings expectations.
Carbon intensity is becoming a capital allocation decision
The more consequential development may be what producers are doing with those economics.
Aemetis is installing a mechanical vapor recompression system at its Keyes, California ethanol plant that is expected to reduce natural-gas consumption by approximately 80%. The company estimates that the project could increase annual operating cash flow by roughly $32 million through a combination of lower energy costs and increased value from California LCFS credits and Section 45Z. (Aemetis)
The Andersons is pursuing additional carbon-intensity reductions and carbon sequestration. Green Plains has already paired ethanol production with carbon capture. Across renewable diesel and sustainable aviation fuel, Stillwater Associates' margin analysis reaches a similar conclusion: feedstock carbon intensity is becoming one of the major determinants of profitability because lower-CI pathways can generate greater value from carbon-based incentives. (Stillwater Associates)
That changes the investment question.
Historically, a biofuel producer evaluating a new technology might primarily model energy savings, additional yield or higher co-product revenue. Under 45Z, the same project can potentially have a second return stream if it reduces lifecycle carbon intensity.
The same logic applies to feedstocks.
A lower-carbon feedstock, a change in process energy, carbon capture, renewable power or another verifiable reduction in lifecycle emissions can affect the value of every qualifying gallon produced. Feedstock markets are already beginning to respond: Fastmarkets reports that U.S. biofuel feedstock consumption has increased following both higher renewable fuel requirements and updates to the 45Z program. (Fastmarkets)
The 45Z discussion is moving from tax policy to plant economics
There is still considerable uncertainty around implementation, emissions modeling and the value at which credits can ultimately be transferred. The current Section 45Z framework applies to qualifying clean transportation fuel produced domestically and sold through the end of 2029, giving producers several more years in which CI investments can affect credit generation. (IRS)
But one important uncertainty has already been resolved.
45Z is no longer only a modeled future revenue opportunity.
For a growing number of U.S. biofuel producers, the credit is already affecting reported earnings, operating margins and cash flow. Companies are selling credits, financing projects around expected future credit generation and directing capital toward projects capable of lowering lifecycle carbon intensity.
For investors, lenders and biofuel producers, that makes CI more than an environmental performance metric.
It is becoming part of the economics of the asset.
What to watch next
None of the figures above have been audited by FDCIC.com beyond checking that each is drawn from an SEC filing or company-issued release; we have not independently verified the underlying accounting or the assumptions behind any producer's credit estimate. Investors and lenders evaluating a producer's 45Z exposure should ask the same version-control question we raise for feedstock claims: which emissions pathway and rest-of-system assumptions produced the reported number, and how would it change under the final 45Z regulations. See Tax Credit & Capital Markets ratings for how we track claims from this part of the value chain, and the market map for where each of these companies sits in it.