The Outlook for the Renewable Diesel Market
June 4, 2025 Recently, the USDA released its planting intentions figures for 2025, showing that U.S. growers are planning to plant more corn and less soybeans this growing season. Longer term, however, energy market dynamics will likely favor more soybean acreage.
At the 2025 Ohio Agribusiness Association annual meeting, Michael Reginelli, Risk Management Consultant at Advance Trading, Inc., gave a speech on the U.S. energy sector. In this, Reginelli specifically mentioned soybean oil-driven renewable diesel as one of the key market drivers going forward.
“In 2024, renewables made up about 9% of U.S. energy consumption,” he said. “Renewable diesel is driving the growth in the soybean processing industry. And it’s staggering how quickly that industry is growing. Overall, it’s up 16 times between 2010 and 2025. And it’s expected to have the same rate of growth over the next few years as well.”
And the numbers back this up. In December 2024, U.S. soybean crush reached a new all-time record high of 206.604 million bushels, a 7% increase from November and 5.8% higher than December 2023, according to the National Oilseed Processors Association.
Looking at renewable alternatives to petroleum and natural gas, biofuels represent 32% of the market, with wood accounting for 23%, and biomass waste representing 5%. “And in biofuels, renewable diesel surpassed biodiesel in market share back in 2023,” added Reginelli.
He said that renewable diesel is different than biodiesel, which has been around much longer. “It’s chemically identical to traditional diesel,” said Reginelli, “which is a claim biodiesel can’t make.”
Loading ...In part because of this growth for renewable diesel, Reginelli predicted the U.S. would see more soybean crushing plants coming online over the next few years. However, politics could get in the way of this expansion.
“Policy is probably one of the biggest components of this growth right now, but it’s also the one with the most uncertainty,” he said. “Any pullback on policies supporting renewables could change this equation for new crush plant investment.”
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