{"id":289353,"date":"2026-05-29T20:56:07","date_gmt":"2026-05-29T20:56:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/289353\/"},"modified":"2026-05-29T20:56:07","modified_gmt":"2026-05-29T20:56:07","slug":"fort-pierce-biofuel-company-owner-sentenced-for-cheating-epa-clean-fuel-program","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/289353\/","title":{"rendered":"Fort Pierce biofuel company owner sentenced for cheating EPA clean fuel program"},"content":{"rendered":"

FORT PIERCE, Fla. (CBS12) \u2014 A Fort Pierce biofuel company owner was sentenced to 18 months in prison and ordered to pay nearly $3 million for a $7 million renewable fuel credit fraud scheme.<\/p>\n

Christopher Burdett, who owned a biodiesel company in Fort Pierce, was also ordered to serve two years of supervised release, pay about $2.86 million in restitution, and pay a $150,000 fine.<\/p>\n

Federal prosecutors say Burdett and his general manager, Royce Gillham<\/a>, overstated how much biodiesel the company actually produced, allowing them to falsely collect more than $7 million in Environmental Protection Agency<\/a> (EPA) renewable fuel credits and seek over $6 million in tax credits.<\/p>\n

See also: One of Florida’s wealthiest communities battling critical erosion, according to report<\/a><\/p>\n

Authorities say that when regulators and auditors requested records, the pair provided false information about their production levels and customers to cover up the scheme.<\/p>\n

Prosecutors say their scheme exploited federal programs designed to support cleaner fuel production and misled regulators and taxpayers.<\/p>\n

Burdett previously pleaded guilty to conspiracy to commit wire fraud and filing false claims. His co-defendant was previously sentenced to 37 months in prison.<\/p>\n

Officials with the EPA and IRS Criminal Investigation Division say the case highlights efforts to crack down on fraudsters taking advantage of federal incentive programs.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"FORT PIERCE, Fla. (CBS12) \u2014 A Fort Pierce biofuel company owner was sentenced to 18 months in prison…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":289354,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[12],"tags":[171,173,172],"class_list":["post-289353","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-port-st-lucie","tag-port-st-lucie","tag-port-st-lucie-headlines","tag-port-st-lucie-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/289353","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=289353"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/289353\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/289354"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=289353"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=289353"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=289353"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}