WASHINGTON (AP) — The head of the Environmental Protection Agency is looking to make peace on biofuels standards with a group of senators from corn-growing states who could upend President Donald Trump's nominees for key regulatory posts.

EPA Administrator Scott Pruitt pledged in a letter to Sen. Joni Ernst of Iowa and a half dozen other Republican lawmakers to take specific actions benefiting the biofuels industry.

Last summer, Pruitt proposed biofuels targets for 2017 and 2018 set slightly below current levels. This followed a push by oil companies to ease mandates included in the Renewable...