March 31, 2010
Conservation Group Attacks Ethanol Subsidy (E & E News)
By: Jessica Leber (E&E News)
A conservation group is calling on Congress to end a major subsidy for the ethanol industry just as Midwestern lawmakers work to secure an extension before it expires this year.
Julie Sibbing, an agriculture expert with National Wildlife Federation, called the 45-cent-per-gallon blenders' tax credit for corn ethanol a "duplicative" break for an established industry.
Fuel providers, she noted, must already meet a federal biofuels mandate, which requires that they use 13 billion gallons in 2010 and 15 billion in 2012. Mostly this will be filled with corn ethanol and a little soy biodiesel. Cellulosic biofuel producers are only now opening the first large-scale plants.
"We're not talking about pulling the rug out from under corn ethanol today," Sibbing said. "But why aren't we spending more money to get us to a more sustainable future?"
In a report yesterday, the group called on Congress instead to advance more loan guarantees, grants and research and development funds to make emerging cellulosic fuels more competitive with corn- and soy-based fuels today.
But Growth Energy, an ethanol trade group, said that ending the blenders' credit would wound the U.S. ethanol industry just as it gains a foothold and increase gasoline prices for consumers. The tax credit, the group says, is an incentive for blenders to mix more ethanol with gasoline without passing on the extra costs...Read More (Requires User Name and Password)
