Articles in Federal Legislation
by Kris Bevill (Ethanol Producer Magazine) Witnesses projected strong growth for renewable fuels use in both the power generation and transportation sectors over the next 20 years during a Senate energy committee held Jan. 31, …
(Environmental and Energy Study Institute) Will federal programs critical to the development of sustainable bioenergy and the bioeconomy be renewed in the next Farm Bill? The authorization for current programs will expire at the end …
by Mat McDermott (TreeHugger) We just learned, based on IEA calculations, if all fossil fuel subsidies were eliminated it would result in greenhouse gas emission cuts deep enough to get us halfway to preventing dangerous climate change. Indeed, …
by Cindy Zimmerman (DomesticFuel.com) In his State of the Union address Tuesday night, President Obama voiced strong support for renewable energy and an end to oil subsidies.
“We have subsidized oil companies for a century. …
by Robert E. Kozak (Advanced Biofuels USA) Retain Agricultural Land: Agricultural and forest lands are vulnerable to loss due to reduction of the dairy and pulp/paper industries and conversion to residential or commercial development. They …
By Douglas L. Faulkner (Biofuels Digest) What should be the priorities for federal government support for bioenergy, in an era of fiscal austerity and a broken consensus on energy policy?
My goal is develop interactively with …
by Lisa Gibson (Biomass Power and Thermal Magazine) When the American Council on Renewable Energy’s Biomass Definition Subcommittee pitched its unified biomass definition to members of Congress in early November, the consensus was clear: no …
(Renewable Fuels Association) The Renewable Fuels Association (RFA) is rejecting the notion that greater efforts need to be made to include fossil fuels in the nation’s fuel supply. Specifically, the RFA is very critical of …
by Chris O’Malley (Indianapolis Business Journal) …But it looks like motorists, rather than ethanol makers, stand to feel the pain.
The reason is the survival of another federal measure, known as the Renewable Fuels Standard. It …
by Ken Anderson (Brownfield Ag News)The federal ethanol blenders’ tax credit for grain-based ethanol expired without protest from the ethanol industry at the end of 2011.
But the head of the Renewable Fuels Association—Bob Dinneen—says the …
by Nathanael Green (Energy Now/Natural Resources Defense Council) …Our dependence on oil hurts our economy, helps our adversaries and puts our security at risk. Each day we send over $1 billion overseas for oil, often …
(Farm Futures) Failure to renew the Volumetric Ethanol Excise Tax Credit will create a new world for the industry.
…What many consumers don’t realize is that the tax credit didn’t go to ethanol plants, it went …
by Jeanne Roberts (Energy Boom) On Wednesday, December 14, representatives from the nation’s biofuels, renewable chemicals and biobased products industries provided written testimony to a U.S. Senate Finance Subcommittee aimed at insuring the smooth continuation of …
by Paul Stenquist (New York Times) The U.S. Coalition for Advanced Diesel Cars, a Washington-based advocacy group whose members include Bosch, Honeywell and BorgWarner, all major automotive suppliers, released a white paper on Monday to make …
by Charles Abbott and Reese Ewing (Drovers Cattle Network) A U.S. ethanol tax credit costing roughly $6 billion a year will expire on Dec. 31, with the U.S. industry declaring itself ready to stand on …
byJames C. Greenwood and Robert Johnson (The Hill Congress Blog/BIO/National Farmers’ Union) Maintaining agricultural productivity in America is indispensable to our economic security, so a safety net for farmers is very important. But abundant affordable …
(25 x ’25) Amid the political clamor surrounding congressional efforts to cut federal spending over the next decade and reduce the nation’s deficit, the ethanol industry has conceded that a seven-year subsidy benefiting the sector …
by Kris Bevill (Ethanol Producer Magazine) A coalition of livestock and poultry lobby groups submitted a letter to the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee leaders on Dec. 7, requesting a hearing to evaluate the …
by Garry Niemeyer (National Corn Growers Association) Back in August, the Green Scissors Project identified ways the federal government could shave $380 billion from the federal budget over five years. But their $380 billion in …
by Philip Brasher (Des Moines Register) Programs the Obama administration has been pushing to promote next-generation biofuels are likely to have little funding in the next farm bill, according to the top Democrat on the …
by Ann Marie Edwards (DomesticFuel.com) The Renewable Fuels Association(RFA) has sent a letter to the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee leadership refuting statements that were made in a Nov. 30th letter sent to the committee by …
by Mary Rosenthal (Algal Biomass Organization) …There are four key takeaways from these meetings that I think are critical for our industry as we close out 2011 and plan for 2012.
1. Support for renewable energy …
(Congressman Charles Rangel (D- NY 15) Congressman Charles Rangel on December 2, 2011, introduced legislation to extend “other duty or charge” (ODC), a key component of the Caribbean Basin Economic Recovery Act (CBERA), that provides …
(Brazilian Sugarcane Industry Association/PR NewsWire) In response to the introduction of H.R. 3552, legislation sponsored by four members of the U.S. House of Representatives to extend the import tax on foreign ethanol, the Brazilian Sugarcane …
by Sue Roesler (Farm & Ranch Guide) Cole Gustafson, department chair of the Department of Agribusiness and Applied Economics at North Dakota State University, said while there’s more concerns about corn ethanol at the …
(The Boston Globe) Editorial: …But Solyndra’s subsequent failure isn’t a sign that the administration has gone too far; rather, it’s a sign that Congress, which tolerates all manner of explicit and implicit subsidies for fossil …
(Environment and Energy Study Institute) A steadily rising tax on the carbon content of fossil fuels would be a powerful, market-based approach to addressing one of the greatest crises of our time – global climate …
by Mackinnon Lawrence (Reuters) …Coming off several years of steady industry growth but facing a difficult 2012, Advanced Biofuels Markets 2011 was tinged with exigency. With deficit reduction at the forefront of policy objectives for …
(Green Car Congress) A new study by economists at Oregon State University questions the cost-effectiveness of current biofuels and says they would barely reduce fossil fuel use and would likely increase greenhouse gas emissions. The researchers focused …
by Dan Piller (Des Moines Register) Ethanol producers will lose about 25 to 30 cents per gallon on operating profits when the tax credit for blenders goes away after Dec. 31.
…(Walt) Wendland, who also is president …
by Philip Brasher (Des Moines Register) A draft summary of the new farm bill that lawmakers have been finalizing says farmers will have a new subsidy system to supplement the coverage they now have through …
by William Richards and Dennis McGinn (The Plain Dealer) Guest Columnists: The future of the government’s role in U.S. agriculture remains about as uncertain today as it was before the 1933 enactment of the Agricultural …
by Brent Erickson (Biofuels Digest/BIO) Federal loan guarantees may be scuttled after the Solyndra affair – but should the baby really be thrown out with the bathwater?
…But the programs’ untimely end may coincide with the …
by Holly Jessen (Ethanol Producer Magazine) From the standpoint of Matt Horton, CEO of Propel Fuels, efforts in 2011 to extend the Volumetric Ethanol Excise Tax Credit imperiled the future of the industry. “For so …
by Jim Lane (Biofuels Digest) …Recently, it became clear what fuel Rep. Boren did like in his truck, natural gas, when the Oklahoma congressman co-sponsored legislation that would pay American truck owners up to $64,000, per …
by Holly Jessen (Ethanol Producers Magazine) Just more than a week after announcing the formation of the Coalition for E85 the group said Oct. 21 that it had a new member. The Petroleum Marketers Association of …
by Adam Monroe (Novozymes/The Hill E2Wire) …We are thankful the REFRESH Act’s energy title includes baseline funding. The problem is that the current farm bill does not, putting in jeopardy programs that our farmers and …
by Erin Voegele (Biorefining Magazine) …While (Sen. Debbie) Stabenow has yet to introduce the legislation in the U.S. Senate, her office did provideBiorefining Magazine with a draft of the bill. According to that draft, titled the …
by Cindy Zimmerman (DomesticFuel.com) The House Committee on Science, Space and Technology’s Subcommittee on Energy and Environment is holding a hearing today (November 2, 2011) on “Conflicts and Unintended Consequences of Motor Fuel Standards” with a …
by Susanne Retka Schill (Ethanol Producer Magazine) Interesting article turned up this week from Australia, showing just what could happen with no RFS or mandate. The Courier-Mail reported “Queensland motorists dudded as fuel retailers pull ethanol …
by Bill Lundberg (Biofuels Digest) Should the Renewable Fuel Standard be scrapped, or revised? BP North America chief Susan Ellerbusch makes the case for “No”.
In Chicago, BP Biofuels North America president Susan Ellerbusch, in addressing …
by Ron Kotrba (Biodiesel Magazine) Expiring biofuel tax credits and a dysfunctional Congress
…But given Congress subsidizing an obviously profitable oil industry, coupled with subjecting biofuels to stringent GHG emissions reductions while the petroleum industry has …
by Philip Brasher (Des Moines Register) The biofuel industry is lobbying lawmakers to continue some subsidies and financial assistance that they got in the last farm bill. The programs are set to expire next year if …
by Ben Geman (The Hill/E2Wire) Nine liberal House Democrats are floating legislation to impose a carbon tax on fossil-fuel producers and importers, a measure they say would cut the deficit by a half-trillion dollars and …
by John R. Block (The Washington Times) As Secretary of Agriculture during the Reagan administration, I helped the American ethanol industry take off. Imagine my surprise to read an editorial in The Washington Times (“Corn-fueled politics,” …
by Ben Geman (The Hill/E2Wire) The latest effort came in a Friday letter from 38 members, spearheaded by Reps. Earl Blumenauer (D-Ore.) and Peter Welch (D-Vt.), that argues “the United States can no longer afford …
by Kris Bevill (Ethanol Producer Magazine) Citing “serious concerns” with the U.S. EPA’s decision to allow E15 to be used invehicle models 2001 and newer, Rep. Jim Sensenbrenner, R-Wis., introduced legislation to the House of …
by Gale Buchanan & Bobby Moser (AgriPulse) …Government-funded research can help solve another of our greatest problems – our dependence on limited and declining supplies of fossil fuels – with cleaner, renewable energy sources. And …
by Bryan Sims (Biodiesel Magazine) The biodiesel and oilheat industries have a long-standing history working alongside each other respectively serving the home heating needs of their customers, particularly in the Northeast, and delivering clean-burning Bioheat …
by Cindy Zimmerman (DomesticFuel.org) A coalition of retailers, producers, equipment manufacturers have formed the Coalition for E85with the stated purpose of protecting consumer access to 85% ethanol blends.
According to the coalition, if the current tax credit for …
