Biofuel Industry's Focus Turns To House

By PHILIP BRASHER
Register Washington Bureau

June 23, 2007

Washington, D.C. - The biofuel industry's attention turns to the House now that the Senate has finished work on an energy bill that requires dramatic increases in ethanol usage.

Senate Republicans blocked approval of a tax package that would create a 50-cent-a-gallon subsidy for ethanol made from crop residue and other sources of plant cellulose.

However, Democrats said they would continue pushing for the tax measures.

One option mentioned by Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., is to attach the tax package to the new farm bill.

The energy bill, approved late Thursday, would require usage of 36 billion gallons of biofuels by 2022, about six times the amount of fuel ethanol that U.S. motorists will use this year.

The mandate is intended to guarantee a growing market for conventional corn ethanol as well as jump-start production of the cellulosic version.

"It's a big win for Iowa, it really is," said Ron Litterer, a Greene, Ia., farmer on the board of the National Corn Growers Association.

The road ahead in the House is not clear.

The House Energy and Commerce Committee is to take up an energy bill Wednesday, but the panel has put off until this fall its plan to require higher usage of alternative fuels, which would include coal-derived fuels as well as ethanol. Liberal Democrats objected to the inclusion of coal fuels that fail to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.

Des Moines Register, June 23, 2007