U.S. Senator Joe Donnelly expressed major concern about the Environmental Protection Agency’s Notice of Data Availability considering possible cuts to biofuels blending volumes for 2018 and 2019. These cuts would undercut Hoosier farmers and biofuel producers who provide American-made energy, improve our domestic energy security, and support Indiana’s economy.
Donnelly, a member of the Senate Agriculture Committee, said, “Biofuels are a critical component of an all-in energy strategy. Biofuels are American-grown energy that support farmers in Indiana, while improving our country’s energy independence. The EPA’s move towards undercutting biofuels is short-sighted and totally misses the mark. At a time of international tumult, we should be supporting this renewable, American energy, not undermining it.”
Earlier this year, Donnelly helped introduce the bipartisan American Renewable Fuel and Job Creation Act with 15 Senators including Senators Chuck Grassley (R-IA) and Maria Cantwell (D-WA), which would extend the biodiesel tax credit, an important clean-fuel incentive, for three years and reform the incentive by transferring the credit from the blenders to the producers of biofuels. The switch would ensure that the tax credit incentivizes domestic production and taxpayers are not subsidizing imported fuel.
Donnelly also helped introduce the bipartisan Consumer and Fuel Retailer Choice Act with Senators Deb Fischer (R-NE) and Chuck Grassley (R-IA), which would extend the Reid vapor pressure (RVP) waiver to ethanol blends above 10 percent. This would increase market access opportunities for higher blends of ethanol. It would allow retailers across the country to sell E15 and other higher-ethanol/gasoline fuel blends year-round, increasing regulatory certainty and eliminating confusion at the pump.
Source: Donnelly