America#;s National Corn Growers Association (NCGA) is calling this week#;s US senate approval of S. 517, the comprehensive energy package including a renewable fuel standard (RFS) – by a vote of 88 to 11 – “an unprecedented, historic move”.
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“This is the first time ever that national energy policy would require the use of renewable transportation fuel,” NCGA president Tim Hume said in a statement.
“This is a clear victory for farmers and renewable fuels advocates. When the time came to count votes, renewable fuels were, time and again, able to show the strong support they have in the US senate.”
The NCGA, along with other agricultural, ethanol, oil and environmental organisations, are taking the credit for the bill’s passage after months of lobbying politicians in Washington.
“For the past 20 years, the NCGA has been working side-by-side with farmers, industry and government to build the ethanol industry from the ground up,” said Hume, a farmer from Walsh, Colorado.
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By GlobalDataS. 517 provisions require refiners to use 2.3 billion gallons of renewable fuels, like ethanol, in 2004 and increase that to 5 billion gallons by 2012.
Key elements of S. 517 include the renewable fuel standard, eliminating the reformulated gasoline (RFG) oxygen requirement, banning MTBE additives in four years, creating a renewable credit trading system; and protecting the environmental performance of RFG.
Hume also credited US corn growers and other ethanol supporters with ensuring passage of S. 517.
“Corn growers throughout the nation actively contacted their senators and urged them to pass the comprehensive energy package with RFS provisions,” he said.
“This demonstrates the influence farmers can have on national policy that affects them not only as farmers, but as consumers as well.”
NCGA and other key ethanol industry, oil and agricultural associations, including the Renewable Fuels Association (RFA) and the American Petroleum Institute (API), say that they negotiated the RFS with senate leaders “for weeks”.
In early March, senate majority leader Tom Daschle inserted the RFS into the senate energy package in place of current language.
