Harkin echoes calls to Obama for increased ethanol usage

Sen. Tom Harkin, D-Iowa, joined six other senators on June 25 in sending a letter to President Obama appealing for increased promotion of biofuels that use higher blends of ethanol.

Among several issues discussed in the letter, the statement from the senators urges Obama to respond to the current BP oil spill with a greater sense of urgency to “utilize more homegrown biofuels.”

The letter also expressed concern that the Department of Energy has not yet completed testing of gasoline-ethanol blends with higher than 10 percent ethanol.

“We urge you to use all available means to ensure that the Energy Department’s testing is completed as soon as possible so that both consumers and our biofuels industry are not further harmed by this delay,” the senators wrote.

The concern over ethanol blends comes in the wake of a joint announcement between the Environmental Protection Agency and Energy Department that a decision of whether to approve gasoline blends with higher ethanol content will not come until the fall, as opposed to the original deadline of December 2009.

— by Josh Messer

source: dailyiowan