Bustos calls for boost to biofuels
As oil prices crash, U.S. rep. says biofuels ‘must not be left in the rearview mirror’
The sun sets on the Andersons grain elevator in Champaign. (Flickr/tengrrl)
By Ted Cox
As oil prices crash due to a global glut in supply brought on by the coronavirus lockdown, an Illinois congresswoman is calling for the Trump administration to recommit to biofuels.
U.S. Rep. Cheri Bustos of Moline issued a statement in response to a briefing held by U.S. Agriculture Secretary Sonny Perdue late Friday on farm relief packages meant to address the impact the pandemic is having on the economy.
“I am pleased the assistance Congress provided for our family farms through the CARES Act is beginning to flow to producers. For many, this is much-needed relief,” Bustos said.
“But for our farmers, biofuels are an integral part of what makes their market work, and no relief package can be complete without supporting biofuels,” she added. “After struggling with export losses due to the administration’s trade war and facing the challenges of a difficult growing season, our biofuel producers must not be left in the rearview mirror as our country begins to look forward.”
The Trump administration has had an inconsistent policy on biofuels like ethanol. Illinois farmers raised the issue with Perdue last summer on a visit to Decatur, complaining that waivers granted by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency to refineries so that they wouldn’t have to process ethanol had cut production by 2.6 billion gallons. Perdue seemed sympathetic, calling the EPA waivers “disappointing” and saying they had been “way overdone.”
But an attempt by the Trump administration to correct that drew criticism from both Bustos and U.S. Sen. Dick Durbin at the end of last year. They charged that the rules attempting to limit the waivers — typically granted to small or start-up refineries, but distributed to major gas companies like Exxon and Chevron under Trump — had been “watered down” and constituted a “complete failure” for farmers.
Farmers have pushed for government supports for ethanol production because it provides them with an additional market for their crops — especially vital with the drop in soybean trade with China in the tariff war Trump launched two years ago.
But the situation is additionally complicated in the midst of the coronavirus pandemic, as stay-at-home measures around the world have reduced the demand for gasoline. On Monday, oil prices actually dropped into negative territory, as investors who’d committed to accept oil deliveries but had no place to store them were forced to not only dump the stocks at any price, but even had to pay people to take it off their hands.
Bustos made the case that that made government supports for biofuels even more critical. “Right now, roughly half of all ethanol capacity is offline,” she said. “Without assistance, some of our biofuel plants may never reopen, leaving our farmers permanently at risk of losing an entire market.”
Bustos said she’d joined bipartisan colleagues in the biofuels caucus is sending a letter to Perdue and the U.S. Department of Agriculture calling for coronavirus relief funds to go to biofuels producers. “Secretary Perdue and the administration’s decision to leave our biofuel producers out of this stimulus plan is shortsighted — plain and simple,” she said. “As we work to help all Americans move forward, we must make sure that no farmer is left behind.”