Senators Offer Bipartisan Amendment to Repeal the Corn Ethanol Mandate

U.S. Senators Dianne Feinstein (D-CA) and Pat Toomey (R-PA) this week offered an amendment to the Keystone pipeline bill, which is being debated in the U.S. Senate, to repeal the corn ethanol mandate. Senator Jeff Flake (R-AZ) is also a co-sponsor of the Corn Ethanol Mandate Elimination Act of 2015. The Feinstein-Toomey amendment abolishes the corn ethanol mandate in the Renewable Fuel Standard (RFS). The RFS requires annual increases in the amount of renewable fuel that must be blended into the total volume of gasoline refined and consumed in the U.S. In 2014 the Act required refiners and blenders to use 18.15 billion gallons of renewable fuel. According to the Senators: “The current statute effectively mandates the use of corn ethanol at the expense of other fuels.”