New farm bill hobbles E15 ethanol expansion
Daniel Strohl at 8:59 am  Hemmings Daily



While E15 availability has slowly spread across the Midwest over the last couple of years, a handful of provisions included in the federal farm bill passed earlier this month will effectively make the continued roll-out of the ethanol-blended fuel more difficult, if not stop it in its tracks entirely.

The Agricultural Act of 2014, which passed into law February 7, primarily set the federal government’s food and agricultural policies for the next several years. Perhaps the provision most crippling to the push for widespread E15 adoption, however, was the one cutting a Rural Energy for America Program subsidy that would help gas stations install as many as 10,000 E15 blender pumps over the next two to five years. Rather than dispense pre-blended E15, the blender pumps would instead mix the gasoline and ethanol in the specified blend, whether that be E10, E15, E85, or other discussed but yet-to-be-approved blends. The ethanol industry has long seen blender pumps as key to increasing demand for E15.

While the Environmental Protection Agency in 2011 approved E15 use in 2001 and newer passenger and light-duty vehicles, it has not approved it for use in motorcycles, ATVs, small engines, or in vehicles older than the 2001 model year. According to a list published by the Renewable Fuels Association, E15 is now available in 59 gas stations across 12 states, up from about a couple dozen about a year ago.

- See more at: http://blog.hemmings.com/index.php/2014/02/25/new-farm-bill-hobbles-e15-ethan...