A previously unlikely alliance of the oil and biofuel industries may finally make higher-ethanol fuel available year-round, a leading advocate in Congress said Tuesday.
Rep. Adrian Smith (R-Neb.) told reporters he’s grown more confident that legislation to lift season restrictions on E15 — which is 15 percent ethanol, 85 percent gasoline — can pass Congress, once backers find a measure it can ride on.
Smith said the liquid fuels industries have a “great partnership” that’s formed in recent years, a reference to their shared worries about the rise of electric vehicles. Petroleum groups have dropped much of their most vocal opposition to E15, which can’t legally be sold in summer across most of the country.
“We want to be ready,” said Smith, who nearly scored the E15 provision’s inclusion in a stopgap spending bill late last year, only to see it removed in final negotiations. “Certainly we were at the end of last year.”
