Hillary flip-flops on ethanol use...
Published May 23, 2006
http://desmoinesregister.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20060523/NEWS/60523014/1001/NEWS
Hillary Clinton plugs increased ethanol use
PHILIP BRASHER
REGISTER WASHINGTON BUREAU
WASHINGTON, D.C. – Sen. Hillary Clinton, who once opposed requiring motorists to use corn-based ethanol in their cars, proposed Tuesday to dramatically boost use of the alcohol fuel.
Clinton called for $1 billion in grants for research on methods of making ethanol from plant cellulose, the fibrous stuff found in everything from corn stalks to wheat straw, grass and wood. Ethanol is now made almost exclusively from grain.
“We have the capacity to make nearly 4.5 billion gallons of ethanol, but that is a long way from helping us deal with our gas problems,” Clinton said in a speech at the National Press Club.
“We need to be moving on a much faster track.”
Clinton, who is considered a frontrunner for the Democratic presidential nomination, was one of 26 senators who opposed the energy bill passed by Congress last year mandating the use of 7.5 billion gallons of ethanol by 2012.
Clinton opposed both the ethanol mandate and lawsuit protections for
ethanol.
Clinton once explained her opposition to an ethanol mandate at a meeting with the Greater Des Moines Partnership by saying, "I have to look to first protecting and supporting the needs of the people I represent right now."
Many farm-state lawmakers have proposed increasing the ethanol mandate to as much as 15 billion gallons by 2012 and for extending the 51-cent-gallon ethanol tax subsidy that is scheduled to expire in 2010. Clinton did not mention either issue.
Instead, her suggestions focused on speeding development of cellulosic ethanol and making it easier for motorists to buy fuel that is 85 percent ethanol, a product known as E85. Ethanol is primarily used as a 10-percent additive to conventional gasoline.
The 2005 energy bill Clinton opposed included a 30-percent tax credit for defraying the cost of installing E85 pumps, plus a program authored by Sen. Tom Harkin, D-Ia., for subsidizing the production of cellulosic ethanol.
On Tuesday, Clinton proposed increasing the tax credit for E85 pumps to 50 percent and called for requiring oil companies to install the E85 pumps at the filling stations they own.
She also proosed providing loan guarantees for construction of cellulosic ethanol plants.
“Biofuels is a tremendous opportunity for us, but we need to make sure we seize it.”
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