Indiana corn growers support waiver allowing summer sales of E15 BY DAVE BLOWER JR. The Indiana Corn Growers Association (ICGA) thanked President Biden for approving a waiver to allow E15 gasoline – gasoline that uses a 15 percent ethanol blend – to be sold this summer. President Biden made the announcement on April 12 from a POET ethanol plant in Menlo, Iowa. A lower-cost and lower-emission fuel blend, E15 is often marketed as Unleaded 88. Ethanol is a major player in Indiana’s economy, and it is especially important to Hoosier corn growers. Indiana ranks as the fifth-largest producer of U.S. ethanol – generating more than 1.2 billion gallons per year. The Hoosier State produces nearly 8 percent of the total U.S. ethanol output. There are 14 ethanol plants in the state. Collectively, these plants consume about 47 percent of Indiana’s total corn crop – more than 461 million bushels. “Ethanol adds billions of gallons to the U.S. fuel supply every year, lowering demand for high-cost oil while increasing total fuel available to American motorists,” said ICGA President Scott Smith, a farmer from Windfall, Ind. “Ethanol has been priced an average of 80 cents less per gallon than unblended gasoline at wholesale through
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March, and drivers currently save up to 20 cents or more per gallon where E15 is available.” With several factors driving gas prices higher, including Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, the National Corn Growers Association (NCGA) and farmer leaders across the country asked President Biden to extend the use of E15 to hold down prices at the pump. Farmers asked their members of Congress to support continued availability of E15, sending thousands of messages in recent weeks and backing bipartisan Senate and House advocacy for the action announced in April. Russia is the world’s third-largest oil producer, and it accounts for 11 percent of the global supply. Before sanctions by the Biden Administration on March 8, Russian oil imports equaled nearly 8 percent of the U.S. oil supply, according to the Energy Information Administration. President Biden, on March 31, ordered the release of 1 million barrels of oil per day from the strategic petroleum reserve through the end of September. That is the largest release in the reserve’s history.
