Seventeen members of the Congressional Biofuels Caucus, including Mike Bost, Cheri Bustos, Rodney Davis, and Tammy Duckworth, urged EPA this week "to make significant changes" to the final 2014-2016 Renewable Fuel Standard (RFS2) targets. Their message to EPA Administrator Gina McCarthy mirrored the message from IL Corn in our written comments to EPA and it oral testimony back in June at a hearing in Kansas City.

At the hearing in June, Illinois Corn Growers Association President Ken Hartman, Jr., told EPA, “Your proposal for 2015 is sending an arbitrary signal to the market that according to USEPA, we don’t need 350 million bushels of corn for the 1 billion gallons of ethanol. And you’re also signaling that the oil industry does not need to comply with the original statute.”

In the letter sent by House members this week, EPA was told, “"Unfortunately, the EPA's proposed rule is inconsistent with the intent of the law. The proposed rule adopts a zero-growth approach and proposes limiting the annual blending targets based on available infrastructure -- a criteria that is not included in the EPA's clearly defined statutory waiver authority and was expressly rejected by Congress during the conference committee on the 2005 Energy Act.”

The members who signed the letter were: Reps. Collin Peterson (D-Minn.), Rodney Davis (R-Ill.), Kristi Noem (R-S.D.), Dave Loebsack (D-Iowa), Rod Blum (R-Iowa), Tim Walz (D-Minn.), Brad Ashford (D-Neb.), Tom Emmer (R-Minn.), Jeff Fortenberry (R-Neb.), Steve King (R-Iowa), David Young (R-Iowa), Cheri Bustos (D-Ill.), Mark Pocan (D-Wis.), Tammy Duckworth (D-Ill.), Marcy Kaptur (D-Ohio), Mike Bost (R-Ill.) and Sam Graves (R-Mo.).