Lugar Drops US/Brazil Bill

Indiana Senator Dick Lugar has introduced legislation that would essentially put into law the memorandum of understanding signed by the US and Brazil earlier this month.  According to a release from Lugar’s office, the bill would:

• Establish a regional energy forum as a standing but flexible mechanism to advance energy issues and an emergency cooperation mechanism to deter political manipulation of oil trade;
• Undertake feasibility studies to assess each Latin American country’s biofuel needs and biomass production potential, with particular emphasis on helping the poorest countries in the region that are also dependent on foreign fuel, and attention to food security and the environment;
• Establish a grant program for advanced biofuels research collaboration;
• Increase international extension services for energy crops and conservation;
• Promote a carbon trading system to encourage preservation of tropical rain forests in the face of growing demand for energy crops;
• Seek ways to help optimize Mexican oil output, which is lagging to the detriment of the region, and encourage South America to exploit fully its natural gas supplies with new pipelines and liquefied natural gas facilities;
• Call for a study of political and economic impacts of the tariff on ethanol and the impacts of repealing or modifying it;
• Authorize to be appropriated $59 million for 2008 to implement this legislation.

The RFA is supportive of efforts to develop ethanol markets, both in the Western Hemisphere and around the globe.  Such development, however, must be undertaken by each nation individually and not come at the expense of US taxpayers or our own domestic ethanol industry.