EPA Set to Give Ethanol a Big Boost?

In the midst of a drive by Washington’s powerful ethanol lobby to expand what critics often deride as an artificially created, and government aided and promoted market for “fuel made from food,” the top administrator from the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) Wednesday testified before the Senate Interior and Environment Appropriations Subcommittee, telling lawmakers the agency will make a final determination late summer on allowing higher levels of ethanol to be blended into gasoline.

The ethanol industry is currently petitioning the EPA for a waiver to increase ethanol blends in gasoline from 10 percent to 15 percent, in order to create a larger market–and artificial demand–for the fuel source.

Administrator Lisa Jackson said the agency’s decision awaits completion of Department of Energy (DOE) tests on ethanol—namely, how higher ethanol blends might adversely affect vehicle engines, a long-running concern of automakers and the marine leisure industry, among others—which she expects to receive by May. “We expect that once we get that additional data, and it will be publicly available, the EPA will be in a position to move toward a final decision on the waiver, late summer in the time period,” Jackson said in response to a line of questioning by ethanol booster Senator Ben Nelson of Nebraska.

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Tags: automakers, Ben Nelson, Department of Energy, EPA, epa waiver
Posted Mar 8th 2010 at 4:23 pm in Congress, Environment, News, Politics | 86266171 Commentshttp://biggovernment.com/capitolconfidential/2010/03/08/epa-set-to-give-ethanol-a-big-boost/EPA+Set+to+Give+Ethanol+a+Big+Boost%3F2010-03-09+00%3A23%3A12Capitol++Confidential

Pork Report October 26, 2009: Decorative Street Lights Edition

New Jersey spending federal stimulus funds to keep an eye out for graffiti

National Science Foundation researchers study the cure for low approval ratings of members of Congress

“The groundbreaking study … found that online deliberative forums are likely to sway swing voters in favor of the lawmaker holding the online forum,” says taxpayer funded study

Taxpayer funded study claims online town hall meetings increase constituents’ approval of politicians and likelihood of voting to re-elect a politician to Congress

Department of Energy will spend $151 million for “radical” research projects, “most of which will probably fail”

Congressman supported at least $44 million in earmarks for companies that did not operate in his home state, nearly all of which donated to his campaign just before or soon after receiving the promise of federal money

House subcommittee plans Honolulu junket to check on stimulus spending

Vinegar producer in Nebraska gets start up funds from the U.S. Department of Agriculture

Boyz Nite Out: Cover band concert underwritten with federal stimulus funds

Indiana city spending $625,000 in federal transportation funds to place 40 decorative street lights

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Tags: congressional junket, Department of Agriculture, Department of Energy, Earmarks, National Science Foundation
Posted Oct 26th 2009 at 3:45 pm in Uncategorized | 2125420 Commentshttp://biggovernment.com/porkreport/2009/10/26/pork-report-october-26-2009-decorative-street-lights-edition/Pork+Report+October+26%2C+2009%3A+Decorative+Street+Lights+Edition2009-10-26+22%3A45%3A36The+Pork+Report

Grande Gobierno: Obama Uses Feds to Protect His ‘Green Jobs’ Fantasy

On numerous occasions, to tout his own agenda President Obama told America to “take a look at what’s happening in countries like Spain” to witness his model for a “green jobs” economy. Well, a team of Spaniards produced an academic study, officially of King Juan Carlos University in Madrid, which revealed that Spain’s scheme has proven a disaster.

In response, Obama’s administration provided a lesson in how Big Government can be abused when its officials are angered and embarrassed, turning its institutions on a private individual, even a foreign academic whose offense was to produce scholarly research about his own nation’s policy failures.

Here is what happened. The Spanish “green jobs” study received substantial play in the U.S. media and gained favorable attention in the Wall Street Journal’s U.S., Europe and Asia editions, among other outlets. It came up in a White House press conference, embarrassing spokesman Robert Gibbs who boasted how he disagreed with the study and its conclusions while admitting he had not read it.

The rest of administration’s three-fold response was in sum highly troubling. The benign second step was to substitute, without missing a beat, Denmark for Spain in Obama’s ritual “look at what’s happening in…” litany of our environmental superiors (though that experiment, too, has been defrocked). Then things got ugly.

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Tags: Department of Energy, Dr. Gabriel Calzada, El Condidencial, green jobs, International Energy Association
Posted Sep 28th 2009 at 9:25 am in Environment, News, Obama, Politics | 9722128 Commentshttp://biggovernment.com/chorner/2009/09/28/grande-gobierno-obama-uses-feds-to-protect-his-green-jobs-story/Grande+Gobierno%3A+Obama+Uses+Feds+to+Protect+His+%27Green+Jobs%27+Fantasy2009-09-28+16%3A25%3A52Christopher+C.+Horner