House misses its own deadline for bill to expand ethanol sales

David Jordan, CQ-Roll Call on Feb 26, 2026

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WASHINGTON — House Republicans blew past a deadline to release legislation that would allow the year-round sale of E15 gasoline last week, but at least one member of a panel to resolve the issue says he hopes a final deal will soon emerge.

The E15 Rural Domestic Energy Council, established last month to satisfy lawmakers threatening to vote against appropriations bills, missed its Feb. 15 deadline to release legislation allowing the year-round sale of E15, or gasoline containing up to 15 percent ethanol.

The panel’s lapse meant the House missed a deadline to vote on the legislation Wednesday. Lawmakers favoring E15 met with Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., Wednesday but there’s no indication when legislation could emerge or a floor vote take place.

“We’ve got draft language that I’m going to go through and I think people are going to be happy,” said Rep Derrick Van Orden, R-Wis., a member of the E15 panel. “Balancing our bean farmers, our corn farmers, the biomass producers and refineries, large, small, medium, it’s difficult.”

One major issue is the treatment of economic hardship exemptions for small refineries. The refiners say they face hardships from ethanol mandates, but ethanol supporters say the EPA grants too many exemptions to refiners who don’t need them.

That issue pits lawmakers from oil-producing states against those from corn-producing states, regardless of party. Republican Reps. Randy Feenstra of Iowa and Stephanie Bice of Oklahoma are co-chairs of the council.

Neither Bice nor Feenstra’s office responded to a request for comment.

Current rules allow E15 use nine months of the year but limit blends to 10 percent ethanol during the summer due to concerns about smog pollution.

Rep. Dusty Johnson, R-S.D., another member of the council, said Bice and Feenstra “are doing an excellent job of trying to thread that needle to get us to a point where we’ve got a deal that can stand up on the House floor.”

The House floor is where the issue erupted about a month ago. After President Donald Trump said he supported year-round E15, lawmakers tried to attach a bill that would allow year-round E15 sales to fiscal 2026 spending bills.

The House passed a rule on Jan. 22 that deemed as adopted a resolution establishing the E15 council and governing floor debate on two spending bills. Backers of E15 weren’t happy.

“I’m encouraged by the creation of the E15 Rural Domestic Energy Council but let me be very clear this council is not a substitute for action and I refuse to let it be utilized as a delaying tactic. It is a results driven commitment,” said Adrian Smith, R-Neb., the sponsor of the bill.

Farm groups were more blunt.

“Kicking the can down the road and creating a new council to study future legislative options would just exacerbate the uncertainty and apprehension already being felt across rural America,” Geoff Cooper, the CEO and president of the Renewable Fuels Association, said in a statement at the time. “Farmers need real solutions right now, not more foot-dragging and more debate. It isn’t clear to us at all how the council process would work and what would ultimately come out of it.”

Cooper, in Florida for the National Ethanol Conference this week, urged Congress to act.

“Our message to the council, and to every member of Congress, is clear: year-round, nationwide E15 is an urgent priority for America’s farmers, energy sector, and working families, and it can’t wait any longer,” he said.

Small and independent refiners, however, are still concerned about changing current law. In a Feb. 19 letter to the council, they said the ethanol industry was seeking to “drive already unachievable ethanol mandates even higher.”

“As a result, authorizing year-round E15 sales without appropriate checks in place to contain the costs of the ethanol mandate will result in the closure of certain refining facilities, the loss of good-paying jobs, and increased domestic fuel prices,” the letter said. The refiners said compliance with renewable fuel standards added $9 to the cost of a barrel of oil.

Democrats from corn-producing states have latched on to the missed deadline as political fodder.

“Instead of securing year-round E15, they formed a council that didn’t include a single Democratic voice. Our growers deserve better. They deserve leaders in Washington who offer more than empty promises,” Rep. Nikki Budzinski, D-Ill., posted Wednesday on the social media site X.

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—Valerie Yurk and Olivia M. Bridges contributed to this report.