[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 150 (2004), Part 9]
[House]
[Page 11228]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                       ENERGY REFORM LEGISLATION

  (Mr. SHIMKUS asked and was given permission to address the House for 
1 minute and to revise and extend his remarks.)
  Mr. SHIMKUS. Mr. Speaker, last week, an article in Biofuels Journal 
stated that, according to a new report by economist John Urbanchuk, 
motorists would be facing much higher gasoline prices, an additional 30 
cents per gallon, were it not for the growing ethanol industry adding 
billions of gallons to U.S. fuel supplies.
  Without ethanol, our country would be even more reliant on foreign 
imports of gasoline, and the pain at the pump would be much more 
severe. More than 30 percent of all U.S. gasoline is blended with 
ethanol. Without ethanol, refiners would be forced to import about 
217,000 barrels per day of high-octane, clean-burning gasoline blending 
components.
  Over the last 25 years, while no new U.S. refineries have been built 
and scores have been closed, 78 new ethanol plants have been built and 
10 more are under construction today.
  Ethanol use will bolster U.S. gasoline supplies by more than 3.3 
billion gallons in 2004 alone.
  We need the Senate to pass H.R. 6, the first comprehensive energy 
legislation Congress has put forth in years. It will increase our use 
of renewable fuels like ethanol and biodiesel and reduce our continued 
overdependence on foreign oil.

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