By Kevin Lavery, KWMU
Edwardsville, Ill – Illinois Senator Dick Durbin says provisions that promote the production of ethanol should be removed from a federal energy bill that's bogged down in Congress.
A major sticking point in the original bill had been a liability exemption for producers of the fuel additive MTBE, which has been linked to contaminated drinking water.
Durbin says the bill has since been restructured, and that Senate Democrats are fighting to pass the ethanol measures independently.
"Senator Daschle and a number of us have appealed to the farm bureau and the corn growers and a number of other organizations, begging them: call the ethanol provisions," Durbin said. "We can pass them this year. It will really be a test to see if we can do it, and I think we can."
Supporters say the provisions would double ethanol production by the year 2012, and create 214,000 new jobs in the U.S.