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Iowa will help businesses that sell renewable fuels

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By Dan Gearino | Monday, May 12, 2008 |

DES MOINES — Gas station owners would have heightened incentives to sell renewable fuels under a bill signed Monday by Gov. Chet Culver.

“Iowa can both feed and fuel the world,” Culver said at a signing ceremony.

The bill rewrites an existing grant program to further reduce the financial risk for gas station owners.

Stations that agree to sell E85 or biodiesel can get reimbursed for up to 70 percent of the cost of installing the pumps, with a maximum benefit of $50,000, up from 50 percent and $30,000 respectively.

To get the maximum, stations must agree to sell the fuel for five years.

The bill also allows the existing grant program to be used for blender pumps, which are pumps that allow the customer to select the ethanol level.

E85, which is 85 percent ethanol and 15 percent gasoline, is available at fewer than 100 gas stations statewide.

Lawmakers passed the original version of the law in 2006, providing $13.6 million for grants.

The grants were not as popular as sponsors had hoped. As of February, only $3.1 million had been awarded and about $7 million sat in the state treasury waiting for applicants.

State officials said the program was hindered by concerns by businesses that E85 and biodiesel were not popular enough to justify the cost of new pumps.

“We know we can do better,” said Monte Shaw, executive director of the Iowa Renewable Fuels Association.

The new bill is an attempt to make the grants more enticing to businesses and reduce the risk even more.

“What we’re doing is making sure we have access to renewable fuels. We really want to make sure people are able to purchase and store” the fuel, said Sen. Amanda Ragan,

D-Mason City, who shepherded the bill through the Senate.

Dan Gearino can be contacted at

(515) 243-0138 or dan.gearino@lee.net. Comment on this story at qctimes.com.