Can market handle ethanol boom?

The industry pushes sales of E85 amid fears the corn supply can’t support production targets

The rush to build ethanol plants is raising concerns about whether drivers will buy all that biofuel.

At the current construction pace, within the next few years the production capacity will close in on the limit of how much ethanol can be used as a 10-percent additive, called E10, in gasoline.

The industry is counting on boosting the sales of a higher blend of ethanol, E85, a fuel that is 85 percent ethanol and 15 percent gasoline, and is looking for Congress to help increase its availability and use. One bill introduced by Sen. Barack Obama, D.-Ill., a possible presidential candidate, would create a new tax credit to cut the price of E85.

But finding an E85 pump will continue to be difficult. Wal-Mart and other major retailers won’t offer the fuel until mid-2008, at the earliest.

Iowa, the nation’s No. 1 maker of ethanol, has staked a big slice of its economic future in the industry’s growth.

Des Moines Register