The Donald, quoted here on September 22nd:
'Trump said that he supports the RFS at Iowa’s Faith and Freedom Forum, “I am totally in favor of ethanol, 100 percent.” This is the first time Trump gave his stance on the topic publicly.'
So far this only amounts to Trump supporting the current Renewable Fuel Standard signed into law by George W. Bush in 2005, but that's still bad policy. Ethanol is inefficient as a fuel, bad for engines and does zero to reduce carbon emissions. It diverts corn from animal feed, driving up the cost of food supplies from beef, pork and poultry, and from corn added to other products. Ethanol also makes it more lucrative to put more and more land into corn production than would otherwise be the case, potentially stressing the environment.
Arguably Ben Carson's success in Iowa over Trump in part has to do with Carson's pledge to push for 30% ethanol fuel blends, a tripling of the current standard.
The crony capitalism involved with ethanol is YUGE, making Iowa more important politically than it otherwise would be were it not for federal gasoline dictates:
"Iowa produces nearly one-third of the nation’s ethanol and nearly half of Iowa’s corn goes into ethanol production, according to the Iowa Corn Growers Association.
"Iowa’s renewable fuels industry, which includes biodiesel production, supports 47,000 jobs and accounts for $5 billion of the state’s gross domestic product, according to the Iowa Renewable Fuels Association."
That's about 3.2% of 2014 Iowa GDP.
Nebraska estimates Iowa production capacity at 25% of the nation's capability, ahead of Nebraska in second at 13%. Illinois, Minnesota, Indiana and South Dakota round out the top six, who all exceed the 1 billion gallon level of capacity per year. At 10.8 billion gallons of available capacity, the top six states produce almost as much as they can at 10.6 billion gallons, over 70% of total national production.
A number of the current crop of Republicans running for president is more or less opposed to ethanol:
"Former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush, Texas Sen. Ted Cruz, Carly Fiorina, Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal, former New York Gov. George Pataki and Florida Sen. Marco Rubio have all expressed interest in eliminating or phasing out the ethanol mandate that requires a certain percentage of ethanol in transportation fuel."
Trump's position may reflect a conviction that he generally needs to be supportive of ethanol in these states to win them in the general election even though it appears Carson has outbid him in the primary season.
