The historic announcement of Barack Obama’s election as the 44th president of the United States came this morning. Biofuels policy was always a major point of difference between Obama and his republican rival John McCain.
POLICY DIFFERENCES
McCain supported lowering the US import tariff on ethanol which would potentially have led to an increase in Brazilian ethanol and a subsequent fall in demand for domestically produced corn-based ethanol. Brazilian ethanol is far more efficient, both economically in terms of production costs and environmentally in terms of the energy produced. In contrast Barack Obama has repeatedly emphasised the importance of US energy independence as a driver of biofuels production in the US and is therefore likely to support domestically produced biofuels in favour of imports.