(Radio Iowa) – Fourth District Congressman Randy Feenstra says there will be a vote to end the E-P-A smog rule that keeps E-15 gasoline from being sold nationwide in the summer. The U-S House deadline for the bill passed Wednesday, and Feenstra says there were reasons the vote didn’t happen. “We had a couple discussions with the speaker. We have to understand, so there was a February 25th date. We had a snowstorm that hit D-C on Monday, and then we had the State of Union on Tuesday, and we’re done on Wednesday,” he says. Feenstra says the missed deadline doesn’t kill the issue.

“This is going to pass. It’s just a matter of if it’s this coming week, and we’re just making sure that when we take this vote, all right, whether it be this week or next week or this coming week, is that it gets passed, and then it moves on to the Senate,” Feenstra says. “I mean, we’ve been at this for ten some years now, and we’ve got to finally get it passed. It’s energy independence, it’s domestic energy. And, you know, it helps our commodity prices.” Feenstra leads the House Rural Domestic Energy Council and has been negotiating with lawmakers who represent states with oil refineries in trying to find a compromise on E-15.

“It’s a civil war within the oil refineries right now on E-15. The large refineries, small refineries, one of them refineries are sort of struggling. It’s not a win for everybody. We’re trying to get everybody to the table and say, hey, let’s get to neutral,” Feenstra says. The need for a new bill came after House G-O-P leaders removed a mandate for year-round E-15 sales from a budget bill that passed in January. The president of the Renewable Fuels Association says he is not terribly optimistic that we’re going to see the E-15 legislation passed before summer.