While a group of senators yesterday urged an end to ethanol incentives, another group sent a letter supporting an extension of the current tax credit and associated tariff.

The letter, sent to Senate leadership and signed by Senators Charles Grassley (R-IA) and Kent Conrad (D-ND) with 13 others, asked that the ethanol incentives be “a high priority on the Senate’s legislative agenda” during the lame duck session.

“Allowing the provisions to expire or remain expired would threaten jobs, harm the environment, weaken our renewable fuel industries, and increase our dependence on foreign oil,” they wrote, asking that Congress act to “extend the biofuels tax and tariff policies for the longest term possible.”

Earlier this year, Grassley and Conrad introduced the bipartisan GREEN Jobs Act of 2010 that would extend through 2015 the Volumetric Ethanol Excise Tax Credit (VEETC), the offsetting tariff on foreign ethanol, the Small Producers Tax Credit, and the Cellulosic Ethanol Producer Tax Credit.

Growth Energy CEO Tom Buis noted that as long time veterans on the tax writing Finance Committee, Sens. Conrad and Grassley play a critical role in the energy debate. “We commend these senators for their efforts to ensure a cleaner, more secure energy future for America,” said Buis. “The current ethanol tax incentives have played a critical role in the development of the ethanol industry in the United States and reducing our dependence on foreign oil. In the near-term, an extension of the ethanol tax incentive and the tariff will stabilize the marketplace, provide added certainty and give Congress the opportunity to consider longer term solutions next year.”