Associate Professor Thomas D. Rogers recently co-authored an opinion piece in The Hill with collaborator Jeffrey T. Manuel, Associate Professor of History at Southern Illinois University Edwardsville. The article examines ethanol policy in the United States and Brazil, the two largest ethanol-producing countries in the world, with a focus on the powerful multiparty blocs of legislators that steer policy in both countries. Rogers and Manuel are writing a transnational history of biofuels in the United States and Brazil. Read an excerpt from the piece below along with the full article: “Who is driving our ethanol policy? And why does it matter?”

“When a government treats energy sources and fuels individually, organized groups like the rural blocs can capture policymaking. Instead, the United States and Brazil should pursue comprehensive national energy policies that prioritize decarbonization. This would diminish agribusiness’s influence over policymaking and move us toward a distributed and diverse energy system.”