Above the clatter of machinery, Bob Beauprez shouted questions to plant operators, asking how the maze of pipes and vats changed corn into ethanol – a homegrown fuel.
“I’m a true believer,” Republican gubernatorial candidate Beauprez said of renewable energy.
Beauprez’s campaign stop at the Sterling ethanol plant this month underscored just how big an issue energy has become.
With gasoline prices hovering around $3 a gallon and electric utilities struggling with brownouts, energy has become a local concern.
Both Beauprez and his Democratic opponent, Bill Ritter, are pushing plans aimed at putting the state in a position to be a leader in cutting-edge energy technology and re-energize rural Colorado, although neither sets specific implementation plans.
Energy also has become political ammunition.
Ritter has criticized Beauprez’s congressional vote that cut more than $20 million from the Golden-based National Renewable Energy Laboratory.
Beauprez blamed the cuts on U.S. Senate Democratic Leader Harry Reid’s move to earmark $34 million in energy funds for his home state of Nevada.
The NREL funds were eventually restored by the Bush administration.
“It’s another classic both- ways-Bob moment … to talk about renewable energy in light of his support of the NREL cuts. He has no credibility,” said Ritter spokesman Evan Dreyer.
Beauprez responded, “I’d say that’s (expletive), if I can be that blunt.”
During his northeastern Colorado campaign swing, Beauprez unveiled a renewable-energy policy focusing on agricultural land, biomass, ethanol and wind energy.
At an Akron town meeting, Beauprez told ranchers and farmers: “I believe we need to continue to encourage more ethanol and biodiesel usage and production right here in our state.”
Beauprez’s plan would triple the number of pumps dispensing the ethanol-gasoline blend E85 to about 30. The plan also calls for building more transmission lines to increase access to wind power and invest in commercialization of biomass fuels.
Beauprez is also proposing creation of a “state utility database” to identify areas to reduce energy usage and use private money to promote residential energy efficiency.
The plan also would use tax credits to encourage companies to find market uses for the research done by the state’s colleges, universities and NREL.
Back in June, Ritter took his own renewable-energy tour to tout an energy plan issued in April, Dreyer said.
Ritter’s plan includes increasing ethanol production and wind and biodiesel energy and creating “new markets specifically for farmers by selling their crops so that they can then be used for biofuels,” Dreyer said.
The proposal “is aimed at establishing Colorado as a leader in renewable energy,” Dreyer said. “The congressman is looking in his rearview mirror at his time on the farm.”
The plan would “establish statewide standards to create and expand markets for renewable-energy products.”
State buildings would have to meet “stringent energy- efficient standards,” according to Ritter’s energy position paper.
Trent Bushner, a Republican and president of the state corn growers association, said boosting ethanol production and the market are crucial.
At a county-fair campaign stop, Beauprez watched a group of kids wrestle pigs to the ground, grab their back two legs and cart them out of the ring wheelbarrow-style.
“It’d be a lot simpler if Ritter and I just settled it like this,” he later said of the governor’s race. “One pig, two men.”
Staff writer Chris Frates can be reached at 303-820-1633 or cfrates@denverpost.com.
