A Senate committee is finally showing some leadership – and some common sense – about the ethanol boondoggle that even the environmentalists now acknowledge is counterproductive.

At least, some members of that committee are. Not everyone agrees that the Renewable Fuels Standard should be abolished.

“The Renewable Fuels Standard has problems that need to be addressed, U.S. Senate Environment and Public Works Committee members suggested at a Feb. 24 hearing about the federal program,” the Oil & Gas Journal reported on Friday. “But they disagreed over whether its renewable fuel volume goals are unrealistic or not ambitious enough.”

The Journal quotes committee Chairman Sen. James M. Inhofe of Oklahoma, who is critical of the program, which mandates that Americans use ethanol and other bio-fuels.

“Most of the rationale originally justifying the RFS has disappeared,” he said. “All we have left is an unstable program rooted in (the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s) waiving entire portions of annual requirements, allowing imported soybeans and ethanol from South America to count toward the RFS, and regularly missing implementation deadlines.”

Of course, Sen. Barbara Boxer disagreed.

“The implementation of the RFS has not been perfect, but the law is sound,” she said. “Congress designed the RFS to be managed in a flexible, commonsense way, and we gave EPA the authority to make certain adjustments when needed.”

In the end, the committee agreed it’s time to reexamine the program.

As the Journal reported, “The premise that advanced biofuels, particularly liquid cellulosic biofuels, would be available in significant amounts at reasonable costs within 5-10 years of the 2007 RFS targets has not been borne out.”

But here’s the thing. Sen. Ted Cruz, who is not on that committee, has in all likelihood slain the ethanol beast. Despite Sen. Boxer’s confidence in the soundness of the law, the only real rationale for ethanol is winning votes in Iowa.

But in February, Cruz won the Iowa GOP caucus despite his opposition to ethanol – and the state’s ethanol-loving governor. With his example, the Senate must stand up to the corn lobby and abolish the environmentally unfriendly biofuel standard.

The fact is that the RFS, signed into law by President George W. Bush, is inarguably harmful to everyone except Iowa corn farmers.

“The corn boom RFS created has impacted over 5 million acres of land once set aside for conservation,” notes The Federalist. “Landowners have filled in wetlands and have sprayed billions of pounds of fertilizer to facilitate the demand for corn to fulfill gas ethanol requirements. As a result, rivers have been contaminated and the habitat of waterfowl and other wildlife has been damaged.”

Perhaps even more importantly, RFS has not reduced carbon emissions – one of the primary objectives of the policy. Scientists at the University of Wisconsin found that the corn boom has released as much carbon dioxide as 34 coal power plants in one year. It turns out ethanol is not carbon-neutral, as promised, and it actually worsens gas mileage, making cars less fuel-efficient and worse for the environment.

There’s no longer any valid argument for ethanol.