In 2018, the ethanol consumption ratio on a national level fell to 10.08 percent from the 10.13 percent registered in 2017. For the 2017 compliance year, the EPA issued 35 small refinery exemptions (SREs) to the oil industry. For 2018, it issued 31 SREs. 

In 2017, 34 states recorded ethanol consumption ratios above the so-called "10 percent blend wall." In 2018, that number fell to 30. The ethanol consumption ratio in Alabama, Arkansas, Louisiana, Michigan and New Mexico all dropped under 10 percent in 2018. Pennsylvannia, however, breached the blend wall that year with ethanol capturing a 10.08 percent share of all fuel consumed. 

In Minnesota, the ethanol consumption ratio was 12.4 percent in 2018, slightly lower than the 12.49 percent ratio in 2017. Similarly, the ethanol consumption ratio in many of the 30 states that were above the blend wall in 2018 were lower than the ethanol consumption ratios recorded in 2017.

In Iowa, for example, the ethanol consumption ratio in 2018 was 11.4 percent. In 2017, it was 11.5 percent. 

At 12.4 percent, Minnesota's ethanol consumption ratio was once again the highest in the nation. 

While total gasoline consumption in the transportation sector in Minnesota fell 2.4 percent to 59.72 million barrels in 2018 from 61.19 million barrels the year before, ethanol consumption in the state fell 3.08 percent to 7.4 million barrels in 2018 from 7.64 million barrels in 2017.

Nationally, gasoline consumption fell 0.03 percent to 3.27 billion barrels in 2018 from 3.28 billion barrels in 2017. Ethanol consumption, however, fell 0.5 percent to 330.64 million barrels from 332.34 million barrels the previous year. 

2018 Ethanol Consumption