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potential ethanol shortage may boost gasoline prices and cause some gas shortfalls this summer, USA Today reported Thursday.

That’s because the ethanol industry cannot keep up with the demand for alcohol additive to mix with gasoline, the head of the Energy Department’s Energy Information Administration told a Senate panel Wednesday.

The hearing before the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee was held to discuss ethanol as a substitute for MTBE (methyl tertiary-butyl ether), a gasoline additive being phased out because it can pollute groundwater, the paper reported.

Ethanol — grain alcohol made mainly from corn domestically — is being promoted by the auto and ethanol industries as a potential substitute for gasoline, sometimes in a mix known as E85, which 85% ethanol and 15% gasoline.

Bob Dinneen, president of the Renewable Fuels Association, told the committee that whatever ethanol cannot be produced in the United States can be imported, USA Today said.

Imported ethanol, which comes mostly from Brazil, carries a 54-cents-per-gallon tariff, and suspending that may help ease any potential gasoline shortages, the Wall Street Journal reported.