An effort to make those tax credits given for investing in ethanol plants more valuable receives preliminary approval in the House, as the body concentrates on three bills backed by agricultural interests. Representative Brian Munzlinger of Williamstown sponsors the tax credit measure. It would allow the credits to be redeemed quarterly, rather than the current annual redemption, which is thought to make them more attractive when farmers sell them to banks and insurance companies. Munzlinger says farmers who have invested in ethanol plants and haven’t been able to use all their tax creidts have been able to only receive about 75-percent of their value when they sell them. The House has also given preliminary approval to a bill that would force the Department of Natural Resources to justify any new environmental regulation. A bill to enact new environmental regulations on huge poultry and hog confinement operations has bogged down in debate.