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January 16, 2008
Take A Guess: What Is The Relationship Between Ethanol Production And Fertilizer Use?
The secret is out. The jig is up. You have been using more fertilizer to produce corn since the ethanol industry’s growth as a dominant market force in the Cornbelt. Now we know where all of that fertilizer has been going. You have been growing more acres and more corn on those acres to take advantage of the corn prices. But the bottom line is that all of the fertilizer you have applied may not have been used up.
Other than land cost, the biggest expense you’ll have this spring in producing a corn crop will be the cost of nitrogen; and the added cost of potash and phosphate will be on top of that. We won’t get into the nitty gritty of crop budgets, but look at the relationship in the growth of fertilizer use and the growth of ethanol production in the Cornbelt. USDA economists have linked the two trends in Assessing Economic and Environmental Impacts of Ethanol Production on Fertilizer Use in Corn Production.
The Economic Research Service team found that in 2005 and 2006 88 pounds of excess nitrogen and 33 pounds of excess phosphorus per acre were applied in the Cornbelt compared to the 1996 and 1997 excess rate of 39 pounds of nitrogen and 21 pounds of phosphorus per acre. Their statistics were based on actual content of fertilizer use and not tons of various forms of fertilizer. They found that farmers spend 60% more on fertilizer in 2006 than in 1989. (Of course, unit prices rose considerably during that time.) The researchers also noted wide variations in practices within states, such as the 32% increased use of fertilizer on Texas cotton ground, versus the 86% rise in fertilizer use on California cotton. Within the Cornbelt fertilizer use has been stable in Iowa and Minnesota, but varies in Kansas and Nebraska.
During the same period, ethanol production grew substantially, fostered by rising federal targets for production and use. Most of the ethanol is produced in the Cornbelt, in proximity to the primary feedstock of corn, observe the economists. They singled out Illinois and Iowa saying increased use and prices of fertilizer were apparent, compared to adjusted prices that were flat for the balance of the Cornbelt. However, they reported increased fertilizer application rates in the Central and Eastern Cornbelt, at the same time as increases in ethanol production were noted. And that region was putting on fertilizer at a rate that was triple the acceleration compared to the Cornbelt as a whole, and at a rate that was twice the acceleration of just the Western Cornbelt.
In general, their survey of fertilizer prices and use suggested a continuous increase in the influence on fertilizer prices of nitrogen and potassium, which they say indicates more being applied with greater effectiveness. As an aside the researchers say Iowa farmers had better fertilizer management practices than their counterparts in South Dakota. Farmers in the Western Cornbelt were seen to have been shifting to more corn production from other crops, but applying increased amounts of fertilizer as they did so.
The economists note that the USDA predicts 30% of the corn crop will be refined into ethanol in the 2009-2010 market year, and expanded acres means more fertilizer use with a likely greater introduction of more nutrients into the environment, due to excess application.
Summary:
Increased chances to produce and sell corn to the ethanol market have pushed farmers to apply increased amounts of fertilizer, to boost production. At the same time ethanol production is going up, so is the use of fertilizer in the Cornbelt. With increased use comes the chance that increasingly larger amounts will not be used by corn plants and will become excess nutrients that enter the environment..
Posted by Stu Ellis at January 16, 2008 12:26 AM | Permalink
Comments
Let's see... If I am a Midwest farmer that averages 25 more bushels of corn per acre than I did 7 years ago... And I shift 20% of my total acres away from soybeans into corn-on-corn... That's 30 more pounds of nitrogen per acre for increased yield potential, and 20% more nitrogen per year for more corn-on-corn... I can see how I would be using more nitrogen to keep up with yields and increased acreage. Is that nitrogen excessive? Surely not, as it is used by the additional plants and ears of corn. Some may be, but surely mostly not. So, do you want to keep buying oil from the Middle East and putting the pollution in the air, or do you mind some more nitrogen flowing to the Gulf of Mexico. Pick your evil, mine is in favor of corn. Which, by the way, is a whole lot more good than evil, and you can't say that for Middle East oil...
Posted by: PaulW at January 18, 2008 4:49 PM
Let me see if I understand this correctly. Governor Blunt is still proposing to spend millions of our tax dollars on unproved ethanol
production, while eliminating the free market to determine its demand. I hate "big oil" as much as anyone, but this ethanol scheme will cost us
millions of tax dollars and simply will not be the answer to the big oil problem.
Take a few minutes to look at the 2008 Fuel Economy Guide (www.fueleconomy.gov) available from any car dealer. In it we find that,"? Flex Fuel Vehicles (FFV) operating on E85 usually experience a 20 -30% drop in miles per gallon due to ethanol's lower energy content". Simple
calculations will show that using E85 will cost the owner around a thousand dollars more per year to drive an FFV.
Let's look at Governor Blunt's plan for alternative fuel, keeping in mind that only Missouri, Minnesota, and Hawaii have state mandates to use ethanol as a fuel and that Matt's lobbyist brother Andy Blunt has ties to
the ethanol industry. To quote the Springfield Business Journal, Matt Wagner - 11/13/2006"? the Associated Press reported that he [Andy] had
invested in Central Missouri Biofuels LLC. The company had 10 percent ownership in Show Me Ethanol, which plans to build an ethanol plant in the northeast Missouri town of Carrolton. Show Me Ethanol has applied for a $48 million linked-deposit loan administered by the state treasurer's office, which has a conflict-of-interest policy that prohibits elected officials or their family members from participating in the program".
The Governor's plan proposes a $2 million tax incentive to help gas stations modify pumps so they can offer E85 (85% ethanol). This cost could
range from $3,000 to $40,000 for the 4,312 service stations in Missouri. If each station averaged $15,000, that would amount to 64,680,000. Next is the income tax incentive to purchase an FFV in the amount of either $1,500 or 10 percent of the cost of the vehicle. The cost of this facet is totally
unknown, since we have no idea how many vehicles will be purchased. Then comes the tax credits of 25 cents per gallon in year one; 20 cents per
gallon in years two and three; and 15 cents per gallon in each subsequent year up to $500 per taxpayer per year. Again, total cost unknown. Remember, this is your tax dollars going into these incentives and into car buyer's
pockets.
Now, let's see what is happening elsewhere concerning the use of food (corn) for fuel. Quoting in part, "The United Nations Climate Conference in Bali, Indonesia, wrapped up on December 14. Like many experts and economists, conference participants showed little enthusiasm for biofuels produced from agriculture?primarily corn-based ethanol. Biofuels are hitting consumers at the pump, at the grocery store, and even at tax time.
Without a doubt, the extremely high cost of biofuel production outweighs its supposed environmental benefits; biofuel production may actually harm the environment more than it helps. One survey presented at the Bali conference polled 1,000 respondents from 105 countries. Biofuels from
agricultural crops finished dead last of 19 possible choices of answers to the world's energy needs." Washington D.C and Missouri Governor, Matt
Blunt, have yet to get the message and continue to promote both corn and cellulosic ethanol through costly subsidies and support payments. The use
of food or corn for fuel is simply morally wrong and socially irresponsible in my opinion.
Cellulosic ethanol can be distilled from virtually any plant matter including farm waste. The most often mentioned grass that might produce the
cellulosic product for ethanol seems to be switchgrass ( Sorghastrum nutans). Switchgrass is even less dense than corn stubble and ethanol has
yet to be produced from switchgrass except in the laboratory on a very small scale as far as I can determine. Those, including our government
officials, who keep tossing the witchgrass/ethanol term around simply have not done their homework on the subject. There are only a comparatively few
acres of this grass in a monoculture nationwide and the conversion of many more acres to it seems unlikely. Switchgrass grows when the soil
temperature is warmer (warm-season) and can be harvested only once per growing season. Having done graduate research and studies in the
establishment, growth, and management of switchgrass, I do not see how this warm-season grass will produce enough tonnage to meet even a tiny fraction of the demand. Cellulosic ethanol has many logistic problems associated
with it. Just the collecting and storing of a million tons of corn stubble, which is more energy dense than switchgrass , each year for a single
ethanol plant is mind-boggling to say the least. One three-year study showed that an 80-million-gallon ethanol plant would require corn stubble from 500,000 acres of corn within a 50-mile radius of the plant and 500 acres to store it after harvest. From what I can read, a million tons of corn stubble might produce 80 million gallons of ethanol. It would take 67,000 semitrailer loads to haul the baled stubble out of the field. That's 187 truckloads a day or one every eight minutes. The need for trucks,
machinery, and manpower would come during harvest time which is already the
busiest time of the year on the farm. These are not my figures and granted, they are open to debate depending on the many variables, but they seem reasonable to me.
To meet just current gasoline demands, we would need 2,500 of these ethanol production facilities to meet the U.S. needs, not including diesel, fuel
oil, or jet fuel. We cannot ignore the energy required to supply these plants. How many gallons of fossil fuels would it take to run all of those
semi-trailer trucks to take the stubble to the plant? How much diesel would it take for the trains to haul the ethanol to market? How much natural gas and electricity would be required to distill off the ethanol? What about the air and water pollution that is produced from each plant? What about the tremendous amount of water required for each plant? There are many more questions and very few answers concerning ethanol production from cellulose.
Posted by: dep at January 23, 2008 8:56 AM
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