Ethanol shines in Nebraska

Amid concerns about a soft farm economy, ethanol is a bright spot in what some see as a bleak forecast for agriculture.

With an operating capacity of approximately 2.2 billion gallons of ethanol, Nebraska ethanol producers — like Husker Ag near Plainview and the Louis Dreyfus plant in Norfolk — used a whopping 31 percent of the state’s corn crop in 2016.

That’s an increase of five percent compared to 2015, with production expected to rise this year — making for what could be a record year for ethanol.

Those statistics come on the heels of an impact study by University of Nebraska-Lincoln economists in 2015 that revealed Nebraska’s ethanol production capacity growth between 1995 and 2014 was tenfold with a $5 billion annual economic impact. That growth has only continued since then.

Continue to full article.