New Study Story Old News but Still Good News

Cindy Zimmerman

An Associated Press story on the wire about ethanol producers being encouraged by “new study” is the study that came out at the end of January (see previous post) Just want to make that clear in case someone sees the story and thinks that this is a different “new” study. It is a very positive story for the ethanol industry, so it’s good to see it resurface for another round. This story, which datelined in Iowa, interviews one of the University of California-Berkeley researchers who did the study. Alex Farrell, co-author of the latest study, said previous research didn’t take into account ethanol byproducts such as distiller grains and corn oil. Corn turned into ethanol also feeds animals and is used for other purposes, he said, which displaces competing products that require energy to make. “Studies with a negative impact ignored that,” Farrell said. Since the latest research wasn’t funded by any special interest group and used the most up-to-date data, Farrell said his group’s information is the most accurate.

Ethanol