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Highlights from an Argus story:
http://www.argusleader.com/apps/pbcs...503200321/1001
Threats emerge to ethanol boom
S.D. leads industry, but future hinges on politics, prices, supply
BEN SHOUSE
bshouse@argusleader.com
published: 03/20/05
South Dakota is, in many ways, the birthplace of ethanol.
Nearly 30 years ago, a South Dakota State University professor demonstrated for politicians in Washington, D.C., how to turn corn into fuel. Today, the state is a leader in the industry.
South Dakota is fifth in ethanol production, but almost one in every three rows of corn goes to ethanol - the top rate in the nation.
One Sioux Falls pioneer is the country's second-largest producer, and a Brookings company owns what soon will be the largest plant of its kind.
More importantly, South Dakota is also first in farmer-owned ethanol plants. Not only do corn growers get prices up to 10 percent higher because of ethanol, 8,000 of them are earning double-digit returns from shares in a local plant.
"It's just so sweet that the farmers finally get a chance to get some more money back," said Barry Olson of Chancellor. "We recover such a small amount of the actual money that's made on a bushel of corn." . . .
The fitful evolution of ethanol began, in part, in a South Dakota State University lab in 1975. Microbiologist Paul Middaugh resurrected the idea from the days of Henry Ford, and recruited brothers Dennis and Dave Vander Griend to help with the engineering.
After a publicity trip that involved making ethanol on the Capitol Mall in Washington, D.C., they won a government grant. The lab became the only group producing the fuel with "dry milling," according to Bill Gibbons, an SDSU professor who was part of the project. Archer Daniels Midland, the world's largest grain processor, started "wet milling" in 1978.
People came from as far as Australia to see the SDSU project, and a flurry of building began in the 1980s, from farm-scale stills to million-gallon plants. . . .
Go State! ;D
http://www.argusleader.com/apps/pbcs...503200321/1001
Threats emerge to ethanol boom
S.D. leads industry, but future hinges on politics, prices, supply
BEN SHOUSE
bshouse@argusleader.com
published: 03/20/05
South Dakota is, in many ways, the birthplace of ethanol.
Nearly 30 years ago, a South Dakota State University professor demonstrated for politicians in Washington, D.C., how to turn corn into fuel. Today, the state is a leader in the industry.
South Dakota is fifth in ethanol production, but almost one in every three rows of corn goes to ethanol - the top rate in the nation.
One Sioux Falls pioneer is the country's second-largest producer, and a Brookings company owns what soon will be the largest plant of its kind.
More importantly, South Dakota is also first in farmer-owned ethanol plants. Not only do corn growers get prices up to 10 percent higher because of ethanol, 8,000 of them are earning double-digit returns from shares in a local plant.
"It's just so sweet that the farmers finally get a chance to get some more money back," said Barry Olson of Chancellor. "We recover such a small amount of the actual money that's made on a bushel of corn." . . .
The fitful evolution of ethanol began, in part, in a South Dakota State University lab in 1975. Microbiologist Paul Middaugh resurrected the idea from the days of Henry Ford, and recruited brothers Dennis and Dave Vander Griend to help with the engineering.
After a publicity trip that involved making ethanol on the Capitol Mall in Washington, D.C., they won a government grant. The lab became the only group producing the fuel with "dry milling," according to Bill Gibbons, an SDSU professor who was part of the project. Archer Daniels Midland, the world's largest grain processor, started "wet milling" in 1978.
People came from as far as Australia to see the SDSU project, and a flurry of building began in the 1980s, from farm-scale stills to million-gallon plants. . . .
Go State! ;D