September 3, 2009

Ethanol industry moving ahead; employment up

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Nebraska's ethanol industry has nearly recovered from the economic doldrums it faced last year and is back near full production capacity, according to the Nebraska Ethanol Board.

That's the lede paragraph from a Robert Pore article in today's Grand Island Independent. You can find the full article here.

Pore noted that the Renewable Fuels Association reported that U.S. ethanol producers continue setting new records for production -- that American ethanol facilities produced 694,000 barrels per day in June 2009, up 109,000 barrels from last June.

Pore reported that several previously idled plants are now up and running and that many ethanol plants have increased production from 70-80 percent capacity to near maximum capacity.

Todd Sneller of the Nebraska Ethanol Board added that Aventine could soon renew construction on its uncompleted 110-million-gallon ethanol plant in Aurora. (Construction also continues on a large plant in Columbus.)

Sneller said there has also been a modest job increase in the industry when comparing 2008 to 2009:

"While overall it may only be a couple of dozen jobs on a statewide basis, it is an important signal because we were in a period of real economic turmoil in the ethanol sector, but yet we didn't see layoffs in those plants, even the ones that went through bankruptcies, and in a couple of cases we saw companies use this time to modify their plants to create addition production capabilities, such as corn oil extraction," Sneller said.

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