U.S. Ethanol Production Capacity Expands to 8.8 Billion Gallons per Year

SUGAR LAND--June 16, 2008--Researched by Industrial Info Resources (Sugar Land, Texas)--According to data extracted from Industrial Info's Ethanol Database, the United States now has 156 operational ethanol plants capable of producing a whopping 8.9 billion gallons of the renewable fuel. With an average of 2.6 gallons of ethanol per bushel of corn, that translates to more than 2.8 billion bushels of corn going toward fuel production. Earlier this month, the U.S. Department of Agriculture released numbers that estimate the 2008 corn crop would be about 11.7 billion bushels, meaning that about 24% of the crop will go straight toward ethanol production.