Study ranks Iowa second-best in use of water to make ethanol

Des Moines Register
By PHILIP BRASHER • pbrasher@dmreg.com • April 16, 2009

Washington, D.C. -— Iowa not only makes a lot of ethanol but also produces it without using nearly as much water as many other states, according to a study.

University of Minnesota researchers looked into how much water is required to make ethanol in each state and found differences based on the amount of irrigation needed to grow the corn.

Their study, published Wednesday by the journal Environmental Science and Technology, found that it takes six gallons of water to produce a gallon of ethanol in Iowa, the No. 1 producer of ethanol. By comparison, ethanol production in Nebraska requires 501 gallons of water per gallon of ethanol.

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