Two soybean growers’ groups have suspended $1.5 million in funding from the University of Minnesota, due to research showing that biofuels could worsen global warming:

The study, by University of Minnesota ecologist David Tilman and others, said that dedicating huge amounts of land to grow corn, soybeans, sugarcane and other food crops for fuel could drastically change the landscape and worsen global warming. Farmers in the U.S., Brazil, Indonesia and other countries will need to clear forests, grasslands and peat lands on a massive scale to grow more of those crops, according to the research, unleashing far more carbon dioxide from natural vegetation than is saved by the lower emissions of the biofuels.

Is anyone really surprised about this finding? Suspension of the funds appears to be only temporary, until the groups have a chance to meet with the Dean of agricultural science. Jim Palmer, the executive director of the two soybean groups, summed up the situation: “The university hurt the farmers’ feelings, OK? That’s probably the best way to say it.”

Ethanol industry officials also had their say in the matter:

Ethanol industry officials criticized the study as a simplistic analysis that doesn’t include the economic benefits for those who grow biofuel crops or the environmental cost of continuing to rely on petroleum.

“The study was over the top by implying that biofuels were bad,” Palmer said. “Farmers were extremely surprised that it came out, why it came out, and that it came from the University of Minnesota.”

This would certainly be an issue if the University of Minnesota was in the business of promoting biofuels, and not interested in the usual process of scientific review.

The Tilman study was reviewed by independent scientists, a standard procedure, before being published in the journal Science. The report is not “anti-ethanol,” said Tilman in an interview when it was published. It recommends that biofuels be produced in the future from crop waste products such as corn stalks or from perennials such as switchgrass and native prairie plants.

The two soybean groups have a right to fund anything they want, but threatening to pull grant funding for “undesirable” research results may be a bit extreme.

Want to evaluate it for yourself? The study can be found here.

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Source: Startribune (Feb. 25, 08): U biofuels study has farmers upset

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Bob Dinneen, head of the Renewable Fuels Association, had this to say at this year’s National Ethanol Conference (via Autopia):

He calls the food-vs-fuel debate a “fallacy” that assumes “farmers are incapable of supplying the growing needs for food, fiber and fuel.” Besides, he said, biorefiners only need the starch in feedstocks; the protein provided 14 million metric tons of livestock feed last year.

Dinneen says a study by Informa Economics found ethanol production caused less than 5 percent of the increase in food prices last year. (The study was funded by the Renewable Fuels Foundation, which is linked to the Renewable Fuels Association.)

I wouldn’t go so far as to call it a fallacy since, as Autopia highlights, US grain subsidies are still implicated in world-wide food price increases.

A report this morning from NPR also weighed in on the value of protein byproducts and local economic stimulus produced by the ethanol industry (Listen Here: Ethanol Demand, Prices Boost Farm Communities). In Northwestern Iowa, local farmer Brian Friedrichsen describes:

“We are able to utilize the co-products from the ethanol plant, and so we’ve expanded our cattle operation a little bit every year for the last four years,” Friedrichsen says.

He says the feed from the ethanol plant cuts his costs by $40 to $50 per steer each year, saving him at least $200,000 annually. Friedrichsen estimates that the number of cattle being raised in the area has tripled as a direct result of the ethanol facility.

Farmland is also shooting up in value. A nearby farm sold last year for almost $7,000 an acre. Before the ethanol boom, an acre of farmland here would often go for less than $2,000.

There’s no question that ethanol is here to stay, but with major increases in food-based ethanol are we putting short-term economic gain at the expense of everything else?

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NPR (Mar. 4, 08), Morning Edition: Ethanol Demand, Prices Boost Farm Communities, by Jason Beaubien

Autopia (Feb. 27, 08): Ethanol Industry, Bigger Than Ever, Says Its Critics Are Wrong