SORGHUM News Release

Increased RFS May Help Expand Ethanol Industry in the Sorghum Belt 

    The National Grain Sorghum Producers (NGSP) thanks Representatives Tom Osborne, Stephanie Herseth, Collin Peterson and Steve King for their efforts to introduce a companion bill to the Senate's Fuels Security Act of 2005. NGSP also thanks Sorghum Belt Representatives Marion Berry, Sam Graves, Ike Skelton, Jeff Fortenberry, Jerry Moran and Jim Ryun for co-sponsoring the bill.

    The bill would establish a Renewable Fuels Standard (RFS) that begins at 4 billion gallons in 2006 and increases to 8 billion gallons in 2012. If implemented, the ethanol industry could grow into Sorghum Belt destination markets like Texas, Oklahoma and Colorado and further expand into Kansas, Nebraska, New Mexico and South Dakota.

    "Ethanol represents the single largest value-added commodity market for grain sorghum producers in the U.S.," said NGSP President James Vorderstrasse of Hebron, Neb. "We expect that the development of ethanol plants in the Sorghum Belt will improve the local price paid to sorghum producers." 

    Grain sorghum is a competitively priced starch source that ethanol plants routinely utilize as a primary source in the starch mix. NGSP estimates that eight ethanol plants in the U.S. produce approximately 258 million gallons of ethanol annually by utilizing grain sorghum and an additional four plants under construction or planned expansion would increase ethanol production from grain sorghum by more than 65 percent. Approximately 11 percent of the U.S. grain sorghum crop goes into ethanol production. One bushel of grain sorghum yields the same amount of ethanol as one bushel of corn.

    NGSP represents U.S. sorghum producers nationwide. Headquartered in Lubbock, Texas, in the heart of the U.S. Sorghum Belt that stretches from the Rockies to the Mississippi River and from South Texas to South Dakota, the organization works to ensure the profitability of sorghum production through market development, research, education and legislative representation.

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