USDA: Corn use for ethanol falls to 434 million bushels in March
May 27, 2020
BY Erin Krueger
The USDA recently released its Grain Crushings and Co-Products Production report for May, reporting that corn use for fuel ethanol production fell to 412 million bushels in March, down from both the previous month and March 2019.
Total corn consumed for alcohol and other uses was 467 million bushels in March, down 3 percent from February and down 6 percent from March 2019. March usage included 90.8 percent for alcohol and 9.2 percent for other purposes.
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Corn consumed for fuel alcohol fell to 412 million bushels, down 5 percent when compared to February and down 7 percent when compared to March 2019. Corn consumed in March for dry milling fuel production and wet milling fuel production was 90.2 percent and 9.8 percent, respectively.
Sorghum consumed for fuel alcohol production fell to 4.64 million hundredweight (cwt) (259,840 tons), down from 5.857 million cwt in February and down from 5.167 million cwt in March of the previous year.
At dry mills, condensed distillers solubles production was at 99,381 tons, up from 99,142 tons in February, but down from 115,583 tons in March 2019. Corn oil production fell to 148,396 tons, down from 148,501 tons in February and 149,168 tons in March of the previous year. Distillers dried grains production fell to 317,411 tons, down from 328,113 tons in February and 386,413 tons in March 2019. Distillers dried grains with solubles production fell to 1.66 million tons, down from 1.81 million tons in February and 1.87 tons in March 2019. Distillers wet grains production was at 1.22 million tons, down slightly when compared to February, and down from 1.34 million tons in March of the previous year. Modified distillers wet grains production increased to 477,519 tons, up from 469,444 tons in February and 362,412 tons in March 2019.
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At wet mills, corn germ meal production reached 69,960 tons, up from 63,305 tons in February 2020 and 61,001 tons in March 2019. Corn gluten feed production was at 291,861 tons, up from 281,160 tons in February, but down from 304,047 tons in March 2019. Corn gluten meal production increased to 92,269 tons, up from 88,021 tons in February and 88,890 tons in March of the previous year. Wet corn gluten feed production increased to 245,209 tons, up from 235,941 tons in February and 224,850 tons in March 2019.
Carbon dioxide captured at wet and dry mills was at 218,593 tons, up from 211,775 tons in February, but down from 242,832 tons in March 2019.
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