Recent grassland losses are concentrated around U.S. ethanol refineries
Although the United States has pursued rapid development of corn ethanol as a matter of national biofuel policy, relatively little is known about this policy’s widespread impacts on agricultural land conversion surrounding ethanol refineries. This knowledge gap impedes policy makers’ ability to iden...
| Main Authors: | , , , |
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| Format: | Article |
| Language: | English |
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IOP Publishing
2017-01-01
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| Series: | Environmental Research Letters |
| Subjects: | |
| Online Access: | https://doi.org/10.1088/1748-9326/aa6446 |
| _version_ | 1797748306443501568 |
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| author | Christopher K Wright Ben Larson Tyler J Lark Holly K Gibbs |
| author_facet | Christopher K Wright Ben Larson Tyler J Lark Holly K Gibbs |
| author_sort | Christopher K Wright |
| collection | DOAJ |
| description | Although the United States has pursued rapid development of corn ethanol as a matter of national biofuel policy, relatively little is known about this policy’s widespread impacts on agricultural land conversion surrounding ethanol refineries. This knowledge gap impedes policy makers’ ability to identify and mitigate potentially negative environmental impacts of ethanol production. We assessed changes to the landscape during initial implementation of the Renewable Fuel Standard v2 (RFS2) from 2008 to 2012 and found nearly 4.2 million acres of arable non-cropland converted to crops within 100 miles of refinery locations, including 3.6 million acres of converted grassland. Aggregated across all ethanol refineries, the rate of grassland conversion to cropland increased linearly with proximity to a refinery location. Despite this widespread conversion of the landscape, recent cropland expansion could have made only modest contributions to mandated increases in conventional biofuel capacity required by RFS2. Collectively, these findings demonstrate a shortcoming in the existing ‘aggregate compliance’ method for enforcing land protections in the RFS2 and suggest an alternative monitoring mechanism would be needed to appropriately capture the scale of observed land use changes. |
| first_indexed | 2024-03-12T16:03:00Z |
| format | Article |
| id | doaj.art-d2446e6af38949caa69815de477bbbeb |
| institution | Directory Open Access Journal |
| issn | 1748-9326 |
| language | English |
| last_indexed | 2024-03-12T16:03:00Z |
| publishDate | 2017-01-01 |
| publisher | IOP Publishing |
| record_format | Article |
| series | Environmental Research Letters |
| spelling | doaj.art-d2446e6af38949caa69815de477bbbeb2023-08-09T14:32:06ZengIOP PublishingEnvironmental Research Letters1748-93262017-01-0112404400110.1088/1748-9326/aa6446Recent grassland losses are concentrated around U.S. ethanol refineriesChristopher K Wright0Ben Larson1Tyler J Lark2Holly K Gibbs3Natural Resources Research Institute (NRRI) , University of Minnesota Duluth, 5013 Miller Trunk Highway, Duluth, MN, 55811, United States of America; Author to whom any correspondence should be addressed.National Wildlife Federation , 1990 K Street NW, Suite 430, Washington, DC, 20006, United States of AmericaNelson Institute Center for Sustainability and the Global Environment (SAGE) , University of Wisconsin-Madison, 1710 University Avenue, Madison, WI, 53726, United States of AmericaNelson Institute Center for Sustainability and the Global Environment (SAGE) , University of Wisconsin-Madison, 1710 University Avenue, Madison, WI, 53726, United States of AmericaAlthough the United States has pursued rapid development of corn ethanol as a matter of national biofuel policy, relatively little is known about this policy’s widespread impacts on agricultural land conversion surrounding ethanol refineries. This knowledge gap impedes policy makers’ ability to identify and mitigate potentially negative environmental impacts of ethanol production. We assessed changes to the landscape during initial implementation of the Renewable Fuel Standard v2 (RFS2) from 2008 to 2012 and found nearly 4.2 million acres of arable non-cropland converted to crops within 100 miles of refinery locations, including 3.6 million acres of converted grassland. Aggregated across all ethanol refineries, the rate of grassland conversion to cropland increased linearly with proximity to a refinery location. Despite this widespread conversion of the landscape, recent cropland expansion could have made only modest contributions to mandated increases in conventional biofuel capacity required by RFS2. Collectively, these findings demonstrate a shortcoming in the existing ‘aggregate compliance’ method for enforcing land protections in the RFS2 and suggest an alternative monitoring mechanism would be needed to appropriately capture the scale of observed land use changes.https://doi.org/10.1088/1748-9326/aa6446renewable fuel standardethanolbiofuelland use changegrassland |
| spellingShingle | Christopher K Wright Ben Larson Tyler J Lark Holly K Gibbs Recent grassland losses are concentrated around U.S. ethanol refineries Environmental Research Letters renewable fuel standard ethanol biofuel land use change grassland |
| title | Recent grassland losses are concentrated around U.S. ethanol refineries |
| title_full | Recent grassland losses are concentrated around U.S. ethanol refineries |
| title_fullStr | Recent grassland losses are concentrated around U.S. ethanol refineries |
| title_full_unstemmed | Recent grassland losses are concentrated around U.S. ethanol refineries |
| title_short | Recent grassland losses are concentrated around U.S. ethanol refineries |
| title_sort | recent grassland losses are concentrated around u s ethanol refineries |
| topic | renewable fuel standard ethanol biofuel land use change grassland |
| url | https://doi.org/10.1088/1748-9326/aa6446 |
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