As cellulose becomes a viable feedstock for the country’s ethanol production, the U.S. farm sector will have to go through transformations, and Congress will help that come about when it writes a new farm bill next year, Iowa Sen. Tom Harkin said yesterday.
 
“We need to lay the groundwork, the foundation, for the next ten years of transition - a transition to different kinds of production with different kinds of crops,“ said Harkin, who will take over as Chairman of the Senate Agriculture Committee in January and lead the Senate effort to put together a new farm bill.

Government and industry officials are predicting it will not be long before leftover plant material, such as corn stover, can be used by energy producers in lieu of corn.
 
In addition, American farmers will need new kinds of equipment and new storage facilities to deal with the cellulosic material expected to fuel future ethanol production, Harkin said.  New tax laws will be also be necessary to prepare for an ethanol production expansion, he said and stressed he was glad Sens. Max Baucus, D-Mont., and Charles Grassley, R-Iowa, will both be on the Senate Agriculture Committee as the 2007 farm bill is created.
 
USDA Under Secretary Thomas Dorr said recently that cellulosic ethanol is close to being commercially viable, but it’s not there yet.
 
James Hettenhaus, the author of the November report, said corn stover and wheat and rice straw will be the first primary farm residues used to make ethanol on a commercial scale. He said that in three to five years farmers could be selling 200 million dry tons of the residue to ethanol plants, boosting ethanol production three times what it is now.
 
The USDA expects 20% of U.S. corn production, or more than 2 billion bushels, to go towards ethanol production this year, according to a recent speech by USDA Chief Economist Keith Collins.