Renewable Energy Report: October 2016 Report

The Renewable Fuels Monthly Report is produced as a partnership between the Agricultural Marketing Resource Center operated by the Value Added Agriculture Program at Iowa State Extension and Outreach (ISUEO), the Iowa Grain Quality Initiative (IGQI), an ISUEO program directed specifically at grain processing and handling, and is authored by Decision Innovation Solutions, LLC, an economic research and analysis firm located in Urbandale, Iowa.

U.S. ethanol production reached 981,000 barrels per day for the week ending September 16 according to the most recent Weekly Ethanol Plant Production report from the Energy Information Administration (EIA). Figure 1 illustrates weekly U.S. oxygenate plant production of fuel ethanol (thousand barrels per day) and weekly U.S. ending stocks of fuel ethanol (thousand barrels) from June 4, 2010, to September 16, 2016. Correspondingly, weekly ending stocks of fuel ethanol are at....

Wind power, a clean, renewable form of energy, is one of the fastest growing sources of new electricity generation and the main source of new renewable power supply added since 2000 (DEO, 2015), generating 4.7% of the total U.S. electricity supply in 2015 (EIA, 2016).According to the American Wind Energy Association (AWEA, 2016), since 2008, the U.S. wind industry has generated more than $100 billion in private investment and has brought revenue to rural communities by providing lease payments to landowners. Moreover, wind technology produces electricity with virtually no greenhouse gas emissions or other common pollutants and uses virtually no water (AWEA, 2016).Some challenges to wind technology include land use, wildlife concerns, and radar interference issues, all of which, according to the Department of Energy (DOE, 2015), can be successfully managed with proper planning, technology, and communication among stakeholders.

An excellent, very detailed chart by Saul Griffith of Otherlab showing how all the energy in the U.S. is used can be found on the districtenergy.org blog.

The spreadsheets listed below provide data and trends for various components of the renewable energy industry. These files are updated with new information each month.