The Irony Of It All -- North Dakota Will Lose More Grassland, More Wetlands To Ethanol Than To The Oil And Gas Industry

Related post: EPA is ready to cut back on corn-ethanol mandate for 2014, taking it back to 2012 level. 

The Bismarck Tribune is reporting:

In the period from 2006 to 2011, North Dakota has had a net loss of about 220,000 acres of grasslands that have been converted into corn and soybean fields. 

That’s according to Christopher Wright of the Geographic Information Science Center of Excellence at South Dakota State University. Wright, who along with Michael Wimberly, authored a scientific paper on land use changes in the western Corn Belt of the U.S., spoke to group of conservation scientists Wednesday at the Ducks Unlimited regional headquarters in Bismarck.

Wright’s presentation was timely as the national debate continues over the effectiveness of the ethanol program aimed at reducing greenhouse gases.

Wright told the group that land conversion from grasslands to corn and soybeans, spurred by demands for biofuel stocks made from the crops, may take decades to reverse in terms of carbon once locked into the soil that has been released into the atmosphere.

Remember: only parts of four or five or six counties in northwestern North Dakota and a couple in southwestern North Dakota are affected directly by the oil and gas industry. Almost the entire state is affected by farming, in comparison. And farmers are making a lot of money off ethanol.

• The AP reveals the devastation created by the ethanol program; despite the overwhelming evidence, the president stands by his Interior Secretary, the EPA, and the ethanol program
• Farmers cashing in on ethanol.

And with an ever-increasing number of slicers and dicers killing bats, eagles, hawks, and whooping cranes, the oil and gas industry is starting to look like an oasis of common sense.