The National Research Council has released a report that claims increasing corn ethanol production will stress the nation’s fresh water supplies.
Growing lots more corn using current farm practices will come at a huge water cost to Nebraska and other states where the fuel is made. Industrial farming methods would deplete underground water supplies and result in a flow of agricultural chemicals and eroded soil into rivers, lakes and oceans, according to the report, “Water Implications of Biofuels Production in the United States.”
“It is equivalent to ‘mining’ the water resource, and the loss of the resource is essentially irreversible,” the report said.