Corn use for fuel ethanol reaches 469 million bushels in January

The USDA recently released its Grain Crushings and Co-Products Production report for March, reporting that corn use for fuel ethanol production for January was down from the previous month, but up from January 2019.

Total corn consumed for alcohol and other uses in January was 519 million bushels. Total corn consumption was down 2 percent from December 2019, but up 5 percent from January 2019.

Corn use for fuel alcohol was at 469 million bushels, down 2 percent from the previous month, but up 6 percent from the same month of 2019. Corn consumed in January 2020 for dry milling fuel production and wet milling fuel production was 90 percent and 10 percent, respectively.

Sorghum consumed for fuel alcohol production was at 4.967 million hundredweight (cwt) (278,152 tons), down from 5.341 million cwt in December 2019, but up from 4.883 million cwt in January 2019.

At dry mills, condensed distillers solubles production reached 121,740 tons, up from 101,158 tons in December 2019 and 118,145 tons in January 2019. Corn oil production was at 151,162, down from 165,210 tons the previous month, but up from 148,896 tons during the same month of 2019. Distillers dried grains production fell to 358,478 tons, down from 388,156 tons in December 2019 and 369,647 tons in January 2019. Distillers dried grains with solubles production reached 1.95 million tons, up from 1.91 million tons in December 2019 and 1.82 million tons in January 2019. Distillers wet grains production was at 1.39 million tons, down from 1.4 million tons in December 2019, but up from 1.36 million tons in January 2019. Modified distillers wet grains production was at 476,126 tons, down from 493,170 tons the previous month, but up from 469,787 tons during January of the previous year.

At wet mills, corn germ meal production was at 68,154 tons, down slightly from 68,957 tons in December 2019, but up from 61,166 tons in January 2019. Corn gluten feed production reached 308,081 tons, up from 306,318 tons in December 2019 and 263,218 tons in January 2019. Corn gluten meal production was at 93,097 tons, down from 93,644 tons the previous month, but up from 84,214 tons during the same month of the previous year. Wet corn gluten feed production reached 258,481 tons, up from 257,381 tons in December 2019 and 253,103 tons in January 2019.

At dry and wet mills, carbon dioxide capture fell to 216,915 tons, down from 220,510 tons in December 2019 and 262,241 tons in January 2019.