Giese: “Carbon capture is vital to the future of ethanol, corn prices”

Al Giese, the owner of Prairie Feed & Trucking, member of the Quad County Corn Processors, and president of the Iowa Renewable Fuels Association, effectively makes the case for carbon capture and sequestration projects in a powerful op-ed for The N’West Iowa REVIEW.

Following a successful 30-year executive leadership career with CHS and Land O’Lakes in the Twin Cities, Giese returned to his “roots in northwest Iowa to raise crops and cattle.”

Giese wrote, “While folks have different views of carbon policies and credits, every Iowan needs to fully understand the real-world impact they have on Iowa’s ethanol plants. If we want to maintain or grow Iowa ethanol production, it will require CCS. So, if you are a farmer and you are honestly willing to accept a very low corn price and negative basis reminiscent of the 1990s and you still oppose CCS, that’s your right. But if you assume you can oppose CCS and there won’t be a huge economic price to pay, then I politely suggest that you think again.”

“If Iowa enacts laws that make CCS a practical impossibility for its ethanol plants, it will be a massive blow to our farm economy and the entire Iowa economy. IRFA members urge all Iowans to pull together and to find a fair and equitable path forward for CCS because capturing and sequestering carbon will be life or death for most Iowa ethanol plants over the next five years,” Giese concluded.

Click here to read the entire op-ed.