Corn-based ethanol has fish, wildlife officials worried

This is sobering news for conservationists (or it should be). Corn-based ethanol is marketed as a cleaner burning fuel than gasoline, but most policymakers have yet to raise any questions about what its production means to other aspects of the environment.
Like lost wildlife habitat.
Like the consequences of more field erosion — commonplace with corn rotations — and what that means for our rivers and streams and the fish that swim in them; the increased inputs of farm chemicals like atrazine and nitrogen fertilizer sand how they will impact the environment and public health.
What’s also certain is that there’s going to be a big push by farm interests to phase out the nation’s premiere wildlife initiative, the two-decades-old Conservation Reserve Program (CRP), which has roughly 37 million acres enrolled nationwide. That’s a lot of ground that could be planted to corn, and farm groups know it.
“I think CRP in the next farm bill will be under increased scrutiny,” said Bogenschutz, adding that he believes the program is too popular to be phased out. “There are just a lot of unknowns right now. But the ethanol push is changing the landscape.”
According to Bogenschutz, in the last 20 years, Iowa has lost 30 percent of its potential upland habitat. Some of that loss comes from expiring CRP contracts. But much more of that is the conversion of hay and small grain fields — adequate wildlife habitat, though not as good as CRP grass — to row crops.

The Pilot-Independent