IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/enepol/v37y2009i2p745-749.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

How does petroleum price and corn yield volatility affect ethanol markets with and without an ethanol use mandate?

Author

Listed:
  • Thompson, Wyatt
  • Meyer, Seth
  • Westhoff, Pat

Abstract

The recent increase in ethanol use in the US strengthens and changes the nature of links between agricultural and energy markets. Here, we explore the interaction of market volatility and the scope for policy to affect this interaction, with a focus on how corn yields and petroleum prices affect ethanol prices. Mandates associated with new US energy legislation may intervene in these links in the medium-term future. We simulate stochastically a structural model that represents these markets, and that includes mandates, in order to assess how shocks to corn or oil markets can affect ethanol price and use. We estimate that the mandate makes ethanol producer prices more sensitive to corn yields and less sensitive to changes in petroleum prices overall. We note a discontinuity in these links that is caused by the mandate. Ethanol use can exceed the mandate if petroleum prices and corn yields are high enough, but the mandate limits downside adjustments in ethanol use to low petroleum prices or corn yields.

Suggested Citation

  • Thompson, Wyatt & Meyer, Seth & Westhoff, Pat, 2009. "How does petroleum price and corn yield volatility affect ethanol markets with and without an ethanol use mandate?," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 37(2), pages 745-749, February.
  • Handle: RePEc:eee:enepol:v:37:y:2009:i:2:p:745-749
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0301-4215(08)00504-1
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Simla Tokgoz & Amani Elobeid & Jacinto F. Fabiosa & Dermot J. Hayes & Bruce A. Babcock & Tun-Hsiang (Edward) Yu & Fengxia Dong & Chad E. Hart & John C. Beghin, 2007. "Emerging Biofuels: Outlook of Effects on U.S. Grain, Oilseed, and Livestock Markets," Food and Agricultural Policy Research Institute (FAPRI) Publications (archive only) 07-sr101, Center for Agricultural and Rural Development (CARD) at Iowa State University.
    2. Unknown, 2006. "Overview: Developing New Energy Sources from Agriculture," Choices: The Magazine of Food, Farm, and Resource Issues, Agricultural and Applied Economics Association, vol. 21(1), pages 1-4.
    3. Gallagher, Paul W., 2006. "Energy Production with Biomass: What Are the Prospects," Staff General Research Papers Archive 12559, Iowa State University, Department of Economics.
    4. Gallagher, Paul W., 2006. "Energy Production with Biomass: What Are the Prospects?," ISU General Staff Papers 200601010800001446, Iowa State University, Department of Economics.
    5. Hamelinck, Carlo N & Faaij, Andre P.C., 2006. "Outlook for advanced biofuels," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 34(17), pages 3268-3283, November.
    6. Eaves, James & Eaves, Stephen, 2007. "Renewable corn-ethanol and energy security," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 35(11), pages 5958-5963, November.
    7. Gallagher, Paul W., 2006. "Energy Production with Biomass: What Are the Prospects?," Choices: The Magazine of Food, Farm, and Resource Issues, Agricultural and Applied Economics Association, vol. 21(1), pages 1-6.
    8. Lavigne, Amanda & Powers, Susan E., 2007. "Evaluating fuel ethanol feedstocks from energy policy perspectives: A comparative energy assessment of corn and corn stover," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 35(11), pages 5918-5930, November.
    9. Bernard, F. & Prieur, A., 2007. "Biofuel market and carbon modeling to analyse French biofuel policy," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 35(12), pages 5991-6002, December.
    10. Bomb, Christian & McCormick, Kes & Deurwaarder, Ewout & Kaberger, Tomas, 2007. "Biofuels for transport in Europe: Lessons from Germany and the UK," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 35(4), pages 2256-2267, April.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. John Quiggin, 2010. "Agriculture and global climate stabilization: a public good analysis," Agricultural Economics, International Association of Agricultural Economists, vol. 41(s1), pages 121-132, November.
    2. Henderson, Jason R. & Gloy, Brent A., 2008. "The Impact of Ethanol Plants on Land Values in the Great Plains," 2007 Agricultural and Rural Finance Markets in Transition, October 4-5, 2007, St. Louis, Missouri 48148, Regional Research Committee NC-1014: Agricultural and Rural Finance Markets in Transition.
    3. Pat Westhoff & Wyatt Thompson & John Kruse & Seth Meyer, 2007. "Ethanol Transforms Agricultural Markets in the USA L'éthanol transforme les marchés agricoles aux Etats‐Unis Ethanol transformiert die Agrarmärkte in den USA," EuroChoices, The Agricultural Economics Society, vol. 6(1), pages 14-21, April.
    4. Chao Bi & Jingjing Zeng & Wanli Zhang & Yonglin Wen, 2020. "Modelling the Coevolution of the Fuel Ethanol Industry, Technology System, and Market System in China: A History-Friendly Model," Energies, MDPI, vol. 13(5), pages 1-26, February.
    5. Blanco, Luisa & Isenhouer, Michelle, 2010. "Powering America: The impact of ethanol production in the Corn Belt states," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 32(6), pages 1228-1234, November.
    6. Antar, Mohammed & Lyu, Dongmei & Nazari, Mahtab & Shah, Ateeq & Zhou, Xiaomin & Smith, Donald L., 2021. "Biomass for a sustainable bioeconomy: An overview of world biomass production and utilization," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 139(C).
    7. Quiggin, John, 2005. "Counting the cost of climate change at an agricultural level," Risk and Sustainable Management Group Working Papers 152085, University of Queensland, School of Economics.
    8. Quiggin, John C., 2009. "Agriculture and global climate stabilization," 2009 Conference, August 16-22, 2009, Beijing, China 53204, International Association of Agricultural Economists.
    9. Brent A. Gloy & Jason Henderson, 2008. "The impact of ethanol plants on cropland values in the Great Plains," Regional Research Working Paper RRWP 08-01, Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas City.
    10. Henderson, Jason R. & Gloy, Brent A., 2008. "The Impact of Ethanol Plants on Cropland Values in the Great Plains," Working Papers 51080, Cornell University, Department of Applied Economics and Management.
    11. Carriquiry, Miguel A. & Du, Xiaodong & Timilsina, Govinda R., 2011. "Second generation biofuels: Economics and policies," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 39(7), pages 4222-4234, July.
    12. Van de Velde, Liesbeth & Verbeke, Wim & Popp, Michael & Buysse, Jeroen & Van Huylenbroeck, Guido, 2009. "Perceived importance of fuel characteristics and its match with consumer beliefs about biofuels in Belgium," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 37(8), pages 3183-3193, August.
    13. Unknown, 2008. "The 30-Year Challenge: Agriculture's Strategic Role in Feeding and Fueling a Growing World," Issue Reports 45719, Farm Foundation.
    14. Zhang, Wendong & Irwin, Elena G. & Nickerson, Cynthia J., 2012. "The Expanding Ethanol Market and Farmland Values: Identifying the Changing Influence of Proximity to Agricultural Delivery Points," 2012 Annual Meeting, August 12-14, 2012, Seattle, Washington 124690, Agricultural and Applied Economics Association.
    15. Hoefnagels, Ric & Banse, Martin & Dornburg, Veronika & Faaij, André, 2013. "Macro-economic impact of large-scale deployment of biomass resources for energy and materials on a national level—A combined approach for the Netherlands," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 59(C), pages 727-744.
    16. Jacinto F. Fabiosa & John C. Beghin & Fengxia Dong & JAmani Elobeid & Simla Tokgoz & Tun-Hsiang Yu, 2010. "Land Allocation Effects of the Global Ethanol Surge: Predictions from the International FAPRI Model," Land Economics, University of Wisconsin Press, vol. 86(4), pages 687-706.
    17. Doug Auld, 2008. "The Ethanol Trap: Why Policies to Promote Ethanol as Fuel Need Rethinking," C.D. Howe Institute Commentary, C.D. Howe Institute, issue 268, July.
    18. Amela Ajanovic & Gerfried Jungmeier & Martin Beermann & Reinhard Haas, 2012. "The Long-Term Prospects of Biofuels in the EU-15 Countries," Energies, MDPI, vol. 5(8), pages 1-16, August.
    19. Du, Xiaodong & Hayes, Dermot J., 2009. "The impact of ethanol production on US and regional gasoline markets," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 37(8), pages 3227-3234, August.
    20. Hochman Gal & Sexton Steven E & Zilberman David D, 2008. "The Economics of Biofuel Policy and Biotechnology," Journal of Agricultural & Food Industrial Organization, De Gruyter, vol. 6(2), pages 1-24, December.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Ethanol Mandate Price variability;

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:eee:enepol:v:37:y:2009:i:2:p:745-749. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Catherine Liu (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.elsevier.com/locate/enpol .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.