CHICAGO (Reuters) — U.S. ethanol makers produced a record amount of the biofuel last week, government data showed on Wednesday, as plentiful corn supplies and high ethanol prices resulted in the best profit margins in about six months, traders said.
Ethanol production rose more than one percent to an average of 982,000 barrels per day in the week ending Nov. 21, the U.S. Energy Information Administration said. That is the largest weekly total since EIA started tracking the data in 2010.
Stocks of the grain-based biofuel decreased by 263,000 barrels to 17.07 million barrels, the smallest in about a month.
Read Also
New wild pig website launches in Canada
A new website has joined the fight against invasive wild pigs in Canada, aiming to offer tools, information and resources to educate the public and offer them a way to report wild pig sightings.
The record production came as the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency last week delayed a decision until next year on targets for biofuel use in the nation’s gasoline supply.
The EPA announcement likely had little impact on ethanol production, said Jerrod Kitt, a biofuels analyst with the Linn Group, a Chicago brokerage. “It’s purely seasonal, plus margins,” he said.
Many ethanol plants perform annual maintenance before the autumn corn harvest, allowing them to run near-capacity when supplies of the grain are cheapest and most plentiful. Ethanol makers are earning as much as US$2 per bushel of corn on the ethanol they make — the best profits since last summer, Kitt said.
Ethanol futures eased about one cent to $2.04 per gallon in thin volume at the Chicago Board of Trade, with prices hovering near a 2 ½ month high reached on Tuesday.
