Ethanol Subsidy Fund Encourages More Factories

The North Dakota Legislature set up an ethanol subsidy fund four years ago hoping to encourage more ethanol factories The fund hasn t been used yet but it could be making payments soon The fund s formula is set up to help ethanol plants if fuel prices decline and Corn prices stay high This year corn prices have usually been above three dollars a bushel And the price of ethanol has dropped from 2 50 a gallon in January to about 1 70 a gallon now North Dakota Commerce Department energy engineer Bill Huether says the fund has some payment limits New plants can only get up to one-point-six M million dollars of support each year And each factory is capped at ten M million dollars of support during its lifetime Two new ethanol plants started operating in North Dakota in the last year and another one is being built near Casselton