Thursday, July 19, 2012  USDA May Be Overestimating Corn Needed
For Ethanol by 10%  And here I was about to fire off a letter to
the President asking for an Executive Order rescinding the EPA's
mandate that we use up 5 Billion bushels to make hooch. From
Reuters via CattleNetwork: As corn burns, excess ethanol credits
help dampen demand   As drought devastates the U.S. corn crop,
relief from near-record prices may come from an unexpected
quarter: oil companies, which may buy less ethanol than their
government mandate suggests.  With a 50 percent surge in corn
prices stirring fears of global food inflation and threatening
to revive the debate over using crops for fuel, traders are
zeroing in on a little-known niche of the ethanol business known
as Renewable Identification Numbers (RINs) that may help ease
the pressure on corn.  In essence, RINs are certificates used by
refiners or fuel companies to demonstrate they are meeting their
government mandate to use a set amount of renewable fuel every
year. Each RIN