The growing ethanol industry in Nebraska is creating benefits, opportunities and challenges for researchers and beef producers in the state.
Nebraska's ethanol industry is at an advantage because its plants are close to where the corn is produced. Also, there is a large cattle industry to take advantage of the wet and dry byproducts of ethanol production, which can be used for feed.
"If ethanol production is increased, then byproduct production is increased as well," said Galen Erickson, an associate professor of animal science at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln.
Nebraskans need to find ways to take advantage of those byproducts, he said.
The byproducts are mostly used by feedlots but are also used by dairy and cow-calf operations.
The wet byproducts are better for the cattle, and ethanol plants save money by not having to dry the byproducts.
"So it's kind of a win-win in Nebraska," Erikson said.
"The biggest issue for ethanol plants is the drying of the byproduct," said Terry Klopfenstein, a professor of animal science at UNL.
The drying process costs plants $40 per ton of byproduct. Wet byproducts can spoil if kept for too long, so if the ethanol plants and cattle production facilities are in close proximity, they can sell the byproducts wet and save the $40 a ton, he said.
"That would make a difference of 12 cents for each gallon of ethanol produced," Klopfenstein said. Both the plant and the producer want the 12 cents, so it gets split in half, but it's still a benefit to both, he said.
Other models show that cattle producers who use the byproducts of ethanol production as feed gain $20 to $40 per head more than producers who don't, Erickson said.
"I think this is one of the best things for rural Nebraska," Klopfenstein said.
Also, the plants have created the best ever cooperation between cattle and corn producers and the ethanol industry, he said.
Having all three industries work together will become a key factor in some of the upcoming problems each might face, such as phosphorous management.
When cattle are fed ethanol byproducts, their manure contains more phosphorus, which must be spread over a larger land area.
"If we (Nebraskans) aren't able to handle this, no one can," Erickson said.
Also, sulfur becomes an issue when large amounts of byproducts are fed to cattle.
If beef producers feed their cattle too much byproduct too soon, the feed can affect the cattle's digestive systems.
"That's our job as researchers to get that resolved," Klopfenstein said.
"I've been here for 42 years, and this is the biggest thing to happen to the cattle industry since I've been here."
It takes a lot of fine-tuning to be able to replace corn in cattle's diets with 60 to 75 percent byproducts, Erickson said.
The main focus of the animal science department's research is finding out how to use more byproducts in diets to replace grain, he said.
"Our goal is to position Nebraska well so it's helped, not hurt, by ethanol production," Erickson said.
is a member of the 
