(June 4, 2013) WASHINGTON - RFA’s President and CEO Bob Dinneen responds to a new Rice University and University of California at Davis study examining the impact of global warming and its effect on corn production and the long term water supply.

"When weathermen and climatologists are often wrong about next week's forecast, why should anyone believe this study can accurately predict weather conditions 40 years from now? The effects of climate change on future precipitation and crop yields is a highly unsettled and uncertain area of analysis. Some studies have actually shown crop yields in the north-central U.S. will increase due to climate changes in the long term. It appears the authors have chosen to highlight a doomsday scenario, rather than giving equal consideration to a broad array of possible future outcomes. It also appears that the authors have ignored the future commercialization of crop technologies under development today that will better withstand drought and heat stress. Additionally, only 10-12% of the U.S. corn crop is irrigated today, and water use on those irrigated acres has trended downward in recent years. The study also omits any comparison to the water use and water quality impacts of current and future oil production methods—fracking and extracting oil from tar sands use far more water than ethanol. The bottom line is this isn’t a scientific study at all; it is an editorial by a pair of oil industry sympathizers intended to deflect attention from the fact ethanol and the RFS have worked for America."