A study by Chris Kucharik of the University of Wisconsin-Madison and lead author Simon Donner of the University of British Columbia modeled the effects of biofuel production on nutrient pollution in an aquatic system.
They looked at the estimated amounts of land and fertilizer needed to meet a U.S. Senate production target of 36 billion gallons a year by 2022, more than three times the amount of ethanol produced in 2006.
If that goal is reached, the researchers say nitrogen loading from the Mississippi River into the Gulf of Mexico would increase by 10 to 19 percent.
As a result, they predict that nitrogen levels would rise to twice their recommended levels, leading to an expansion of the oxygen-starved dead zone that cannot support life -- an area already equal to the size of New Jersey.
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