Ethanol refinery with farm fields

Just a few short years ago, farmers across the upper Midwest were faced with crops withering in fields or rotting in storage as a result of increased transportation costs and lack of rail capacity due to oil being shipped by rail.  Now, with another shortage of pipeline capacity, farmers may be faced with another round of economic hardship.

“As volumes continue to build, so will the pressure on the constrained pipelines system,” Kevin Birn, a director at IHS Energy in Calgary, said by e-mail Wednesday. “At some point in the coming months those volumes could very well overtake available capacity and increased movements of rail should be expected.”

Read more – Bloomberg