Per the EIA’s Weekly Petroleum Status Report, average weekly ethanol production remained very strong over the latest reporting period. During the week ending Aug 18^th, production averaged 1.052 million barrels per day, down 7,000 barrels a day from the week prior. Gasoline demand increased by 107,000 barrels per day to 9.63 million. Ethanol stocks narrowed 319,000 barrels to 21.509 million. Ethanol imports reverted to zero. The decrease in ethanol production lowered corn demand by up to 104,000 bushels per day. DDGS output fell in sync with ethanol production, edging 0.66% lower, week over week.

Year to date, ethanol production has averaged 1,023,242 b/d, which is up 898,000 barrels per day from last week and remains above last year’s average of 981,000 b/d. At its current pace, the industry is on track to produce 15.67 billion gallons, well beyond the 2017 finalized ethanol RVO of 15 billion gallons. Whether the industry can blend enough to meet the mandate remains the question.  Average ethanol production for the latest week is 24,000 barrels a day more than it was a year ago (1,052K bpd vs. 1,028K bpd). Domestic gasoline demand increased by 1.12%. Ethanol inventories narrowed 1.46% to 21.51 million barrels.  Ethanol production as a percent of gasoline demand dropped to 10.93%. 2017 gasoline demand is, on average, 9.02 million gallons less per day than it was over the same period in 2016.

Approximately 15.59 million bushels of corn were used daily in the production of ethanol and, as a co-product of production, 112,499 metric tons of livestock feed was produced daily. DDGS production accounted for 100,054 metric tons, with the balance comprised of 10,501 MT of corn gluten feed and 1,945 MT of corn gluten meal.  Additionally, 6.82 million pounds of distillers’ corn oil was produced daily from dry mill ethanol plants.

The estimated ethanol-processing margin decreased 3.5%. Revenue derived from ethanol and DDGS sales fell by 15 cents per bushel, while the cost of corn slipped 9 cents per bushel.  This allowed the margin to narrow by 4 cents to $1.10 per bushel.