Double Cropping of Corn in Brazil and Ethanol Production: Market Impacts and Potential as a Low-Carbon Sustainable Aviation Fuel

by Amani Elobeid, Miguel Carriquiry, Jerome Dumortier, Luciane Chiodi Bachion, and Sofía Marques Arantes

 

Sustainable aviation fuels (SAFs) are attracting growing interest as a potential additional source of demand for agricultural feedstock. Corn ethanol can be used as a feedstock for alcohol-to-jet SAF production, which could create new market opportunities for both corn and ethanol producers. This opportunity is particularly relevant because ethanol demand from road transportation has grown modestly in recent years, and long-run growth may be limited by the rise of electric vehicles, limitations in retail infrastructure, and gasoline demand trends. At the same time, the rapid expansion of corn ethanol production in countries such as Brazil is likely to intensify competition for producers in established corn ethanol-producing countries, including the United States, where corn and ethanol producers are seeking alternative demand opportunities such as SAF. Brazil is especially important because of its capacity to grow corn as a second crop following soybeans, which allows for crop expansion while limiting upward pressures on land use and prices.

Brazilian corn ethanol production increased from 1.2 to 2 billion gallons between 2022 and 2024. Official sources at the Brazilian Energy Research Office (EPE) expect the expansion to reach 3.5 billion gallons by 2032 (EPE 2024), while industry sources have estimated even larger increases in ethanol produced from corn. Corn ethanol production in Brazil is obtained primarily from corn produced as a second crop, that is, on land which has already been used for agriculture (mostly soybeans) in the same year. Second-crop corn area has increased in recent years while first crop corn has declined with our projections suggesting that this trend will continue (figure 1). Brazil has also gained market share as a major exporter of corn, narrowing the gap with the United States, the world’s largest corn exporter. Given Brazil’s large soybean area, double cropping corn has the potential to expand, further increasing exports and ethanol production with implications for global corn trade, prices, and land-use change (figure 1).

Stacked line chart shows Brazil’s crop area (million hectares) from 2000–2033, where soybeans (black line) rise from about 14 million hectares in 2000 to roughly 46–47 million hectares by the early 2030s, while first crop corn (black area) gradually declines from about 10 to around 5 million hectares and second crop corn (gold area) expands from roughly 2–3 to about 20 million hectares.
Figure 1. Historic (2000–2023) and projected (2024–2033) corn (first and second crop) and soybean area in Brazil in the baseline of the CARD LRLU Model.

Expanding second-crop corn production on land already under soybeans cultivation allows for an increase in production with limited indirect land-use change and potentially lower price effects. Some authors (e.g., Colussi et al. 2025) argue that the combined expansion of domestic demand for ethanol and from the livestock sector is reducing exports and providing price support for corn. Corn and sugarcane ethanol plants in Brazil use biomass (e.g., bagasse, eucalyptus chips, agro-industrial and agricultural residues) for processing energy (Moreira et al. 2020). These features reduce the carbon intensity of Brazilian corn ethanol production, potentially placing it an advantageous position for targeting the SAF market relative to corn ethanol in countries like the United States. In this line, while the life-cycle greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions of corn ethanol in the United States have been studied for many years, much less is known about the life-cycle emissions of corn ethanol produced in Brazil.

The CARD Long-Run Land Use (LRLU) model is well suited to analyze the impact of a rapid expansion of corn ethanol production in Brazil on corn prices as well as on global trade. The partial equilibrium model of global agriculture includes land use, production, and demand equations of the main temperate crops and livestock. The model has been used extensively for research and policy analysis and validated by its application in several peer reviewed papers. In this article, we present a summary of the implications of different paths of the expansion of corn ethanol production in Brazil for global trade as well as for corn prices based on the full analysis in Elobeid et al. (2026). The impacts are measured as the differences in the variables of interest between the business-as-usual 10-year projection (baseline) and the results of expanding corn ethanol production under different scenarios. The scenarios considered represent two accelerated paths of corn ethanol expansion in Brazil (figure 2). The first path is based on projections conducted by EPE (2024) of corn usage for ethanol production in Brazil (“EPE Scenario”) while the second scenario is based on projections conducted by industry (“Industry Scenario”). 

Panel (a) line chart shows corn used for ethanol in Brazil rising from about 12 million metric tons in 2023 to roughly 28 million by 2033, reaching about 35 million under the EPE scenario and about 47 million under the industry scenario. Panel (b) shows percent change from the baseline—around +30% by 2033 for the EPE scenario, and roughly +70% by 2026–2027 for the industry scenario.
Figure 2. (a) Corn used for ethanol production. (b) Change in corn used for ethanol production in scenarios relative to the baseline. 

The impact of different production supply elasticities (i.e., the responsiveness of production to prices) on corn production is also investigated. There is large uncertainty regarding this elasticity for the second crop of corn in Brazil and hence, we investigate a wide range of values to explore the boundaries of our results. For this purpose, we run an additional scenario with the same ethanol production expansion of the “Industry Scenario” but assuming that Brazilian producers can very easily expand production at the minimal price increase (perfect supply elasticity). Thus, the price remains constant even when facing additional demand for corn. This scenario is labeled as the “Industry Perfect Elasticity” in what follows.

Results and findings

Results are presented in terms of changes between the scenarios and the baseline over the projection time and for some variables of interest (namely, corn used in ethanol production, corn prices, Brazilian net exports, crop area, and land-use change). In the “Industry Scenario” we see an initial rapid (albeit small) increase in corn prices in the first few years, which then levels off by the end of the projection period (figure 3 panel a). This is a direct result of the assumed paths of expansion, which also has implication for the paths of other variables of interest. Given the magnitude of the shocks, the price of corn increases by less than 2% by the end of the period in the “EPE” and “Industry” scenarios and remains unchanged in the “Industry Perfect Elasticity” scenario. Increases in domestic uses of corn reduce Brazilian net exports in the scenarios, creating a global excess demand that leads to higher prices to clear the market (figure 3 panel b). The relatively small price changes reflect the assumption that corn production responds strongly to price changes (price elastic). In the extreme case of a perfectly elastic supply, exports and prices are almost unchanged (figure 3). Any demand expansion is immediately met by increased supplies. 

Panel (a) line chart shows percent change in corn prices relative to the baseline from 2023 to 2033—the industry scenario (dotted line) rises to about +1.2% by the early 2030s, the EPE scenario (dashed line) increases to roughly +0.55%, and the industry perfect elasticity case (solid line) remains near 0%. Panel (b) shows percent change in Brazilian net corn exports relative to the baseline, with exports declining about −2% under perfect elasticity, around −7% under the EPE scenario, and nearly −18% under the industry scenario.
Figure 3. (a) Corn price change relative to the baseline. (b) Change to Brazilian net exports from increasing ethanol production.

Given the net export and price changes, the expansion of corn ethanol production in Brazil can have global implications with other countries expanding production and land use (figure 4). An important aspect is that the possibility of using land already in cultivation with soybeans for double cropping reduces the need to incorporate additional land into production. This reduces both global land-use change and GHG emissions, relative to an expansion of production in places where double cropping is not feasible.1

Two bar charts comparing crop area changes in 2033 (in thousand hectares) with and without adjusting for second crop. Adjusting for second crop shows modest increases for the EPE and industry scenarios and small declines under industry perfect elasticity, while Brazil’s changes remain near zero. Without second-crop adjustment shows increases, especially for Brazil under industry perfect elasticity (near +1,900 thousand hectares), alongside moderate global gains and smaller changes in the EPE scenario.
Figure 4. Crop area change (from the baseline) for different scenarios in 2033 with and without adjusting for the second crop (1,000 hectares).
Note: Without adjusting for second crop means that additional new land would be required to produce more corn ethanol.

Implications

Land-use change is a major concern when crops are used as substitutes for fossil energy because it can affect food security and reduce the GHG benefits of biofuels. Brazil’s potential to expand ethanol production from second-crop corn may mitigate some of these concerns, since production can increase on land already cultivated with soybeans rather than through agricultural expansion.

The magnitude of this benefit depends critically on the supply elasticity of second-crop corn (i.e., how easily producers can expand corn production within existing double-cropping systems). Although little is known about the size of this elasticity, it is central to assessing whether Brazil can meet rising ethanol demand while maintaining supplies for food, feed, and exports. A more elastic supply response would help limit corn price increases and reduce the risk of shifting land-use change abroad through lower exports or higher global prices. In short, if Brazilian producers can flexibly expand second-crop corn for ethanol production, this pathway could have substantially lower GHG emissions and greater decarbonization value than ethanol produced from corn that is not double cropped.

Footnotes

1. We use the output from the LRLU model simulations as input into an ad-hoc land-use change and carbon model to calculate GHG emissions.

References

Colussi, J., G. Schnitkey, and N. Paulson. 2025. “Brazil’s 2024-25 Corn Harvest Grows, But Exports Projected to Decrease.” Farmdoc daily 15(105). Department of Agricultural and Consumer Economics, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. https://farmdocdaily.illinois.edu/2025/06/brazils-2024-25-corn-harvest-grows-but-exports-projected-to-decrease.html

Elobeid, A., M. Carriquiry, L. Chiodi Bachion, S. Marques Arantes, and J. Dumortier. 2026. “Global Agricultural Market and Land-Use Implications of Producing Sustainable Aviation Fuel from Second Crop Corn Ethanol in Brazil” Agricultural Economics, 1-17. https://doi.org/10.1111/agec.70108

EPE. 2024. “Análise de Conjuntura dos Biocombustíveis - Ano 2023 (Biofuel Situation Analysis 2023).” Technical Note EPE/DPG/SDB/2024/03, Empresa de Pesquisa Energetica. Accessed November 10, 2025. https://www.epe.gov.br/pt/publicacoes-dados-abertos/publicacoes/analise-de-conjuntura-dos-biocombustiveis-2023

Moreira, M., J. Seabra, L. Lynd, S. Arantes, M. Cunha, and J. Guilhoto. 2020. “Socio-Environmental and Land-Use Impacts of Double-Cropped Maize Ethanol in Brazil.” Nature Sustainability 3:209-216. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41893-019-0456-2 

Suggested citation

Elobeid, A., M. Carriquiry, and J. Dumortier. 2026. “Double cropping of corn in Brazil and ethanol production: Market impacts and potential as a low carbon sustainable aviation fuel.” Agricultural Policy Review, Spring 2026. Center for Agricultural and Rural Development, Iowa State University. https://agpolicyreview.card.iastate.edu/spring-2026/double-cropping-corn-brazil-and-ethanol-production-market-impacts-and-potential-low