Corn-Powered in Yuma

Yuma Ethanol will create 40 jobs paying an average of $40,000 a year, well above the county's per capita income of $26,707. The Panda operation, valued at more than $120 million, plans to hire 500 construction workers, as well as a permanent staff of 50. Officials estimate both projects will generate $6 million in annual revenue that will help fund several ambitious water-conservation, construction and drainage projects.

Beyond that, restaurant owners say they're serving more customers. Tire vendors and diesel-fuel stations are busier, as 100 trucks a day will move through the Yuma Ethanol plant. Land prices are rising. And dealers expect to sell more pickups. Dennis Wagner, the sales manager of MV Equipment, where John Deere tractors cost $100,000 to $250,000, points out that "a farmer will be able to dictate when he can update his equipment, rather than have the economy dictate to him."

Trent Bushner, a Yuma farmer and county commissioner who grows 1,200 acres of corn on his 3,500-acre spread, says $4 corn brings its own set of problems--higher planting costs, for one, as he busts more sod. But Bushner allows that he can live with that: "Every time we put a gallon of ethanol in our car, that's a gallon of gasoline we're not putting in it that we got from the Middle East." Seems that the view on alternative fuels from down on the farm goes much farther than just over the next ridge.