It's been a roller coast ride for ethanol in the U.S. the past couple years. After getting a major boost in interest and investment during the early phase of the oil price boom, investment in ethanol plunged and several producers canceled plans to build new plants in the U.S. as high corn prices and low stock prices slowed interest.

But lately ethanol is getting some new support. Following the Environmental Protection Agency's decision in August to deny a request by the governor of Texas to reduce for one year the mandate on ethanol production, the ethanol industry rallied at the American Coalition for Ethanol conference in Omaha, Neb. The Associated Press reports that plans announced at the meeting include a social networking Web site so ethanol producers can share information and promotion of a package of proposed laws ethanol producers can get enacted in their states.

The increased interest has also brought plans for new plants again. In August, Poet, a Sioux Falls, S.D., ethanol distiller, got approval to build its largest plant yet in West Lebanon, Ind. with capacity for 115 million gallons a year. Poet also said that construction will be completed on a $4 million pilot-scale cellulosic ethanol production facility and the plant will be being production this year adjacent to its ethanol production facility in Scotland, S.D.

But already, the uptick in ethanol interest has some market watchers talking about ethanol's impact on corn prices, despite the dramatic dive in corn prices in the summer and the Agriculture Department projection that this year's corn crop has withstood rains and flooding to deliver a harvest of 12.3 billion bushels—573 million more than it forecast earlier this year and second in size only to last year's harvest.

Reuters reports that the USDA raised by 150 million bushels, to 4.1 billion, its expected total of corn to be used to make ethanol this year, which would take 33% of the crop grown and likely increase prices.