WASHINGTON — Iowa produces more corn than any other state, and it will be the first beneficiary of the national craze to produce vast quantities of ethanol as a motor fuel. At present, the United States is producing 5 billion gallons of ethanol a year. It is a dandy octane booster and emissions curb; and President Bush is so taken with ethanol that he wants to expand production to 60 billion gallons a year by 2030.

Whoa, Nellie!

Ethanol is produced from vegetable matter high in sugar or starch, which is then fermented and distilled to produce fuel. Backers of ethanol see it as a perpetual motion discovery. We will grow the fuel we need.

Although ethanol was rejected as a serious contestant in the United States after the energy crisis of 1973-74, it is all the rage today, with powerful special interests promoting it at every turn.

Of all the nations that looked at ethanol in the 1970s, only Brazil went into it seriously. A surplus of sugarcane, an abundance of cheap labor, and limitless land drove the Brazilian effort. Yet Brazil has been cagey about the real benefits and the real economics of ethanol.

Many scientists doubt that large-scale production of ethanol, especially from corn, can produce more energy than growing, transporting and proc-essing the corn would consume. With present technology, only sugar- and starch-bearing crops — in short, food crops — can be converted into ethanol.

The next stage will involve using the whole plant, and converting the cellulose into starch. It also opens up the possibility of using switch grass and other non-food crops as feedstock. This technology has not yet been perfected.

With or without cellulosic ethanol, a mighty industry is growing up around corn. Its special interests include farmers, food-processing giants, agricultural equipment manufacturers and Wall Street. All the ingredients for an artificial boom are there.

Unfortunately for consumers, the ethanol euphoria is already affecting the price of corn, and driving up the price of meat. Last year, there was a shortage of grain for livestock, and beef prices rocketed. Other dislocations are likely when corn becomes the must-grow cash crop.

Ironically, Brazil has vast surpluses of ethanol at clearing prices half those of the U.S. product. But agricultural tariffs keep the Brazilian fuel out of the American market.

It is clear that if we do not pay for ethanol at the pump, we will pay for it at the supermarket. Farmers I have spoken to are enjoying the high prices but are worried about the long-term impact on agriculture. Particularly, farmers wonder what will happen if cellulose can be converted into fuel. They fear soil depletion when they do not have cornstalks and other waste to plow back into the fields.

"Soil is a living thing," a farmer from South Dakota told me. He feared that unscrupulous farmers would rely on heavier use of fertilizer (made from natural gas) as the farms produce motor fuel.

The fact is that the United States, and the rest of the world, has to do something about the amount of oil consumed by private automobiles; and the best hope for a new direction lies with the hybrid, followed by the all-electric car.

Not only is there something repugnant about using food for gasoline, but in all probability, it will cause damage to the whole agricultural cycle and to the agricultural economy. This way lies madness.

And it is shameful that so many environmental organizations have embraced ethanol, which may save no energy whatsoever. In his State of the Union address, Bush called for something remarkably close to an ethanol economy. This will be the second huge catastrophe of his presidency.

Llewellyn King is the publisher of White House Weekly (www.kingpublishing.com) and host of the weekly PBS television show "White House Chronicle."