It might not be corn but rather corn ears that are the problem. A friend sent me this link about tropical maize that gets very sugary in the stalk (25%) when grown at higher latitudes. There may be some evidence that Algonquin cultivated this variety for sugar. Corn does not need a lot of nitrogen until it starts to set ears.

Chris

I think you're right about the nails being put in the coffin for corn ethanol. The fact that it's an ineffective oil displacement fuel is becoming widely accepted. Corn is being seen now as what the biofuels research arm of the University of Tennessee has termed a "first generation feedstock" for the ethanol infrastructure that's being built. They are hard at work developing high net energy switchgrass feedstocks that are inedible and not a food inflation problem. Even the science challenged U.S. Congress is mulling over things like all new ethanol infrastructure facilties built after 2012 being noncorn based. But all fuel crops are going to induce a huge water problem. Even without the dire need for fuel crops and the lucrative export driven economic growth they imply, the developing populations of the world are becoming desparate for water that's fit for human consumption. The U.N. estimates that 80% of the hospital beds in the world are occupied by cases of drinking bad water. There is a tandem bull market emerging in agriculture and water while everyone debates runnin' on corn sqeezins just as there was a bull market emerging in oil 4 years ago with everyone poking fun at peak oil.