Dennis R. Keeney (born July 2, 1937) is an American scientist in soil science and water chemistry. He was the first director of the

Leopold Center for Sustainable Agriculture The Leopold Center for Sustainable Agriculture (LCSA) is a center at Iowa State University devoted to the study and promotion of new techniques in sustainable agriculture. The goals of the Center are: “to identify and develop new ways to farm prof ...

Ames, Iowa Ames () is a city in Story County, Iowa, United States, located approximately north of Des Moines in central Iowa. It is best known as the home of Iowa State University (ISU), with leading agriculture, design, engineering, and veterinary medici ...

Early life and education

Keeney grew up on his family's dairy farm near Runnells, Iowa not far from Des Moines. He graduated from Iowa State University (ISU) with a B.S. in

agronomy Agronomy is the science and technology of producing and using plants by agriculture for food, fuel, fiber, chemicals, recreation, or land conservation. Agronomy has come to include research of plant genetics, plant physiology, meteorology, and ...

. He studied soil science at University of Wisconsin and obtained an M.S., followed by a Ph.D. in agronomy and biochemistry from Iowa State University.

Career

Keeney became a professor of agronomy, and stayed on as faculty member in soils and water chemistry for more than 20 years. In 1987, the Leopold Center for Sustainable Agriculture was established at ISU, and in 1988 he became its first director. The Leopold Center developed research studies and teaching about the environmental impacts of farming, sustainable agriculture, preservation of natural resources, including soil and water quality, and

rural community development Rural community development encompasses a range of approaches and activities that aim to improve the welfare and livelihoods of people living in rural areas. As a branch of community development, these approaches pay attention to social issues pa ...

. Keeney defined sustainable agriculture as

"It means using the resources we have wisely. Probably number one to conserve the soil resource, the water resource, and the land resource. It's a Leopold concept really, because Leopold talked about land as the water, the air, the soil, and the animals living on it."

Already in 1988 Keeney examined the energy balance of ethanol fuel as a "renewable" fuel and concluded, that more energy was required to produce ethanol than was retrieved from it then. Keeney retired from the Leopold Center in 1999. He was succeeded by Fred Kirschenmann. With the

corn ethanol Corn ethanol is ethanol produced from corn biomass and is the main source of ethanol fuel in the United States, mandated to be blended with gasoline in the Renewable Fuel Standard. Corn ethanol is produced by ethanol fermentation and distillation ...

industry rapidly expanding between 2000 and 2005, in what Keeney called "...an "irrational exuberance" trip with biofuels" he was one of few Iowa scientists looking at water consumption. In 2009, Keeney published his latest peer-reviewed paper on the "Environmental, social, economic, and food issues brought on by the rapidly expanding ethanol-from-corn industry in the United States". he has continued to publicly question its benefits. He was president of the Soil Science Society of America and the American Society of Agronomy. he consults as a Senior Fellow for the

Institute for Agriculture and Trade Policy The Institute for Agriculture and Trade Policy (IATP) is a non-profit organization, non-profit research and advocacy organization that promotes sustainability, sustainable food, farm, and trade systems. IATP has offices in Minneapolis, Minnesota, W ...

in Minneapolis and the Department of Soil, Air and Water at the University of Minnesota. He is a visiting scholar for the

Center for a Livable Future The Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health is the public health graduate school of Johns Hopkins University, a private research university in Baltimore, Maryland. As the second independent, degree-granting institution for research in epi ...

, Johns Hopkins University. In February 2015 his memoir “The Keeney Place: A Life in the Heartland” was published after nine years of work.

Selected publications

Keeney has published over 140 peer reviewed papers on soil and water quality research. *Dennis Keeney “The Keeney Place: A Life in the Heartland”, Levins Publishing. 110 pages. Website: thekeeneyplace.com
Nitrogen and the Mississippi
September 11, 2000, IATP
Nitrogen and the Upper Mississippi River
March 17, 2002, IATP
Testimony to the US Commission on Ocean Policy
September 30, 2002
The New Road
April 15, 2003
Genetically Modified Crops and Integrated Pest Management adoption
April 15, 2003
Shallow Water
October 12, 2003
Performance Based Approach to Control of Agricultural Non Point Source Pollution
October 20, 2003
Our fragile food supply
September 2, 2004
Reducing Nutrients in the Mississippi River and the Gulf of Mexico
December 14, 2006
Biofuel and Global Biodiversity
May 5, 2008
Agriculture Sustainability
February 28, 2010
Colonialism is not dead
March 21, 2010
Drought in my life
August 6, 2012
Resiliency, agriculture and the 2012 drought
August 14, 2012

References

External links

*Dennis Keeney: Ethanol's Power Politics; interview by Ben Kieffer, host of The Exchange on

Iowa Public Radio Iowa Public Radio is a state network in the U.S. state of Iowa that combines the operations of the National Public Radio member stations run by Iowa State University, the University of Iowa, and University of Northern Iowa. They broadcast programs ...

, 5 May 2007.
Ethanol Production: Environmental Effects
PowerPoint slides (pdf) for presentation at 24th Proceedings, Red River Basin Commission, 3MB, February 9, 2007. * Intervie
"A Life in the Heartland:" Dennis Keeney Reflects on Mid-Century Farming
by Charity Nebbe, Iowa Public Radio, 45 min, 2 March 2015 {{DEFAULTSORT:Keeney, Dennis 1937 births People from Polk County, Iowa Iowa State University faculty Iowa State University alumni University of Wisconsin–Madison College of Agricultural and Life Sciences alumni Sustainability advocates American agronomists Living people University of Wisconsin–Madison faculty University of Minnesota fellows Johns Hopkins University people