From the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
Switch from corn to grass would raise ethanol output, cut emissions
CHAMPAIGN, Ill. — Growing perennial grasses on the least productive farmland now used for corn ethanol production in the U.S. would result in higher overall corn yields, more ethanol output per acre and better groundwater quality, researchers report in a new study. The switch would also slash emissions of two potent greenhouse gases: carbon dioxide and nitrous oxide.
The study used a computer model of plant growth and soil chemistry to compare the ecological effects of growing corn (Zea mays L.); miscanthus (Miscanthus x giganteus), a sterile hybrid grass used in bioenergy production in Western Europe; and switchgrass (Panicum virgatum L.), which is native to the U.S.
The analysis found that switching 30 percent of the least productive corn acres to miscanthus offered the most ecological advantages.
“If cellulosic feedstocks (such as miscanthus) were planted on cropland that is currently used for ethanol production in the U.S., we could achieve more ethanol (plus 82 percent) and grain for food (plus 4 percent), while reducing nitrogen leaching (minus 15 to 22 percent) and greenhouse gas emissions (minus 29 percent to 473 percent),” the researchers wrote in their report, published in the journal Frontiers in Ecology and the Environment.
“Globally, agriculture contributes about 14 percent of the greenhouse gases that are causing global warming to the atmosphere,” said University of Illinois plant biology and Energy Biosciences Institute (EBI) professor Evan DeLucia, who led the study with EBI feedstock analyst Sarah Davis. “The whole Midwest has been, since the advent of modern agriculture, a source of greenhouse gases to the atmosphere.”
 |
||||
|
 |
|
 |
|
|
|
  IMAGE:Experimental plots in Urbana, Illinois, include corn, switchgrass and miscanthus in side-by-side trials.Click here for more information. |
|
|
|
 |
|
 |
|
|
||||
“According to our model, just by making this replacement you convert that whole area from a source of greenhouse gases to the atmosphere to a sink for greenhouse gases from the atmosphere,” DeLucia said.
Miscanthus grows in thick stands up to 13 feet tall in test plots in Illinois. It does well on marginal land without being fertilized, so using it as a biofuel feedstock instead of corn would eliminate a major source of air and water pollution, Davis said. Nitrous oxide, a byproduct of the fertilizers used on cornfields, “is actually a more potent greenhouse gas than carbon dioxide,” she said.
“Both switchgrass and miscanthus are perennial grasses, which means that you don’t have to till every year, you don’t have to plant every year, so there’s much less soil disturbance happening than with corn,” Davis said. “And because the root system remains in place year after year, there’s more carbon going into the soil.”
Several hurdles remain before the transition from corn to cellulosic ethanol production can occur on a commercial scale, the researchers said. Converting the sugars in corn to ethanol is easier than releasing the energy locked in plant stems and leaves.
Currently, one commercial-scale lignocellulose biorefinery is under construction in the U.S. – in Florida, the researchers said, and other facilities are in the planning stages. More research must be done to increase the efficiency of the process, the researchers said.
“We know that these grasses are enormously productive; we know the agronomy works; we know the ecology works,” DeLucia said. “So the next step is to break down the economic barriers by making an efficient conversion chain from lignocellulosics to ethanol.”
DeLucia said most scientists in the field expect this to be achieved within a decade.
DeLucia is an affiliate of the Institute for Genomic Biology at Illinois. The BP-funded Energy Biosciences Institute funded this study.
The paper, “Impact of Second-Generation Biofuel Agriculture on Greenhouse Gas Emissions in the Corn-Growing Regions of the U.S.,” is available online or from the U. of I. News Bureau.
================================================================
Oh gosh it’s funded by BIG OIL, quick ignore it!
“Miscanthus grows in thick stands up to 13 feet tall in test plots in Illinois. It does well on marginal land without being fertilized, so using it as a biofuel feedstock instead of corn would eliminate a major source of air and water pollution, Davis said. Nitrous oxide, a byproduct of the fertilizers used on cornfields, “is actually a more potent greenhouse gas than carbon dioxide,” she said.”
Are these people completely ignorant of the realities of growing stuff? If you are going to remove the stuff you grow, the next crop requires that fertilizer be brought in to replace what was taken. Else, you deplete the soil to the point that nothing grows.
Idiots!
This study merely outlines the efficiency of changing some crop land from corn to switch grass- IF a cheap enzyme system were ever to become available to convert cellulose to sugar then EtOH.
The meager gains it predicts should be kept in context: simply by bringing all American corn farms up to current state of the art in terms of irrigation/drainage, use of additives to improve N &P bioavailability and simply dialing in the seed planter properly could increase corn yield by 60%. Improved genetics are expected to improve yield another 40% within 10 yrs.
There are some issues that have not been addressed. For example, driving multi-ton harvesters on that soil will compact it quite a lot. How will that effect the grass? Anyone who has walked the same path over and over on a lawn knows that it doesn’t take long for the grass to get the idea and it simply stops growing along that path.
“Why don’t these morons try a grass like sugar cane. That would eliminate 75% of the cost of production. ”
Mainly because SugarCane in the US grows well in a farly small, well defined area. There are other cane sources being developed, but, none of them are commercially viable yet.
As to the fertility depletion. In some cases, they are leaving the miscanthus lay, and either get rained or snowed on before harvest to assisst in leaching of nutrients, or harvesting it very late in the season when some of the minerals have been redeposited in the roots.. This is problematic, for a number of reasons. Also, I don’t think these dolks have ever tried to cut and bale something 13 foot tall and woody. Not for the faint of heart.
“The whole Midwest has been, since the advent of modern agriculture, a source of greenhouse gases to the atmosphere.”
Of course, the natural carbon cycle didn’t exist before the advent of modern agriculture …
Ignoring such nonsense, note the reference “marginal for corn”. Corn is cow/pig/poultry food which is probably better produced on productive, not marginal, land for economic reasons.
Brian H says:
July 12, 2011 at 9:12 pm
“When you plug in the irrelevance of both CO2 and NO2 to climate, the nonsensicality of the whole exercise is painful to contemplate.”
Yes, in that sense it is nonsensical, but it does make sense to conserve or increase carbon in soil. Perennial biomass crops have the potential to reduce soil erosion. Carbon is the proxy term for soil organic matter – lose too much of it and you may be in for trouble from low fertility, reduced waterholding capacity and soil erosion. This had nothing to do with climate until the Carbonistas took over the Agenda for Everything.
Given the lack of technology for large-scale ligno-cellulose processing, an alternative is dry anaerobic digestion of biomass to produce methane, which can utilised locally for power generation. There is movement on this in UK and Europe, but it is subsidised at present.
I have met several founders of Poet and a couople of former execs. Several actually came from Koch industries. Poet is about the only prosperous enterprise in the industry. I have looked to see if they could live and survive without massive subsidies.
Cellulosic just lost a 200 million dollar stunt in Georgia. It never came to name plate output and was closed.
“Range Fuels to build first wood cellulosic ethanol plant in Georgia. Potential to produce over 1 Billion Gallons a Year”
“The company has received over 300 million dollars in funding since breaking ground for the plant in 2007, but have not been able to get enough money to expand the facility for commercial production. There are also reportedly some “technical problems” with the plant”.
If they only had a couple hundred million more…..
Don’t encourage these wastefull ventures. They are huge money spenders.
“There are some issues that have not been addressed. For example, driving multi-ton harvesters on that soil will compact it quite a lot. How will that effect the grass? Anyone who has walked the same path over and over on a lawn knows that it doesn’t take long for the grass to get the idea and it simply stops growing along that path.”
Typically, you are talking once a year harvest, and natural processes help loosen the soil some, although there will definately be some compaction, and harvest conditions can impact that. However, we have fields that have been in hay and pasture for 40 years and they still produce.
Speaking as a graduate of that institution, it’s a study and studies are of less substance than actual science and filled with limitations that are ignored and projections that are what ifs and conditioned by “may” or “possibly likely.” Less substance even than Monty Python’s Anne Elke’s theory that dinosaurs are thin on one end, thicker in the middle, and then rather thin again on the other end . This study has the smell and substance of wishful thinking complete with some generally politically correct goals and consisting of a model.
Go Illini, I guess.
This whole thread is unnecessary in that biofuels are only needed if we believe that in 10 years all the oil is going to be gone, and we all know that’s not going to happen.
New technology happens, self-supporting new technology that is, when it solves a real problem, meets real needs. For the vast majority of energy consumption, biofuels, solar, wind, geothermal, wave action – don’t meet that basic criterium. The proof is in the subsidies needed.
Free markets are incredibly efficient in producing said solutions, and weeding out the failures. The only nearly free market the world has ever seen is Electronics, and look at the incredible progress there, the turmoil, the redistribution of assets, the – beyond Flash Gordon – inventions.
Science made it possible, killing science can destroy it as well.
Gary Turner says:
July 13, 2011 at 4:08 am
“… Are these people completely ignorant of the realities of growing stuff? If you are going to remove the stuff you grow, the next crop requires that fertilizer be brought in to replace what was taken. Else, you deplete the soil to the point that nothing grows.
Idiots!”
Miscanthus stands in the field becoming senescent before harvest, most of the mineral content is returned to the rootstock, the leaves drop off, and the harvested stand (which may be good for 20 years) is mostly cellulosic with a small proportion of lignin. Apart from some reactive nitrogen, which falls in rain to the tune of ~50kg/ha/year, the biomass is composed of C,H and O. None of which invokes the use of great amounts of fertiliser …
Are these people completely ignorant of the realities of growing stuff? No, not these people. Others are, though.
Why do they keep bothering with these hard to get to technologies? The possibilities for tax funded subsidies of course.
If they used half the sugar and wheat that goes into the tasty world of pastries, tarts, and candy, they could keep corn for food and still have enough pastries, tarts, and candy over (since, apparently, most of that goes to waste anyways.) Not just green, but healthy too. :p
“Nitrous oxide, a byproduct of the fertilizers used on cornfields, “is actually a more potent greenhouse gas than carbon dioxide,” she said….”
Whoa!
Looks like that Nitrous Oxide is no laughing matter!
🙂
Henry chance writes “Don’t encourage these wastefull ventures. They are huge money spenders.”
You may be right; then on the other hand, you may not. One of the aims of the USA is to be less dependent on foreign oil, including Candian oil. (I am a Canadian). Is it worthwhile gambling 300 million dollars on a project that might make the USA less dependent on foreign oil. My answer would be `Yes`. As I say, let us see what happens to Project Liberty in 2012. It is not that far away..
I’m not sure I’m following. Does the study say some land being used to grow corn for ethanol should be instead used to grow switchgrass (and similar plants) for ethanol instead? That’s a great idea, except nobody seems to know how to economically make cellulosic ethanol economically.
ON the other hand, I’m not sure anybody knows how to make corn ethanol economically, either. That why we have all the subsidies, mandates and import tariffs.
What they didn’t say was the miscanthus uses 30% more water than the corn and switchgrass and that it depletes ground water tables in the midwest.
Just to be technically correct – Corn is grass. So what is being discussed is a switch from grass (corn) to another type of grass (switchgrass). GK
“The switch would also slash emissions of two potent greenhouse gases: carbon dioxide and nitrous oxide.”
With that one statement you can disregard this entire paper as pure hogwash. Reading further just gets you more lies and exaggerations.
They say Miscanthus would be non-invasive because it propagates by rhizomes.
Hm.
I could name a few quite seriously invasive plants which propagate by rhizomes … and the fun begins when one wants to get rid of said rhizomes.
“If we had some ham, we could have ham and eggs, if we had some eggs.” Mind-blowingly irrelevant, just another pretext for sucking up some global-warming-related publicity.
anything that has a range of 29 percent to 473 percent tells me one thing … They DO NOT HAVE A CLUE … this is not science it is voodoo …
Why can’t we admit that ethanol additives for gasoline is a bad idea, inefficient, dirty, not cost efficient, and bad for combustible engines. Those involved in the energy business have plenty of incentive without government grants or subsidies to continue research for replacements for fossil fuels.
pat says:
Why don’t these morons try a grass like sugar cane.
++++++++
Sugar cane critics point out that there are huge energy inputs to sugar and a large amount of chemicals needed for intensive production. The returns per hectare are fantastic, but it is a thirsty crop. At Nsoko, Swaziland, the largest private sugar estate in Southern Africa belongs to Michael Forbes producing 135 tons per ha (7% sugar) on about 2500 ha. That is a huge amount of energy, but also a huge input in chemicals to protect the monocrop that it is. It is toxic enough that the snakes move as if they are drunk. The cane rats, however (genus Thryonomys) are huge and delicious! Mmmm!
Another computer model, indeed. Have any of these computer models ever proved to be correct?
Perhaps a study is needed to determine the track record of computer models.
Since there isn’t such a study, I suspect we all know what the answer is.
Does the computer model include a working model of creating ethanol from switchgrass?
In 10 years I suspect algae will be the bio-fuel of choice.