The Race For Biofuels Driving Alternative Sources Of Biomass
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When will biofuels be at all local fuel pumps and from where will they come?
Researchers have been studying fuels from biomass for years. Now, with growing dependency on foreign oils and an energy-conscious society emerging, biofuels are fast becoming part of a fuel revolution that could reach pumps all across America.
Ethanol blends are already available at some gas stations. However, their availability varies from state to state, depending on the volume of ethanol produced. Sources of biomass for biofuel production in each state also vary widely.
"To see it everywhere, we have to make more of it on a regional basis," says Dr. Bill Rooney, professor of plant breeding and genetics, Soil & Crop Sciences Department, Texas A&M University. "The best source for biofuel in a region is contingent on the environment, growing season, water and fertility availability, stress resistance, and processing and conversion techniques. In any location, there will be several species grown for biomass."
Approximately 20 percent of grain sorghum is now used for ethanol production. Rooney is currently developing sorghum varieties specifically for bioenergy. He will discuss this topic on Wednesday, Nov. 7 during his talk, "Sorghum Breeding for Bioenergy Traits," at the International Annual Meetings of the American Society of Agronomy (ASA), Crop Science Society of America (CSSA) and Soil Science Society of America (SSSA). He will speak at 2:30 pm during the symposium "Breeding and Genomics of Crops for Bioenergy" at the Ernest N. Morial Convention Center in New Orleans, room 207.
Another presentation related to biofuels, "Sweet Fuel for the U.S.", will be given by Dr. Jorge Da Silva, associate professor of molecular genetics and plant breeding, Soil & Crop Sciences Department, Texas A&M University, on Tuesday, Nov. 6 at 10:15 am. His presentation will be during the symposium "Agronomic Aspects of Biofuel Crop Production" in room 214 of the Convention Center.
"Production of energy, such as ethanol, from sugar is more efficient than production from grains in both cost per unit and energy efficiency," Da Silva says. "Sugarcane is ranked first among all other crops for biomass production and can be a key component of biomass supply. Technology for producing ethanol from sugarcane is well established in tropical countries such as Brazil, where energy independence has been achieved."
Although there is no finite development timeline, there is clearly a race for biofuels as the cost of petroleum reaches previously unimaginable levels, reserves diminish, and environmental concerns soar. If won, this race could bring about a revolution as significant as Henry Ford’s creation of the Model T car.
[tags]biofuel, renewable energy[/tags]
2 Comments
crash course
October 26th, 2007
at 6:23pm
Ethanol is increasingly being looked at as a non-green solution.
I think oils as diesel replacements look greener and more readily produced.
WIDEPART
October 28th, 2007
at 6:15am
NO, NO, NO, Bio-fuels ARE NOT the way to go……..food prices are going up because farmers are selling their (corn crops for example) at a higher rate to the ethanol producers than to the food industry and this will continue to happen as more and more farmers start growing for the fuel industry than for the food industry.
We are so close to having electric powered vehicles that are practical that the money waisted on this bio fuel for your car is going to be just that, “waisted” because once a practical electric car hits the market they will sell big time and the fossil fuels now being produced can run the electrical generators to help charge the batteries.
Now very close to production is a battery system that can power a small car for two hundred and fifty miles and be fully recharged from a 110 source in five to ten minutes.
Tell me this won’t impact the planet in a short few years. In a good way.
Our reliance for fossil fuels is not one, that we as citizens did to ourselves, but one the governments and big oil interests did to us by working together to further their cause not ours. (they sucked us in because we didn’t figure out what they’re doing till now)
If they (the governments) would have put JUST A FEW billions of dollars into the research or backed the research by others twenty years ago we wouldn’t be paying the price we now pay for fuel and the pollution it creates.
Back to my thoughts on bio-fuels; if we harvested the “dead fall” in our bush land and forests and converted this material to bio-fuels, although it is not the ideal crop it would help keep these massive ever so common bush and forest fires from being so hard to stop. We have been so good—-TOO GOOD at stopping forest fires in the last twenty years or so that the dead fall just lies there waiting for a spark or a lightening strike. This is what really gets the fires going and makes it almost impossible to stop.
Yes I know that this bio-mass is far from ideal as a source for the manufacture of bio-fuels but it is FREE for the taking and that should compensate the bio-fuel manufacturers because it is cheaper (FREE) than buying corn or other stuff grown to fuel the industry and we can use this bio-fuel to power the electric generation plants to produce the electricity we need to keep our electric cars running until we can run the electric plants on fusion power……another place where governments have fallen down on the support (investment) to figure out this pollution free - free power source.
OOOOps I do get carried away. sorry’boutthat
Widepart