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Calculated bioethanol yield per hectare. A study by Agricultural Research Service (ARS) scientists found that sweet potatoes grown in Maryland and Alabama, and tropical cassava grown in Alabama, yielded between two to three times as much carbohydrate (starch, sucrose, glucose) for fuel ethanol production via fermentation as field corn grown in those states. Dr. Lew Ziska, a plant physiologist at the ARS Crop Systems and Global Change Laboratory in Beltsville, Md., and colleagues at Beltsville and at the ARS National Soil Dynamics Laboratory in Auburn, Ala., performed the study. The research is unique in comparing the root crops to...

Forget food crops. Future fuels will come from more practical feedstocks. Plus, each generation will use fewer resources and pack more energy than the last. PM crunches the numbers on alternative fuels for the real world.By Chris Ladd Photograph by Bill DiodatoPublished in the September 2008 issue. Eric Meek of the Corning Museum of Glass in Corning, N.Y., created this handblown beaker for our cover story. Watch the beaker take shape on PopMech TV right here. RELATED STORIES • NEW COVER STORY: "The Shape of Fuels to Come," On Sale Now! Process*: Raw biomass is typically ground up and pretreated...

A Georgia company looking to solve America's energy problem has finally teamed up with the federal government, hoping to make millions of barrels of oil every day from virtually anything that grows out of the Earth. Bell Bio-Energy, Inc. says it has reached an agreement with the U.S. Defense Department to build seven test production plants, mostly on military bases, to quickly turn naturally grown material into fuel. "What this means is that with the seven pilot plants – the military likes to refer to them as demonstrations – with those being built … it gives us the real-time engineering...

Washington, D.C. (AHN) - Up to 12.3 billion bushels of corn are expected to be harvested this season in the U.S., despite the recent Mississippi flooding which inundated many farms in the Midwest. With 600 million extra bushels for the summer harvest, it will be the second-highest corn yield on record, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture.Prior to the confirmation of the bountiful harvest, there were fears the Midwest flooding could lead to food shortages and major economic losses for American farmers. Before perfect weather was enjoyed by farmers recently, corn future prices rose to $8 per bushel. On...

Des Moines, Iowa (AP) -- Republican presidential candidate John McCain didn't mince words Friday at the Iowa State Fair, telling corn producers he didn't want to subsidize their ethanol but was eager to help market farm products around the world. "My friends, we will disagree on a specific issue and that's healthy," McCain said as he stood near bales of straw at one of the nation's premier farming showcases. "I believe in renewable fuels. I don't believe in ethanol subsidies, but I believe in renewable fuels." McCain has never been shy about speaking against subsidizing ethanol when he is in...

HOUSTON -- A company based near the Woodlands has carved out a nifty niche in the renewable energy market by converting animal and vegetable waste nobody wants into ''green" electricity. Bio Fuels Power once hoped to make renewable fuel for vehicles but switched direction when high commodity prices made the process too expensive. Instead, the company focused on converting very low cost feedstock like pig lard and chicken fat into a biofuel that could be burned to produce electrical power. "Power generation does not need the quality fuel thats required for transportation," says Bio Fuels Power founder Steve McGuire. Two...

CHAMPAIGN, Ill. — In the largest field trial of its kind in the United States, researchers have determined that the giant perennial grass Miscanthus x giganteus outperforms current biofuels sources – by a lot. Using Miscanthus as a feedstock for ethanol production in the U.S. could significantly reduce the acreage dedicated to biofuels while meeting government biofuels production goals, the researchers report. The new findings, from researchers at the University of Illinois, appear this month in the journal Global Change Biology. Using corn or switchgrass to produce enough ethanol to offset 20 percent of gasoline use – a current White...

The biomass gasifier at Chippewa Valley Ethanol Co. is fuel-flexible by design. Thisrequires a handling system engineered to move feedstocks of varying volumes and densities. Biomass Magazine speaks with Rapat Corp., the engineer of the bulk conveyance system, and equipment vendor Robert White Industries Inc., about the project. The idea was fairly simple. Use the organic material left over from processing an agricultural product, such as potatoes or sugar beets, to produce methane. The methane can then be used as a heat source for the processing facility, or turned into electricity and sold back to the power grid. A team...

Imagine a three-way chicken and egg question. What came first: the chicken, the egg or the nest? That is the latest conundrum facing anyone trying to get started in the biodiesel business. How does one ensure that over a plant’s life that production will find an open market, access to feedstock, will not contravene local ordinances, and will have a trained and efficient pool of employees? The best answer begins with feedstocks because they determine how far and how fast one can adapt to changing market conditions. Feedstock prices typically represent approximately 85 percent of the price of biodiesel. Never...

Mark Rosenzweig, owner of San Jose Tallow, was driving home through suburban San Jose, Calif., one mid-April day when he noticed a pumper truck pulling into a shopping center. He was immediately suspicious. Rosenzweig knew the only eatery in that center was a Burger King because he held the contract for grease removal. “I followed him until he pulled into the Burger King where I watched him steal the grease,” he says. Rosenzweig is no stranger to grease theft. “It’s a common problem out here,” he says. He told Biodiesel Magazine that in one week during the month of June...

he steep rise in fuel prices is creating opportunities for entrepreneurs to innovate and discover new low-cost feedstocks for biofuels production. Neptune Industries, a Florida company, is looking to collect waste generated byits fish farming operation to fertilize algae production for biodiesel feedstocks.

Advocates claim that ethanol mandates and subsidies protect our planet, enhance U.S. security, and ease our pain at the pump. In fact, ethanol policy hurts all Americans except for the tiny slice of the population that grows corn or distills it into ethanol. What is ethanol? Basically, in the United States, it is moonshine derived from the starch in corn. You can drink it. Rowdy collegians have been known to mix 1 part ethanol with 40 parts fruit juice to make huge vats of punch for parties. The law does not allow you to drink and drive, but it now...

WHEN it comes to global warming, extreme scare stories abound. Al Gore, for example, famously claimed that a whopping six metres (20 feet) of sea-level rise would flood major cities around the world. Gore’s scientific advisor, Jim Hansen from NASA, has even topped his protégé. Hansen suggests that there will eventually be sea-level rises of 24 metres (80 feet), with a six-metre rise happening just this century. Little wonder that fellow environmentalist Bill McKibben states that “we are engaging in a reckless drive — by drowning of much of the rest of the planet and much of the rest of...

The world of biofuels has been turned on its ears in the past twelve months, as environmentalists finally realized policies they supported to reduce use of petroleum had literally created a subsidized global market for biofuel - leading to massive new rounds of rainforest destruction to grow, for example, oil palms. Suddenly biofuels is not being described as the answer to everything. Yet through all this there has always been the promise of sustainable biofuel - a crop that stablizes soil, serves as a windbreak, and grows in arid land where nothing else will survive. A fuel crop that not...

As Price of Grain Rises, Catfish Farms Dry Up By DAVID STREITFELD LELAND, Miss. — Catfish farmers across the South, unable to cope with the soaring cost of corn and soybean feed, are draining their ponds. “It’s a dead business,” said John Dillard, who pioneered the commercial farming of catfish in the late 1960s. Last year Dillard & Company raised 11 million fish. Next year it will raise none. People can eat imported fish, Mr. Dillard said, just as they use imported oil. As for his 55 employees? “Those jobs are gone.” Corn and soybeans have nearly tripled in price...

From his Cessna a mile above the southern Amazon, John Carter looks down on the destruction of the world's greatest ecological jewel. He watches men converting rain forest into cattle pastures and soybean fields with bulldozers and chains. He sees fires wiping out such gigantic swaths of jungle that scientists now debate the "savannization" of the Amazon. Brazil just announced that deforestation is on track to double this year; Carter, a Texas cowboy with all the subtlety of a chainsaw, says it's going to get worse fast. "It gives me goose bumps," says Carter, who founded a nonprofit to promote...

Tastiota, Mexico-A few miles inland from the Sea of Cortez, amid cracked earth and mesquite and sun-bleached cactus, neat rows of emerald plants are sprouting from the desert floor. The crop is salicornia. It is nourished by seawater flowing from_a_man-made_canal. And if you believe the American who is farming it, this incongruous swath of green has the potential to feed the world, fuel our vehicles and slow global warming. He is Carl Hodges, a Tucson-based atmospheric physicist who has spent most of his 71 years figuring out how humans can feed themselves in places where good soil and fresh water...

Could an annoying plant hold the key to reducing our dependence on foreign oil? A Cleveland, Tennessee man who knows how to make ethanol out of kudzu may soon bring his refining process to market. This time next year, the gas you fill-up with in Chattanooga may be cheaper than other parts of the country. Tom Monahan with Agro*Gas says Chattanooga will be number one and then it will spread out from there. In the basement of a Cleveland, Tennessee home, Doug Mizell's experiment in energy appears to be taking off. He's found a way to turn kudzu into fuel....

A new analysis suggests that biofuels grown in the tropics are not a much greener source of energy than drilling for oil--at least in the short term. The research paints an even gloomier picture of biofuels than previous studies, which have begun to cast doubts on the greenhouse gas benefits that these alternatives to petroleum might provide. Proponents see plant-based biofuels as a carbon-friendly alternative to fossil fuels. That's because plants that produce, say, palm oil or corn ethanol recycle carbon dioxide from the atmosphere as they grow. In contrast, petroleum production introduces new carbon into the air that was...

The increased use of corn-derived ethanol and other bio-fuels has been blamed for rising food prices worldwide. But defenders of these fuels say their impact on food prices is being exaggerated and that new fuels under development will largely bypass that problem in any case. VOA's Greg Flakus has more on the story from College Station, Texas. American corn, wheat and soybean fields feed much of the world and also provide the material from which alcohol fuels like ethanol are produced. Ethanol has benefited the U.S. heartland by giving farmers more stable prices for their grains and creating jobs at...

The average gasoline price in Madison set a daily high this week, topping $4.02 a gallon on Tuesday. On the same day a federal forecast warned that gas prices nationwide are likely to remain above $4 a gallon for the rest of the year and into 2009. The higher cost of gas is a costly problem that underscores the importance of proceeding full speed ahead with efforts to develop biofuels as an alternative to gasoline. That's why Wisconsin policymakers and entrepreneurs should focus on making the state a leader in the next generation of biofuels, made from wood waste and...

Food Inflation: In advance of the G-8 meeting, a new World Bank report blames rising global food prices on the mandated use of biofuels, including ethanol. G-8 leaders may be forced to relax their mandates. Will we?The report, actually completed in April, likely will make interesting reading as leaders of the G-8 industrialized countries meet in Hokkaido, Japan, this week. One of the topics of discussion is the global food crisis. The report concludes that biofuel mandates intended to fight global warming in Europe and the United States are the prime culprit in a 75% rise in food costs between...

US and EU urged to cut biofuels Biofuels can be made from crops like wheat and rapeseed World Bank President Robert Zoellick has called for reform of biofuel policies in rich countries, urging them to grow more food to feed the hungry. He was speaking at the G8 summit in Japan, where soaring food and fuel prices are top of the agenda. The G8 leaders have been holding talks with seven African leaders. UN chief Ban Ki-moon - also at the summit - urged the group to tackle the "interconnected" challenges of climate change, food prices and development. Speaking on...

The thrust of the article, however, is not to highlight the folly of the leftist policies of mandating the use of biofuels, it is of course, to bash the Bush Administration. "The daily said the report was finished in April but was not published to avoid embarrassing the US government, which has claimed plant-derived fuels have pushed up prices by only three percent." Last time I checked, Bush is not in the Enviro-kook camp, so it’s not like he’s trying to cover for Barack Obama, Al Gore, and their minions, who want to use more biofuels as an alternative to...

Biofuels have forced global food prices up by 75% - far more than previously estimated - according to a confidential World Bank report obtained by the Guardian. The damning unpublished assessment is based on the most detailed analysis of the crisis so far, carried out by an internationally-respected economist at global financial body. The figure emphatically contradicts the US government's claims that plant-derived fuels contribute less than 3% to food-price rises. It will add to pressure on governments in Washington and across Europe, which have turned to plant-derived fuels to reduce emissions of greenhouse gases and reduce their dependence on...

CNN rarely features much of interest but did run a piece recently on biofuels which included some attention to a nation which, unlike the United States, learned something from the oil crisis of the 1970s. That nation resolved not to continue its dependence on Arab whims and wars and chose to become energy self-sufficient. Instead of virtually shutting down domestic oil exploration and ceasing to build oil refineries and nuclear generating plants, and bemoaning the cost of fuel—as we did, and are doing—that nation began developing its own resources. Those resources included limited domestic oil fields and an unlimited supply...

The rush to develop biofuels has played a "significant" role in the dramatic rise in global food prices, which has left 100 million more people without enough to eat, a Government report says. *snip* The Gallagher report, due to be published next week, is expected to force Britain and Europe to rethink a major part of their environment strategy. A review of British and EU targets for the use of plant-derived fuels in place of petrol and diesel is likely, it was reported last night. The report panel, chaired by Professor Ed Gallagher, head of the Renewable Fuels Agency, calls...

Government-Induced Food Insecurity by: Emily Miller, June 18, 2008 The recent food crisis and rising global food prices are short-term problems, said CATO Institute Research Fellow for India and Asia Swaminathan S. Anklesaria Aiyar last week. “I firmly believe the current food crisis will soon blow over and we are going to be back very soon to the issues of overproduction through subsidies,” said Aiyar in a discussion about trade and food security at the Heritage Foundation. “I do believe that the current phase is a temporary one.” Aiyar blamed export caps, which forty countries currently impose on grain, for...

Unable to turn a profit from investing in such green technologies as biofuels and reclaiming rubber from old tires, EarthFirst Technologies, based in Tampa, filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection. The company's latest setback comes after months of financial problems. Documents filed in bankruptcy court Friday reveal that EarthFirst owes at least 20 companies hundreds of thousands of dollars. In 2007, EarthFirst generated $18.3-million in revenue, but couldn't overcome setbacks in its biofuel business or surmount millions in operational costs, bringing its year-end net loss to $9.1-million. In January, EarthFirst dodged a big bullet after a lawsuit filed by investment...

Sizing-Up Anaerobic Digestion When Richard Kessel became the chief executive officer for the Tarrytown, N.Y.-based Environmental Power Corp. in July 2006, he was armed with more than 30 years experience in the energy field and the wherewithal to mold companies into formidable players in the renewable energy industry. EPC, and its single subsidiary Microgy Inc., is rapidly expanding its renewable energy portfolio by developing, owning and operating large-scale anaerobic digestion facilities that produce methane-rich biogas from agricultural livestock and organic wastes. EPC’s ability to design anaerobic digestion systems and to provide ongoing operational maintenance on a large scale sets it...

Silicon Valley is experimenting with bacteria that have been genetically altered to provide 'renewable petroleum' Some diesel fuel produced by genetically modified bugs “Ten years ago I could never have imagined I’d be doing this,” says Greg Pal, 33, a former software executive, as he squints into the late afternoon Californian sun. “I mean, this is essentially agriculture, right? But the people I talk to – especially the ones coming out of business school – this is the one hot area everyone wants to get into.” He means bugs. To be more precise: the genetic alteration of bugs – very,...

One hundred and fifty years ago sweet sorghum plants could be found swaying in the winds across southeastern United States. A U.S. patent officer brought the plant to the United States in 1853, according to the National Sweet Sorghum Producers and Processors Association. The plant was of interest as a substitute for sugarcane, but extracting dry sugar from the syrup proved to be too difficult. Sorghum production peaked in the 1880s and declined as it faced competition from sugarcane and sugar beets. Today, sweet sorghum is making its second debut as a versatile feedstock that can be used for food,...

RomeThe Summit on soaring food prices, convened by the UN Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), has concluded with the adoption by acclamation of a declaration calling on the international community to increase assistance for developing countries, in particular the least developed countries and those that are most negatively affected by high food prices."There is an urgent need to help developing countries and countries in transition expand agriculture and food production, and to increase investment in agriculture, agribusiness and rural development, from both public and private sources," according to the declaration. Donors and international financial institutions are urged to provide "balance...

Air New Zealand has announced that its planned airliner biofuel test will be carried out using biodiesel made from jatropha nuts. Jatropha plants, able to survive in deserts, could offer a biofuel source which would not compete with food production or drive deforestation. "Air New Zealand is absolutely committed to being at the forefront of testing environmentally sustainable fuels," said the airline's chief, Rob Fyfe, quoted in the Sydney Morning Herald. The test will be carried out later this year, using a Boeing 747 with engines from Rolls Royce. Boeing has been at the forefront of an industry push toward...

After General Motors Corp. announced a strategic partnership with Coskata Inc. at the North American International Auto Show in Detroit in January, a typical business day for Wes Bolsen, Coskata’s vice president of business development, changed instantly. A flood of questions and concerns ensued—many from the ethanol industry—because Coskata was relatively unknown at that time. Plus, the company says it can produce ethanol from ag and forestry waste, and municipal solid waste—even tires—for less than $1 per gallon, far cheaper than other technologies. “Some people get angry when we talk about the $1-per-gallon production cost,” Bolsen tells EPM. “I don’t...

The development of technologies for the production of ethanol from biomass feedstocks such as wood dates back to the years leading into the first two world wars. Germany, in particular, being a land poor in petroleum began developing internal sources of fuel. Much of the country’s war machine, in fact, was powered by locally produced ethanol. The process technology of choice at this time was a biological approach consisting of concentrated or dilute acid hydrolysis to release simple sugars from wood followed by microbial fermentation of those sugars to ethanol. Although pioneered by the German war effort, the United States,...

A Californian start-up company promising "green crude" fuel from algae has been given $50m (£25.33m) in funding from investors, including Britain's biggest charity, the Wellcome Trust. The year-old start-up, Sapphire Energy, came out of "stealth mode" this week with an announcement that its trials have been so successful that its backers have promised no-limit funding.

From Biofuels to Barack Hussein Obama By Rene Guerra Biofuels are creating a garden variety of problems worldwide. Read UN Food Summit Battles It Out On Biofuels by AP’s Ariel David.Unintended consequences? Or...intended? "Deepen, exacerbate existing contradictions [i.e., problems], and if they don't exist, create them or convincingly claim that they exist, and then deepen, exacerbate them...and, in the resulting chaos, blame our enemies." Vladimir I. Lenin Who is being blamed for the mess, which the leftist environmentalists started? The good old USA...of course! And who is blaming the USA? The Left...of course! David's article confirms it. By the way,...

The global food and fuel crisis is resulting in more than just people going hungry. Rising grain and gas prices, as well as the closure of American slaughterhouses, have contributed to a virtual stampede of horses being abandoned — some starving — and turned loose into the deserts and plains of the West to die cruel and lonesome deaths. Horse rescue projects, which are mostly small, volunteer operations with limited land and resources, are feeling the consequences of this convergence of events. In the meantime, many now unaffordable horses are being sold to abbatoirs south of the border where inhumane...

The state of Texas is now in official opposition to the federal ethanol mandate. Governor Rick Perry has petitioned the Environmental Protection Agency for a one-year reprieve, and the reason is simple and increasingly familiar: Washington's ethanol obsession is hurting the state. We all know that corn farmers everywhere love ethanol. Don't tell that to Texas cattle ranchers. Because of the mandate to add this biofuel to gasoline, ranchers are being forced into bidding wars with ethanol plants for the grains they feed their cattle. They don't appreciate being hammered on price because of a subsidy to corn growers. Thus,...

As relative newcomers to the industrial world, biodiesel producers, who are generally regarded as environmentally friendly, need to be good neighbors when it comes to properly disposing of byproducts. Although the scientific and regulatory communities have yet to agree on the toxicity of biodiesel byproducts, the industry should be prepared as the regulatory framework for the fledgling industry materializes.

The mere mention of moving biodiesel through pipelines brings so many related aspects into question that Biodiesel Magazine decided it was time to address the totality of these interrelated concerns.

What started as a student research project at Augsburg College may become a major change in the biodiesel industry. A team of scientists and engineers have turned a tool for purifying and separating chemicals into a six-second process for turning the poorest quality vegetable oil into biodiesel. The first commercial-scale plant using the process should come on line this year.

The oil from the Moringa tree is considered to be a more sustainable biodiesel feedstock than jatropha oil by those who argue that sustainability is better served by feedstocks that can yield both food and fuel.

ROME — In the past year, as the diversion of food crops like corn and palm to make biofuels has helped to drive up food prices, investors and politicians have begun promoting newer, so-called second-generation biofuels as the next wave of green energy. These, made from non-food crops like reeds and wild grasses, would offer fuel without the risk of taking food off the table, they said. But now, biologists and botanists are warning that they, too, may bring serious unintended consequences. Most of these newer crops are what scientists label invasive species — that is, weeds — that have...

The “food versus fuel” debate being waged in the United States has been nothing more than a cleverly planned public relations campaign. A request for a public relations proposal put forth by the Grocery Manufacturers Association and the media campaign response by the Glover Park Group prove that there has been a concerted effort to attack the ethanol industry. Both documents were recently made public by long-time ethanol advocate, Sen. Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa. The GMA represents more than 300 food, beverage and consumer household goods companies in the United States. The association released a request for a public relations campaign...

Archer Daniels Midland Co. has kept the nameplate capacities of each of its plants a closely guarded secret for many years. After discovering its Cedar Rapids, Iowa, facility could produce as much as 820 MMgy, EPM wondered how such a large plant might impact the industry.

Winnebago, Minn.-based Corn Plus LLLP is interested in an innovative distillers grains microwave drying technology that could bring the facility one step closer to becoming energy independent.

A surprise visit from the ethanol compliance inspector doesn’t have to be an adversarial event. A Minnesota woman is trying to make her regulatory work educational, proactive and fine-free—wherever possible. Her simple advice is to know your permit’s inclusions and limitations, keep your records organized and up-to-date, and appoint a point person responsible for your plant’s compliance. And, if your plant receives a warning letter, act quickly, cooperate with regulatory authorities and take immediate corrective measures. A lapse in compliance doesn’t have to escalate into a fine

Two recently released genome studies are expected to provide answers to how to bolster the production of ethanol from corn and biomass.