ARS Research Shows Sweet Potatoes and Cassava Yield 2-3 Times More Carbohydrate Content Than Corn for Ethanol Production

GrainNet.com
Date Posted: August 20, 2008

In experiments, sweet potatoes grown in Maryland and Alabama yielded two to three times as much carbohydrate for fuel ethanol production as field corn grown in those states, Agricultural Research Service (ARS) scientists report.

The same was true of tropical cassava in Alabama.

The sweet potato carbohydrate yields approached the lower limits of those produced by sugarcane, the highest-yielding ethanol crop.

Another advantage for sweet potatoes and cassava is that they require much less fertilizer and pesticide than corn.

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, AL, performed the study.

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