Stover for Power—Not Just Biofuels

Biomass Power & Thermal
By Kris Bevill November 22, 2011

Partnering to produce energy from stover could be an attractive option for corn ethanol plants.

In mid-July, right around the time the area’s corn crop was beginning to mature and farmers could start looking ahead to the season’s harvest, a number of ethanol producers, farmers and researchers gathered for a daylong meeting at the University of Minnesota to discuss ways to best use the aftermath of the harvest. Corn stover has long been pegged as a potential feedstock for cellulosic ethanol, but this group focused instead on a more immediate application—energy generation. An increasing number of studies are showing that in order for farmers to maintain high corn yields, some of the stover will need to be removed from the fields. For corn-based ethanol plants, this represents an opportunity to displace at least some of their fossil fuel consumption with a renewable resource readily available from their existing corn suppliers. Researchers also believe that it represents an opportunity for new partnerships in the power generation sector.

Read more