The Great Potential of Future Corn Yields

National Corn Growers Association
(9-28-09)

Sept. 28: One of the challenges for the National Corn Growers Association in responding to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s proposed regulations implementing the expanded Renewable Fuel Standard was dealing with its very conservative estimates of future corn yield at a time when yields are significantly increasing. Such a low estimate of yields was a major driver in incorrect assumptions by the EPA about international indirect land use change.

An analysis performed by Ross Korves of the ProExporter Network for NCGA’s formal submission to the EPA spoke of the yields seen in NCGA’s annual National Corn Yield Contest and efforts to translate them into success for more farms.

“Most of the winners in recent years in the non-irrigated categories had yields of 250-300 bushels per acre,” Korves wrote. “The winners in the irrigated categories had yields of 300-360 bushels per acres. Soil capabilities and rainfall patterns are available to support much higher yields than the average yields of today. Technology is now being developed to achieve those higher yields on a more consistent and wide-spread basis.”

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Gevo Launches Gevo Development LLC to Retrofit Existing Ethanol Plants to Produce Biobutanol

Biofuels Journal
Date Posted: October 1, 2009

Englewood, CO—Gevo announced Sept. 30 the formation of Gevo Development, LLC to develop a fleet of biorefineries based on retrofitting existing ethanol plants with Gevo's proprietary technology to produce biobutanol.

Biobutanol is an advanced biofuel that can be blended directly into gasoline and be used to make renewable hydrocarbons ("green gasoline"), jet and diesel fuel, chemical intermediates and biobased plastics.

"Gevo took a very big step today toward commercial deployment of advanced biofuels," said Patrick Gruber, CEO of Gevo.

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Research collaboration hopes to solve US energy problems

StatePress.com (Arizona)
By:Michelle Parks
Published On:Wednesday, September 30, 2009

ASU is leading a new LightWorks program that will combine research from around the nation about the practical uses of light.

ASU officials announced the initiative after hiring businessman Gary Dirks to direct the new program.

Through the collaboration of ASU researchers, national labs and other universities’ research, LightWorks aims to create solutions to some of the nation’s biggest energy problems, Dirks said.

“One of the goals of LightWorks is to leverage the breadth and depth of research from ASU and go after some of the bigger issues, where a small research center or an individual might not be able to go after on their own,” he said.

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Strategy outlined for growing bioenergy while protecting wildlife

EurekaAlert
Public release date: 1-Oct-2009
American Institute of Biological Sciences

Careful planning, together with the use of feedstocks from perennial-dominated prairie, could minimize the adverse effects of expanding bioenergy use on wildlife

A study described in the October issue of BioScience identifies diverse native prairie as holding promise for yielding bioenergy feedstocks while minimizing harm to wildlife. Harvesting diverse prairie, which is dominated by perennial plants, could avoid adverse environmental effects associated with expanding cultivation of corn for ethanol, such as loss of wildlife habitat and high fertilizer runoff. It could also avoid the threat of invasion posed by cultivation of exotic biofuel crops.

The study, by Joseph E. Fargione of the Nature Conservancy and nine coauthors, explores how choices between a variety of current and emerging bioenergy feedstocks and production practices could affect wildlife as demand for biofuels increases. The growing US use of biofuels—so far, almost entirely ethanol made from corn—has contributed to a sharp reduction of the amount of grassland that landowners had enrolled in the Conservation Reserve Program. The conversion of grassland to corn cropland has most likely harmed grassland-dependent wildlife, and a congressional mandate to further step up biofuel production in coming years will add to this pressure.

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Utility Replaces Some Coal With Switchgrass

The New York Times
October 1, 2009, 8:31 am By Clifford Krauss

A replacement for coal? More electricity is already coming from solar and wind sources, so why not from switchgrass?

NRG Energy, a wholesale power generation company that operates in the United States, Australia and Germany, is experimenting with that possibility. The company announced on Wednesday that it has begun a pilot project to replace some coal with locally grown switchgrass and sorgham at its Big Cajun II plant in Louisiana.

In the announcement, the company said, “The Big Cajun II project could lead to commercial-scale projects using biomass fuels to reduce carbon intensity from other coal plants.”

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U.S. ethanol from corn could double by 2030: group

Reuters
Thu Oct 1, 2009 11:50am EDT

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. farmers could grow enough corn to produce 25 billion gallons of ethanol in 2030, twice as much as this year's target of 12 billion gallons, said the leader of a U.S. corn group on Thursday.

U.S. yields could double in 20 years, said Darrin Ihnen, president of the National Corn Growers Association.

Potentially, there would be enough corn in 2030 to produce 25 billion gallons of ethanol, he said.

A 2007 law set a ceiling of 15 billion gallons a year of corn-based ethanol to be blended into fuel in 2015 and a goal of 21 billion gallons of "advanced biofuels," such as ethanol from cellulose found in woody plants, grass and crop debris.

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Makers of Ethanol Ponder Alternative

Wall Street Journal
BY RUSSELL GOLD

Some ethanol makers, battered by unpredictable profit margins and criticism that production of the corn-based fuel drives up food prices, are being presented with a way out: making biobutanol.

Biofuels entrepreneurs are hoping to snap up idled and financially distressed ethanol plants and convert them to make biobutanol, another plant-based fuel that can be blended into gasoline or used to make plastic products such as water bottles.

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Grant money flowing to UGA

OnlineAthens.com
By Lee Shearer lee.shearer@onlineathens.com Story updated at 12:32 am on 9/26/2009

Record $173.4 million to boost research

University of Georgia scientists rebounded from a long slump in the past fiscal year, pulling in a record $173.4 million in research funding, Vice President for Research David Lee said Friday.

"I'd like to think it's the beginning on an overall positive trend," Lee said at a meeting of the UGA Research Foundation, the nonprofit corporation through which most of the university's research grants get funneled.

The figure is a 26 percent increase over last year, when UGA scientists received $137.3 million in research funding from federal agencies, private foundations and other outside sources.

UGA researchers raked in $150 million from grants and other research funding sources in 2005, but research income fell off the following year and is just now recovering.

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POET receives $6.85 million

The Messenger (Fort Dodge, Iowa)
By LINDSEY ORY Messenger staff writer
POSTED: September 30, 2009

U.S. Department of Energy increases original grant award

POET is working with farmers and equipment manufacturers to create corn cob collecting machinery. The corn cobs will be converted to a cellulosic ethanol at POET’s new addition to its biorefinery in Emmetsburg slated to open in 2011.
EMMETSBURG - POET hit the jackpot.

Monday it was announced the company will receive a $6.85 million increase to an existing grant given by the U.S. Department of Energy - the first of two scheduled subsidies.

The second infusion of money - $13.15 million - is expected next year.

The money is intended to help establish a market for corn cobs as POET's Project LIBERTY, a cellulosic ethanol plant specializing in corn cob biomass, is to be built in Emmetsburg.

"The increase to the existing grant will help accelerate equipment production for collection of corn cobs and give farmers incentive to adopt new farming techniques," said Jim Sturdevant, POET director of project LIBERTY.

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U.S. seen unlikely to meet ethanol fuel-content goal

Reuters India
Wed Sep 30, 2009 1:35am IST

OTTAWA (Reuters) - The United States will likely not meet its goal of blending 100 million gallons of cellulosic ethanol into the gasoline supply in 2010 unless it raises the proportion of ethanol allowed in fuel, a U.S. industry group said on Tuesday.

Most U.S. ethanol -- a form of alcohol -- is made from corn. Cellulosic ethanol is made from nonfood sources such as agricultural waste and switch grass.

Retired U.S. General Wesley Clark, co-chairman of the Growth Energy group, said the 100 million gallon level could be reached in time if the cap on the permitted level of ethanol in regular gasoline is increased to 15 percent from 10 percent.

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