September 4, 2007

 

US firm aims to get 27 percent more biofuel from corn

 

 

A US company has claimed that its research would enable it to squeeze 27 percent more fuel out of an acre of corn than is currently possible by making use of traditional byproducts of corn production.

 

Poet, a privately owned ethanol producer in Sioux Falls, currently operates 20 ethanol plants in the US mid west and has had a 20-year history of making ethanol from corn.

 

The company, which is planning to expand its dry-mill ethanol plant in Iowa, would produce alternative fuel not only from corn kernels, but also from waste products of corn production such as cobs and stalks.

 

The company is producing cellulosic ethanol, or fuel made from plants or plant waste. Gaining fuel in this way usually costs about twice as much as deriving it from  corn alone.

 

The company was one of six companies receiving the US$385 million grant from the US Department of Energy. The company is planning to use the US$80 million from the grant for further research.

 

Poet has plans to convert its 50-million-gallon-per-year plant into one of the nation's first commercial cellulosic biorefineries. Once completed, it is expected to produce 125 million gallons per year, a quarter of it derived from corn cobs and fiber. That means each bushel of corn could yield 11 percent more fuel.

 

Jeff Broin, Poet's president and chief executive officer, said the company has been testing the process and would be setting up a pilot-scale model at its research center in Scotland.

 

Corn cobs are easy to harvest and can be removed from the field without causing soil erosion or stealing soil nutrients. The company plans to harvest about 4,000 acres of cobs this fall.

 

While many outside the agricultural industry reserve the harshest criticisms for the incentives that are part of the Farm Bill, Grassley said that developments like these would not have emerged without the incentives that were started more than two decades ago.

 

Grassley said he expects money to be included in the upcoming farm bill for cellulosic feedstock production.