Switchgrass Biofuel
I came across an interesting article at Canada.com today discussing the potential of switchgrass as an eco-friendly and efficient fuel source.
Resource Efficient Agricultural Production (REAP), based in Quebec, has been conducting switchgrass biofuel research since 1991. Executive Director Roger Samson claims that growing switchgrass for biofuel makes much more sense than corn-based ethanol/biodiesel. Here is an exerpt from the article:
Biomass is also more efficient from an energy consumption point of view. Switchgrass pellet fuel has a ratio of energy production to consumption of 14 to one, compared with only 1.5 to one for corn-based ethanol.
From an economic perspective, converting switchgrass into pellets and burning them to heat buildings is much more cost-effective than burning ethanol or biodiesel.
And biomass fuel pellets are also more sustainable than either ethanol or biodiesel in terms of the amount of energy produced relative to an equivalent amount of fossil fuel energy. Samson said a ratio of four-to-one or higher is considered sustainable.
I decided to check out the REAP website and found it to be very informative and interesting. Much of the focus definitely seems to be on the use of switchgrass pellets as a alternative heating source (although switchgrass can also be fermented for ethanol production).
Here is a list (from the site) of some of the advantages of using switchgrass pellets for heating:
- efficient use of low cost marginal farmland for solar energy collection
- minimal fossil fuel input in field production and energy conversion
- replacement of expensive high-grade energy forms in space and water heating
- minimal biomass quality upgrading which limits energy loss from the feedstock
- efficient combustion in advanced, affordable, and user-friendly devices
Another interesting tidbit from the REAP website relating to greenhouse gas emissions:
During combustion of plant-based biofuels, the carbon dioxide emitted is considered to be sequestered during the growth cycle of the plant. Carbon emissions are largely neutral except for energy associated with their production and conversion into fuel pellets. The savings in GHG emissions is considerable because pellets (at 5 kg CO2e/GJ) have much lower emissions than coal (96 kg CO2e/GJ) and natural gas (62.13 kg CO2e/GJ).
It all sounds very interesting to me. REAP will be giving some talks at the University of Guelph Organic Agriculture Conference in January, so I think I may attend and find out some more about their research.
Here’s the link to the article at Canada.com: Grass growing as potential fuel
Be sure to check out the REAP website as well.
Technorati Tags: switchgrass, biofuel, biogas, biomass, ethanol, biodiesel, REAP, Roger Samson, pellet stove, wood burning stove
Written by Bentley on November 15th, 2006 with
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