helping Africans to irrigate cropscould algae that feast on wastewater produce clean biofuels and a healthful supply of fish food?
while dining on these pollutants the plant-like organisms could then be used to produce renewable biofuels or food for fish farms.
and thwart the plans to produce biofuels and fish food. With an initial EPA grant the student team tested 20 species of algae.
or biofuel production is the most economically viable use for algae grown in wastewater. Their faculty advisers are Edward Bouwer professor and chair of the Department of Geography and Environmental Engineering and Michael Betenbaugh professor in the Department of Chemical and Biomolecular engineering.
and land use change and our energy choices (such as biofuels oil sands and shale gas). In this talk we discuss the drivers affecting water sustainability
This is especially true for the cellulase enzymes used to release fermentable sugars from cellulosic biomass for the production of advanced biofuels.
Increasing the sugar yields from cellulosic biomass to help bring down biofuel production costs is essential for the widespread commercial adoption of these fuels.
The enzymatic breakdown of cellulosic biomass into fermentable sugars has been the Achilles heel of biofuels a key economic bottleneck says chemical engineer Harvey Blanch one of the leaders of this research.
and agricultural waste advanced biofuels represent a sustainable nonpolluting source of transportation fuel that would also generate domestic jobs and revenue.
A recent report from the National Research Council stressed the need for advanced biofuels if the United states is to significantly reduce its use of fossil fuels in the coming decades.
which in turn will help reduce biofuel production costs. The technique also has applications beyond biofuels. Our technique takes us toward a much more complete understanding of how enzymes work on solid surfaces Blanch says.
With this technique we should be able to tell where any enzyme binds to a solid material
which in 2011 supplied 100 percent microalgal-derived advanced biofuel for the first U s. passenger jetliner flight powered by advanced biofuel.
The demand for sustainable energy may divert more cropland to production of crops for biofuel production.
#Engineering algae to make the wonder material nanocellulose for biofuels and moregenes from the family of bacteria that produce vinegar Kombucha tea and nata de coco have become stars in a project
It can become the raw material for sustainable production of biofuels and many other products. While producing nanocellulose the algae will absorb carbon dioxide the main greenhouse gas linked to global warming.
Biofuels he said will face a difficult time for decades into the future in competing with the less-expensive natural gas now available with hydraulic fracturing or fracking.
In the long run the United states will need sustainable biofuels he said citing the importance of national energy policies that foster parallel development and commercialization of biofuels.
Hydrogen is one of the most important biofuels of the future. Zhang and his team have succeeded in using xylose the most abundant simple plant sugar to produce a large quantity of hydrogen that previously was attainable only in theory.
Other processes that convert sugar into biofuels such as ethanol and butanol always have energy efficiencies of less than 100 percent resulting in an energy penalty.
#Regulation recommendations so that biofuel plants don t become weedsin the United states only species listed on state
and how they are created researchers at the University of Illinois's Energy Biosciences Institute have developed some suggestions on how to improve the regulation of all invasive plant species including new biofuels plants.
Quinn's job at the University of Illinois's Energy Biosciences Institute has been to investigate the potential for invasiveness in new nonnative crops that are being developed for biofuels.
Will the team's recommendations threaten the development of new biofuels crops? Endres said no that the recommendations offer protection for the industry rather than punishment.
The biggest threat to the biofuels industry is unsubstantiated accusations whether they relate to greenhouse gas savings
Endres said that developers also do not want to spend a lot of money to commercialize a biofuels plant that's going to cause trouble later on--they want to do that analysis beforehand
Quinn said that biofuels crops such as Miscanthus would be subject to the list. The current cultivars that are being sold for production are sterile
As the need for carbon sequestration biofuels and other forest products increases the study suggests that there might be unintended consequences to enhancing ecosystems using fertilization.
#Peach genome offers insights into breeding strategies for biofuels cropsrapidly growing trees like poplars and willows are candidate biofuel crops from
and develop methods for improving plant biomass yield for biofuels. One gene we're interested in is the so-called evergreen locus in peaches
#Microalgae could be a profitable source of biodieseldinoflagellate microalgae could be used as a raw material to obtain biodiesel easily and profitably.
Researchers at the UAB's Institute of Environmental science and Technology (ICTA-UAB) and the Institute of Marine Sciences (ICM-CSIC) have analysed the potential of different species of microalgae for producing biodiesel comparing their growth production of biomass
Their study shows that one type of marine algae that has received little attention till now--dinoflagellate microalgae--is highly suitable for cultivation with the aim of producing biodiesel.
microalgae cultures are close to producing biodiesel profitably even in uncontrolled environmental conditions. If we make simple adjustments to completely optimise the process biodiesel obtained by cultivating these marine microalgae could be an option for energy supplies to towns near the sea points out Sergio Rossi an ICTA researcher at the UAB.
Among these adjustments scientists highlight the possibility of reusing leftover organic pulp (the glycerol and protein pulp that is not converted into biodiesel)
and using air pumps and more efficient cultivation materials. Though similar studies have been done on other alga species dinoflagellate microalgae have shown themselves to be a very promising group that stands out from the rest.
so they would present no environmental threat in the event of leakagethird-generation biodieselfirst-generation biodiesel
The possibility of creating energy from hydrocarbons extracted from organisms like marine phytoplankton the so-called third-generation biodiesel has several advantages.
the use of alternative fuels like biofuels electricity and hydrogen; and strong government policies to overcome high costs and influence consumer choices.
Each combines highly efficient vehicles with at least one of three alternative power sources--biofuel electricity or hydrogen.
and biodiesel are the only biofuels to have been produced in commercial quantities in the U s. to date the study committee found much greater potential in biofuels made from lignocellulosic biomass
greener concrete with biofuel byproductskansas State university civil engineers are developing the right mix to reduce concrete's carbon footprint
biofuel byproducts. The idea is to use bioethanol production byproducts to produce a material to use in concrete as a partial replacement of cement said Feraidon Ataie doctoral student in civil engineering Kabul Afghanistan.
They are finding success using the byproducts of biofuels made from corn stover wheat straw and rice straw.
which is produced biofuel from inedible material such as wood chips wheat straw or other agricultural residue.
and grain to make biofuel. Corn ethanol's byproduct--called distiller's dried grains--can be used as cattle feed
We have been working on applying viable biofuel pretreatments to materials to see if we can improve the behavior
This has the potential to make biofuel manufacture more cost effective by better using all of the resources that are being wasted
and biofuel production Ataie said. If you use this in concrete to increase strength and quality then you add value to this byproduct rather than just landfilling it
Hudson says that it could be a decade before production of biofuel from cyanobacteria is a commercial reality.#
#oewe are excited very that we are now able to produce biofuel from cyanobacteria. At the same time we must remember that the manufacturing process is very different from today's biofuels#he says.#
#oewe need to improve the production hundredfold before it becomes commercially viable. Already there is a demonstrator facility in New mexico U s. for producing biodiesel from algae
which is advanced a more process Hudson says. One of Sweden's leading biotechnology researchers Professor Mathias Uhl n at KTH has overall responsibility for the project.
#oeone of the problems with biofuels we have today that is corn ethanol is that the price of corn rises slowly
#New solution proposed to ensure biofuel plants dont become noxious weedsraising plants for biofuels is many farmers'dream.
and streamline the regulatory methodology for evaluating the invasive potential of plants especially biofuel feedstock that are under consideration for large-scale cultivation.
Biofuels are of mounting economic and ecological importance with the federal government calling for production of 36 billion gallons of biofuel by 2022 about 11.3 percent of all liquid fuel consumption.
which biofuel stocks will be incentivized using the renewable fuel standard mandate. According to our analysis current noxious weed laws do not provide adequate protection to prevent invasions in natural areas
This will help take the expense of noxious weed control away from taxpayers while protecting conscientious biofuels developers some of
more precisea screening tool from the U s. Department of energy's National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL) eases and greatly quickens one of the thorniest tasks in the biofuels industry:
Finding that particular species or that individual tree that has the genetic markers for the optimal biofuel candidate has heretofore been laborious and painstaking.
The Energy Independence and Security Act requires that the United states produce 21 billion gallons of non-corn-based biofuel by 2022.
The market for biofuels is expected to grow steadily between now and then. Market analysts say the successful companies will be those that can steer their enzymes through the cell-wall structures in the easiest and most cost-effective ways including by making changes in the structures themselves.
It's the deconstruction of the raw sugars that produces the sugars the biofuels industry finds valuable.
and breeders can determine what genes in the cloned trees are responsible for the advantageous biofuel potential.
Any biomass feedstock type being used for serious biofuels production--chances are we've tested it.
#Estimates reduce amount of additional land available for biofuel production by almost 80%Amid efforts to expand production of biofuels scientists are reporting new estimates that downgrade the amount of additional land available for growing fuel
. and the European union on how production of biofuels will impact food security. This has led to a realization that increased production of biofuels must take place on so-called marginal land acreage not suitable for growing food crops but capable of growing switch grass Indian beech trees and Barbados nut trees.
Concerned that previous estimates were targeting some areas where land is not marginal the scientists did the calculations using data obtained through crowdsourcing
The revised estimates show that 140 million-2. 6 billion acres of additional land could be cultivated for biofuel production.
#Avoiding virus dangers in domesticating wild plants for biofuel usein our ongoing quest for alternative energy sources researchers are looking more to plants that grow in the wild for use in biofuels plants such as switchgrass.
#Biofuels blend right in: Researchers show ionic liquids effective for pre-treating mixed blends of biofuel feedstockswinemakers have known long that blending different grape varietals can favorably balance the flavor characteristics of the wine they produce.
In the future makers of advanced biofuels might use a similar strategy blending different feedstock varieties to balance the energy characteristics of the transportation fuel they produce.
A collaborative study by researchers with the U s. Department of energy (DOE)' s Joint Bioenergy Institute (JBEI) a bioenergy research center led by Berkeley Lab
and the Idaho National Laboratory (INL) has shown that an ionic liquid proven to be effective for pre-treating individual biofuel feedstocks is also effective at pre-treating multiple different feedstocks that have been mixed
and densifying a wide range of feedstocks has significant potential for helping to make biofuels a cost-competitive transportation fuel technology.
biofuels industry. Produced from the microbial fermentation of sugars in lignocellulosic biomass advanced biofuels are clean green and renewable
and could displace gasoline diesel and jet fuel on a gallon-for-gallon basis and be dropped directly into today's engines and infrastructures.
This can provide the information necessary to modify a metabolic process to do something specific such as altering the lignin content of a tree to make it better suited for biofuel production.
and adapt to environmental surroundings by altering their proteins could help bioenergy researchers develop poplar trees better suited to biofuel production.
This is the first time we've been able to separate observed heat trapping due to ozone into its natural versus human sources and even into specific types of human sources such as fossil fuels versus biofuels.
#Wind in the willows boosts biofuel production: Trees grown diagonally produce five times more biofuelwillow trees cultivated for'green energy'can yield up to five times more biofuel
if they grow diagonally compared with those that are allowed to grow naturally up towards the sky.
and in plantations around the UK but scientists were previously unable to explain why some willows produced more biofuel than others.
These high-energy sugars are fermented into biofuels when the trees are harvested in a process that currently needs to be more efficient before it can rival the production of fossil fuels.
Willow is cultivated widely across the UK destined to become biofuels for motor vehicles heating systems and industry.
The study is published in the journal Biotechnology for Biofuels. Dr Brereton said: We've known for some time that environmental stresses can cause trees to naturally develop a slightly modified'reaction wood
Coupled with work at Rothamsted Research where the National Willow Collection is held the new results will help scientists to grow biofuel crops in climatically challenging conditions where the options for growing food crops are limited
#Photovoltaics beat biofuels at converting suns energy to miles drivenin 2005 President George w bush and American corn farmers saw corn ethanol as a promising fossil fuel substitute that would reduce both
and other biofuels or using photovoltaics (PV) to directly power battery electric vehicles (BEV)? The energy source for biofuels is the sun through photosynthesis he says.
The energy source for solar power is also the sun . Which is better? To find out Geyer joined former Brenschool researcher David Stoms
PV is orders of magnitude more efficient than biofuels pathways in terms of land use--30 50 even 200 times more efficient--depending on the specific crop
PV conversion also has lower GHG emissions throughout the life cycle than do cellulosic biofuels even in the most optimistic scenario for the latter.
The bottleneck for biofuels is photosynthesis Geyer says. It's at best 1-percent efficient at converting sunlight to crop
What it says to me is that by continuing to throw money into biofuels we're barking up the wrong tree Geyer explains.
And we can't say that right now biofuels aren't so great but they'll be better in five years.
That fundamental problem for biofuels will not go away while solar EVS will just continue to get more efficient and cheaper.
If they're already looking better than biofuels in five years the gap will be even greater.
Understanding the environmental impact of widespread biofuel production is unanswered a major question both in the U s
The final tally of 5. 5 billion gallons of ethanol represents about 25 percent of Congress'2022 cellulosic biofuels target said Phil Robertson co-author and MSU professor of crop soil and microbial sciences.
#Lower nitrogen losses with perennial biofuel cropsperennial biofuel crops such as miscanthus whose high yields have led them to be considered an eventual alternative to corn in producing ethanol are shown now to have another beneficial characteristic--the ability
Our results clearly demonstrate that environmental nitrogen fluxes from row-crop agriculture can be reduced greatly after the establishment of perennial biofuel crops said U of I postdoctoral research associate Candice Smith.
The hypoxic zone that forms each summer in the Gulf of mexico is a result of nitrate leaching from the tile-drained Corn belt of the midwestern United states--a likely location for biofuel production he said.
although more research is needed to fully understand the nitrogen cycle in these new and exciting biofuel crops such as miscanthus results from this study clearly show these crops have the potential to quickly
Reduced Nitrogen Losses after Conversion of Row Crop Agriculture to Perennial Biofuel Crops was published in an issue of the Journal of Environmental Quality.
and sal trees have almost as good a thermal efficiency as biodiesel but would produce lower emissions of carbon monoxide waste hydrocarbons and NOX (nitrogen oxides).
of which would reduce injector fouling carbon deposits and piston ring sticking common issues with some biodiesel formulations.
The oil is converted chemically to biodiesel using the process of transesterification which reacts the oily triglyceride content with alcohol using a catalyst.
Biodiesel production from tree seeds in India will not only reduce the dependence on crude oil imports
the sugars that are important to producing next-generation biofuels. Our research focuses on understanding complex network interactions in grasses with a goal of engineering C4 traits into C3 grasses
#Balancing birds and biofuels: Grasslands support more species than cornfieldsin Wisconsin bioenergy is for the birds.
and biofuels too by providing information for land managers farmers conservationists and policy makers as the bioenergy industry ramps up particularly in Wisconsin and the central U s as bioenergy production demand increases we should pay attention to the ecological consequences
According to Blank and Turner the study is one of the first to examine grassland fields already producing biomass for biofuels
While previous studies suggest corn is a more profitable biofuel crop than grasses and other types of vegetation the new findings indicate grassland fields may represent an acceptable tradeoff between creating biomass for bioenergy and providing habitat for grassland birds.
and the biofuels industry can win. Incentives for a conservation-minded approach could be used to help offset potential differences in profit the researchers suggest.
in order to be converted to biogas. The coast is rich with the seaweed. The city of Trelleborg estimates that its beaches host an excess of algae that is equivalent to the energy from 2. 8 million litres of diesel fuel.
#Search for better biofuels microbes leads to human gutscientists have scoured cow rumens and termite guts for microbes that can efficiently break down plant cell walls for the production of next-generation biofuels
but some of the best microbial candidates actually may reside in the human lower intestine researchers report.
but also for biofuels production since the same sugars can be fed to yeast to generate ethanol and other liquid fuels.
In looking for biofuels microbes in the cow rumen we found that Prevotella bryantii a bacterium that is known to efficiently break down (the plant fiber) hemicellulose gears up production of one gene more than others
The study points to human microbes as a potentially potent source of microbes that can aid in biofuels production Cann said.
For the U s. Department of energy which is developing biomass crops for biofuels production this knowledge could determine which genotypes--genetic makeup of an organism--of biomass crop may thrive better than others in certain environments.
and selection such that the alleles or gene variants that we have identified have great promise to provide robust long-term improvements to biofuel feedstocks.
New results pave the way for closed loop biofuel refinerieswhile the powerful solvents known as ionic liquids show great promise for liberating fermentable sugars from lignocellulose
and improving the economics of advanced biofuels an even more promising candidate is on the horizon--bionic liquids.
Researchers at the U s. Department of energy's Joint Bioenergy Institute (JBEI) have developed bionic liquids from lignin and hemicellulose two by-products of biofuel production from biorefineries.
JBEI is a multi-institutional partnership led by Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (Berkeley Lab) that was established by the DOE Office of Science to accelerate the development of advanced next-generation biofuels.
and other non-food crops and in agricultural waste can be used to make advanced biofuels that could substantially reduce the use of the fossil fuels responsible for the release of nearly 9 billion metric tons of excess carbon into the atmosphere each year.
However if biofuels including cellulosic ethanol are to be a commercial success they must be cost-competitive with fossil fuels.
Lignin and hemicellulose are byproducts from the agricultural industry biofuel plants and pulp mills which not only makes these abundant polymers inexpensive
Our results have established an important foundation for the further study of bionic liquids in biofuels as well as other industrial applications he says.
#Regulations needed to identify potentially invasive biofuel cropsif the hottest new plant grown as a biofuel crop is approved based solely on its greenhouse gas emission profile its potential as the next invasive species may not be discovered until it's too late.
In response to this need to prevent such invasions researchers at the University of Illinois have developed both a set of regulatory definitions and provisions and a list of 49 low-risk biofuel plants from
Lauren Quinn an invasive plant ecologist at U of I's Energy Biosciences Institute recognized that most of the news about invasive biofuel crops was negative
She and her colleagues set out to create a list of low-risk biofuel crops that can be grown safely for conversion to ethanol
In approving new biofuel products Quinn said that the EPA doesn't formally consider invasiveness at all--just greenhouse gas emissions related to their production.
However global demand for crops is expected also to rise rapidly during the next two decades because of population growth greater per-capita food consumption and increasing use of biofuels.
and biofuel production. â#oeour research is aimed at understanding the fundamental mechanisms and genes by which CO2 represses stomatal pore developmentâ#says Schroeder.
because biofuel contributes toward reducing the burning of fossil fuel explained the researcher. The researchers conducted measurements and collected 6000 soil samples from 135 regions in south-central Brazil which is responsible for more than 90%of Brazil's sugarcane production.
According to the researchers the study findings could contribute toward guiding expansion policies for sugarcane production aimed at producing ethanol to ensure the biofuel's sustainability--Ethanol demand in Brazil is expected to jump from an annual total of 25 million liters to 61.6
#Win-win-win solution for biofuel, climate, and biodiversityfossil fuel emissions release billions of tons of carbon into the atmosphere each year
In Brazil the demand for alternative energy sources has led to an increase in biofuel crops. A new News and Views paper in Nature Climate Change co-authored by Woods Hole Research center scientists Marcia Macedo
and Eric Davidson reviews new research conducted by Brazilian colleagues demonstrating the high carbon costs of converting intact Brazilian savanna compared to the carbon gains obtained from converting underutilized pastureland for biofuel
and palm oil the rapid growth rate of sugar cane has put it at the forefront of biofuel crops.
Unlike the Amazon which remains over 80%forested over half of the Cerrado has been cleared for agriculture including sugar cane biofuel crops.
With over 2. 5 million square kilometers of existing cleared lands in Brazil much of which is degraded pasture lands there is already a large potential area for biofuel crop expansion.
which includes using degraded pastures for a combination of reforestation expansion of biofuel and food crops and intensification of cattle production.
A new resource for advanced biofuels researchresearchers at the U s. Department of energy (DOE)' s Joint Bioenergy Institute (JBEI) have unveiled the first glycosyltransferase clone collection specifically targeted for the study of the biosynthesis of plant cell walls.
If we can convert this cheap easily available biomass into a high-quality homogeneous fuel that is easy to handle that would have major consequences in terms of the use of biofuel in Norway.
and improve upon Eucalyptus'potential for enhancing sustainable biofuels and biomaterials production and provide a stable year-round source of biomass that doesn't compete with food crops.
Genome sequencing is an essential diagnostic tool for understanding the basis of its superior growth properties attributes that can be propagated to other candidate biofuel feedstock species. Because of its wide adaptability extremely fast growth rate
and the hemicellulose xylan both cell wall carbohydrates that can be used for biofuel production. By tracing their evolutionary lineages
However an equivalent amount is lost through logging clearing of land for grazing and growing biofuel crops such as palm oil soya bean and sugar.
#Wood-waste biofuel to cut greenhouse gas, transform shipping industrya sustainable biofuel made from Norwegian forest wood waste could help transform the shipping industry
and unmerchantable wood left in forests after logging has occurred to produce new biofuels. Via the process of fast pyrolysis where material is heated in the absence of oxygen the wood will be converted into crude pyrolysis oil.
To counter this the Aston team led by Professor Tony Bridgwater will look to stabilise freshly produced pyrolysis biofuel through mild rapid low temperature catalytic hydrogen treatment.
We hope to pave the way for large-scale biofuel production by 2020 in a way that is completely sustainable
Aston University's experience in fast pyrolysis and biofuel production technologies for biomass and biofuel products will contribute considerably in making that goal a reality.
while Swedish packing firm Billerud received â2m from the European commission to build a new biofuel plant based on forest residues.
Researchers at the Institute of Food Research are looking at how to turn straw from oilseed rape into biofuel.
Straw from crops such as wheat barley oats and oilseed rape is seen as a potential source of biomass for second generation biofuel production.
Straw contains a mix of sugars that could be used as a source of biofuels that do not compete with food production
However the sugars are in a form that makes them inaccessible to the enzymes that release them for conversion into biofuels so pre-treatments are needed.
which straw can be converted to biofuels. For example adding enzymes that more effectively remove xylan should improve yield.
whether there are ways of breeding more biofuel-ready varieties of oilseed rape with the same yields of oilseed but with more amenable straw.
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