If you’ve sort of forgotten about domestic ethanol as an alternative to imported gasoline, be assured that Tom Stephens hasn’t.
Stephens, who was in Orlando recently to speak at the National Ethanol Conference, is vice chairman of global product operations for General Motors. He knows as well as anybody that our gasoline supply won’t last forever, and we’re long past the point where we should be concentrating our efforts on weaning the U.S. from our dependence on oil. GM has lived by that philosophy and has been the automotive leader in offering up flexible fuel vehicles that run on gasoline, E85 or any gasoline-ethanol combo in between.
Despite all their efforts, those by NCGA and many others, there are only 7.5 million E85 capable FFV’s in operation today and 2,000 stations offering up the corn-based, eco-friendly fuel. Surely nothing to sneeze at but given our voracious appetite for gasoline in the U.S. we have plenty of room for improvement.
With that sobering assessment, let’s take a look at some signs of what the future might hold. The U.S. Department Energy projections say ethanol production is on the rise and we will make 800,000 barrels a day in 2010, up from 700,000 last year. Another 50,000 barrels a day will be added in 2011. The trend seems to document the buzz in the industry that ethanol makers are recovering from the sluggish economic conditions that have plagued every industry.
That’s a good thing considering the ethanol industry added $53 billion to the U.S. gross domestic product and $16 billion in U.S. household income last year even as the ethanol industry struggled. (more…)
Research by Purdue agronomist Tony Vyn has shown that corn plants are in a fierce battle with each other for resources.
“There is a hierarchy that is formed, even though the plants are genetically the same and should be equal in size and stature,” Vyn said about his findings, which were published in the early online version of the journal Soil & Tillage Research. “No-till corn yield reductions have little to do with an overall height reduction early in the season. They have more to do with height variability during vegetative growth.”
Vyn said yield losses of up to 14 percent can be attributed to this competition in no-till fields where corn is planted the year after corn. In those fields, the leftover corn residue creates patches of soil with lower temperatures and different water and nutrient content. Seeds planted there are at a disadvantage.
“No plant left behind” is the motto of Purdue University researcher Tony Vyn, who is working to increase grain yield for corn at higher plant densities.
“The only way to pursue and achieve higher grain yields on a per-acre basis at high plant densities is to make sure that every single plant has the opportunity to compete with its neighbor in the row,” said Vyn. “The only way to achieve this competition ability is to have the genetic resources, in terms of a hybrid’s ability to compete and gain access to nutrients and water.”
Vyn recently completed a three-year study, which looked at approximately 4,000 individual plants each of the three years to understand how individual plants compete with neighbors at three different plant densities and three different nitrogen rates.
“As we’ve tried to push yield barriers beyond 300 and 350 bushels per acre, it’s extremely important that we think about the ability of the plant to tolerate not just a single stress like high plant density, but also be able to tolerate lower nitrogen availability on a per-plant basis,” Vyn said. “Our results suggest that on the plant breeding side of the equation, more attention should be focused on the joint ability of new corn hybrids to tolerate combined stresses of both high plant density and limited nitrogen.
“If the new hybrids can better tolerate both, then it will be possible for those high-density, low-nitrogen situations to achieve an overall improvement in uniformity of grain yield on a per-plant basis.”
I want to see Oprah wax poetic about the nobility of science and the implications of the full exposure of the corn genome. Instead of Martha Stewart prattling on about the merits of a vegetarian Thanksgiving, and what is wrong with the family farms producing our food, I am waiting for a provocative look at what this understanding of our largest crop means for mankind.
The announcement today that a team of scientists led by The Genome Center at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis has completed the corn genome is nothing short of monumental. But in this man bites dog world we live in the story will likely miss the evening news and the front page of your local paper.
While the glass half full crowd runs about blathering about how we can’t grow enough corn for all uses we are already doing it and the record crops grown in recent years is just a hint of things to come. (Anybody have any more clichés I can stick in this blog?)
The corn genome is a hodgepodge of some 32,000 genes crammed into just 10 chromosomes. In comparison, humans have 20,000 genes dispersed among 23 chromosomes. That officially makes a corn plant more complex than some people I know, but I digress.
This $29.5 million maize sequencing project utilized the collective expertise of 150 scientists and resulted in a road map scientists will explore for many more years to come. In these waning days of petroleum predominance this is welcome news.
Virtually anything made from oil can be made from corn today. Understanding the intricacies of the genome will allow us to make these emerging corn based products more efficiently and economically. Oh, and there is also that feeding the whole world thing. That’s a good idea too.
There’s a good chance that quite a bit of the corn about to be harvested in the Midwest this fall got its start in Hawaii.
According to the latest report from the the Hawaii Field Office of USDA’s National Agricultural Statistics Service (NASS) the value of Hawaii’s seed industry for the 2008/2009 season was a “record high” of $176.6 million. Seed corn accounts for $169.3 million, or 96 percent, of the total value. According to NASS, acreage devoted to seed crops will increase 12 percent from the previous growing season to a record of 5,930 acres.
In fact, a recent Hawaii Farm Bureau Federation study shows that seed crops have become the largest agricultural commodity in the state, exceeding the value of both sugar and pineapple by 180 percent and 90 percent, respectively.
All the major seed companies have operations in Hawaii on a total of about 6,000 acres. Syngenta Seeds Corn Product Development Lead Ben Hable says it allows them to get new products to market faster. “In Hawaii we can actually turn a crop every 3 and a half months so we can increase the seeds that we need to get back here to the mainland for seed production,” Ben told me during an interview at the grand opening of Syngenta Seeds new headquarters in Minnetonka, MN this week. “Syngenta now has over 300 full time staff in the state of Hawaii working on corn and soybean seed production.”
The ethanol co-product known as DDGs or dried distillers grain is mostly being used right now as livestock feed, but someday it could be used to feed the hungry.
A Google search shows that this is not a new concept. One paper that turns up from Virginia Polytechnic Institute dates back to 1986 and discusses the use of DDG flour as an ingredient for preparing wheat muffins. According to that research, “DDG can be incorporated up to 10% in wheat muffins without significant changes in appearance, texture, flavor, and overall acceptability. Addition of either raisins or blueberries to wheat muffins allowed for an increase in the incorporation level of DDG to 15%. Wheat muffins supplemented with DDG had a higher protein, amino acids, and certain minerals content than wheat muffins without DDG.”
There’s even a patent that was issued in 1993 for an invention related “to a method for utilizing wet distiller’s grain (WDG) or distiller’s dried grain with solubles (DDGS), by-products of the alcohol manufacturing industry, in the preparation of bakery products for human consumption.”
Interesting concept that making ethanol from corn could actually help to feed people who are starving because we are making ethanol from corn. Kinda turns the whole food versus fuel argument on its head.
Remember the old, very successful beef commercials that had a grandmotherly character asking “Where’s The Beef?” Well a growing number of real scientists, the kind with actual degrees in their field of expertise, are asking where’s the science?
It seems having a word processor, some passing knowledge of an issue, and some good connections with science magazines or journals who support your position is all it takes these days to get published like an actual scientist.
The most recent example of this emerging trend has degreed and pedigreed academics calling out a high profile paper on land use by Tim Searchinger as nothing more than ideology draped in a lab coat to disguise it as science.
Searchinger, who has questionable credentials regarding land use, contends in assessing the carbon\environmental footprint of ethanol production we must also assess any related changes in land use in the U.S. and internationally. Specifically, he states using increasing amounts of corn in the U.S. to make ethanol must have a direct correlation with cutting down rain forest in Brazil.
Professor John Mathews and Dr. Hao Tan, researchers from Macquarie University in Sydney, Australia, undertook an exhaustive analysis of Searchinger et al. which revealed that the framework used was inappropriate in that it started with faulty assumptions. In fact they say Searchinger et al’s pseudo-science fell far short of acceptable scientific standards because it ignores current information on domestic and international corn yield trends and credible carbon sequestration information, both of which are readily available. Even more concerning is the inability of other scientists to replicate Searchinger’s research.
When a researcher tells you your work lacks transparency and scientific integrity, that is about as harsh as it gets.
“If you wished to put U.S. ethanol production in the worst possible light, assuming the worst possible set of production conditions guaranteed to give the worst possible set of indirect land use effects, then the assumptions would not be far from those actually presented in the Searchinger et al. paper,” commented Dr. Hao Tan. “Frankly, better science upon which to base (EPA) rule-making is available today.”
The Mathews and Tan analysis identified six areas in which Searchinger et al. fell short:
Direct plantings of biofuels crops around the world are ignored, and instead a spike in U.S. corn-based ethanol is considered a trigger;
The U.S. spike is met exclusively by growing corn – but other ways of meeting the U.S. spike, all involving fewer GHG emissions, are ignored;
The U.S. spike met entirely within the U.S. – without regard to trade (such as half of the spike being met by Brazilian sugarcane and imported into the U.S.);
The Searchinger et al. calculations of carbon release are based on trends recorded in the 1990s but are projected forward up to 2016;
Improvements in biomass yields around the world are not considered;
The U.S. spike leads to indirect effects around the world without regard to regulatory limits (even in the U.S.).
Research is reinforcing the economic, environmental benefits of corn cobs as source for cellulosic ethanol.
According to POET, which is already producing cellulosic ethanol using corn cobs at a pilot plant in South Dakota, results from the first year of a multi-year study by Iowa State University indicate that removing corn cobs from fields for use in cellulosic ethanol production appears to have no substantial impact on soil nutrient content.
“This information reinforces previous research showing that corn cobs are a sustainable, environmentally friendly feedstock for producing cellulosic ethanol, and removing them from the field will not alter soil quality,” said Scott Weishaar, POET Vice President of Commercial Development. “We are committed to thoroughly evaluating our process to ensure the benefits of cellulosic ethanol are fully realized.”
Previous research by the U.S. Department of Agriculture showed that cobs contain only 2-3 percent of the measured nutrients of the above-ground corn plant. In addition, the Draft Regulatory Impact Analysis released this month by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency touts the economic benefit of using corn stover, which includes corn cobs, in making cellulosic ethanol.
“… corn stover was chosen as the most economical agricultural feedstock to be used to produce ethanol in order to meet the 16 [billion gallon] EISA (Energy Independence and Security Act) cellulosic biofuel requirement. We estimate that by 2022 greater than 400 million tons of corn stover could be produced. Approximately 82 million tons would be needed to produce 7.8 billion gallons of cellulosic biofuel that our modeling projects to come from corn stover by 2022.”
POET plans to have a 25 million gallons per year commercial cellulosic ethanol plant using corn stover in production in Emmetsburg, Iowa by 2011.
Genetically engineered beagles that glow in the dark have made the news across the globe this week.
The four cute little “ruby puppies” were produced by cloning with a gene that produces a red fluorescent protein that makes them glow. The South Korean scientists who did it say this proves it is possible to successfully insert genes with a specific trait, which could lead to implanting other, non-fluorescent genes that could help treat specific diseases.
Meanwhile, scientists at Dow AgroSciences announced this week that for the first time a gene has been successfully inserted into a specific, pre-determined location in the corn genome.
While that may not be as cute, cuddly or cool as glow-in-the-dark puppies, the breakthrough holds huge potential for increasing crop production.
The new development, EXZACT™ Precision Technology, is based on utilizing proprietary Zinc-Finger Nucleases™ (ZFNs) for trait engineering and establishes a new industry standard to enhance global crop production through precise genetic modification in plant species. It is the only technology capable of specifically targeting any DNA sequence, thereby providing flexibility and versatility in genetic research and enabling developers to add, delete or edit genes in plants. EXZACT™ Precision Technology enhances the efficient discovery and development of novel traits and solutions for crop production.
I just wonder … if you combine these two breakthroughs, would you get a corn dog that can double as a flashlight?
Early last year it was announced that a group of scientists at Washington University had completed a working draft of the corn genome. To finish the job, the National Science Foundation’s Plant Genome Research Initiative is looking for about $100 million in federal funding.
An Iowa corn farmer and chairwoman of the National Corn Growers Association’s (NCGA) Research and Business Development Action Team recently testified before a congressional subcommittee in support of that funding request. “We believe this program is crucial to agricultural research,” said Pam Johnson, a farmer from Floyd, Iowa, at the hearing of the House Appropriations Subcommittee on Commerce, Justice, Science and Related Agencies. “Corn is a model system for studying complex genomic structure, organization and function and its high quality genetic map will serve as the foundation for studies that will lead to improved biomass and bioenergy resources from all crops.”
Why is this research worth $100 million in tax dollars? Essentially, the corn genome holds tremendous potential to meet society’s growing demands for food, livestock feed and fuel. The genome will help unravel the basic biology of corn. That information can be used to look for genes that make corn more nutritious or more efficient for ethanol production, for example.
“Corn growers will be able to plant varieties that are better suited to market and environmental needs, such as pest resistant traits, lower nitrogen and water needs, and higher yields – all increasing sustainability,” Pam said in her comments. “Consumers will also benefit from more abundant and sustainable food, feed and fuel supplies. Improvements aimed at increasing yield and enhancing nutritional value to achieve cheap, plentiful and safe food products that will directly benefit consumers.”
Sounds like a pretty good return for a $100 million investment. Better than most that the government makes!
If you’ve sort of forgotten about domestic ethanol as an alternative to imported gasoline, be assured that Tom Stephens hasn’t.
Research by Purdue agronomist Tony Vyn has shown that corn plants are in a fierce battle with each other for resources.
“The only way to pursue and achieve higher grain yields on a per-acre basis at high plant densities is to make sure that every single plant has the opportunity to compete with its neighbor in the row,” said Vyn. “The only way to achieve this competition ability is to have the genetic resources, in terms of a hybrid’s ability to compete and gain access to nutrients and water.”
I want to see Oprah wax poetic about the nobility of science and the implications of the full exposure of the corn genome. Instead of Martha Stewart prattling on about the merits of a vegetarian Thanksgiving, and what is wrong with the family farms producing our food, I am waiting for a provocative look at what this understanding of our largest crop means for mankind.
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Genetically engineered beagles that glow in the dark have made the news across the globe this week. 
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Why is this research worth $100 million in tax dollars? Essentially, the corn genome holds tremendous potential to meet society’s growing demands for food, livestock feed and fuel. The genome will help unravel the basic biology of corn. That information can be used to look for genes that make corn more nutritious or more efficient for ethanol production, for example.