Mexican magic

[KanJe]

Link

I'd love to hear people's opinions on this.

Edit: Sorry just realised this should have been put into the Sustainable Technologies section. Feel free to move it.

Edited May 28, 2009 by KanJe

[Torsten]

I like aspects of this. Agaves are not very prone to weather fluctuations, so if it doesn't rain one year then you don't get a total crop failure, you just get a reduced yield. Whiel this article talks about growing agaves near sugar cane, they can essentially be grown anywhere where there is sporadic high rainfall in summer. ie rather than a fuel crop that must be grown on the high rainfall coastal strip, it can instead be grown further inland where the winters are extremely dry, but the summers often bring plenty of rain.

Really, the whole biofuel thing is bound to fail unless we identify fuel crops that can be produced in areas that are either not at all used for food production or which are marginal.

What I don't like about this is the monoculture. Rather than breeding high sugar strains this company makes single specimen collections and then cultures them. What we may end up with is an industry where every grower grows the same genetic individual, ie every plant will have the same disease and pest susceptibility. While this is a good short term high profit concept it always fails in the long term.

I am also disappointed that australian native flora is not being explored and utilised more for biofuels.

[Conan Troutman]

Id be interested to know how the growth rate compares to biomass..?

Biofuels still don't solve the emissions issue tho it is an option that doesn't divert from much needed food stuffs.

Also was my understanding that because of this diversion from food crops that biofuels can only ever make up a small % of total fuels?

[Torsten]

Biofuels still don't solve the emissions issue

what do you mean? Emission from such short term crops are reabsorbed in the next crop cycle, so the net effect is zero within a short time. Hence they are called renewable. I don't understand why you think such emissions are a problem....

The biggest problem I ahve with biofuels at the moment is that they still use about 50% petrofuel to produce them. ie for every litre of biofuel you use you also use half a litre of fuel that was used to produce it, which is often petrofuel. ie we need to produce 150% of our annual fuel consumption as biofuels to make us independent from petrofuels.

Also was my understanding that because of this diversion from food crops that biofuels can only ever make up a small % of total fuels?

yes, which is why using food crops as fuel is idiotic. It was a short term fix embraced by greedy politicians that has already bitten us on the ass. We have to rethink fast and get away from the idea that we can use food crops, food crop land, or rainforests for our fuel production. The best fuel production would be in the desert, but failing that we should use marginal land.

[Conan Troutman]

Yes I was alluding to production of renewable biofuels...

I wasnt aware there was a manufacturing process that didnt still involve burning? but yes granted those emissions are less than coal fired power.

Lets hope that this swing towards biofuels increases production of food crops, not reduces it.

[Torsten]

I wasnt aware there was a manufacturing process that didnt still involve burning?

Now I see what you are getting at. You will find that most ethanol production actually uses renewable fuels for the production. eg bagasse from cane is used for the boilers and distillers [in fact they have so much left over that many sugar mills also produce electricity for the grid now]. In the case of agaves you have a similar amount of cellulose material for the same purpose. Ditto for corn, although corn is often fermented away from the source and hence away from the trash, so often needs extra fuel input [trust the americans to pick corn as their preferred fuel crop].

so, the only fuel input is diesel, which is why all such ethanol operations should also have a local source of biodiesel.

[Teotzlcoatl]

I think this is great! We need to continue to explore new plants to make our lives better!

[KanJe]

I am also disappointed that australian native flora is not being explored and utilised more for biofuels.

What Australian natives which could be alternatives do you know of that could be utilised for biofuels. I'm not very familiar in this area.

Edited June 4, 2009 by KanJe

[Torsten]

Pongamia pinnata is being researched already, but what I actually meant by my statement was more in reference to the fact that there is no active screening of suitable plants going on [or at least no results yet].

[Teotzlcoatl]

Very cool!