Good news for struggling ethanol plants. Microbiology professor Joy Peterson and fellow researchers at University of Georgia have whipped up a new technology that helps increase ethanol yields from biomass sources like sugar cane harvest waste, switchgrass and other grasses. Their technology is a breakthrough in the pretreatment portion of the process, and overcomes the difficulty of breaking down plant cell walls, a process that often utilizes unpleasant chemicals or expensive equipment. The new technology reportedly gets ten times more simple sugars out of the biomass while using environmentally friendly technology.

The tragedy of this post is that we can’t tell you exactly what the new technology consists of because the creators are hush-hush about it for now while they file their patent. We do know that the new process uses a “fast, mild, acid-free pretreatment process” and that using this mild process helps eliminate expensive chemical use and disposal on top of being supposedly wildly more effective. If the process pans out, this could be a significant breakthrough in our ability to use non-crop-based plant biomass for ethanol production, and an opportunity to eliminate hunts for new sources. We’ll keep our ears peeled for updates and information releases.

Via GoodCleanTech, UofGeorgia; Photo via Wili

While cellulosic biofuels are making their advances, not far behind are still more methods for turning crops into biofuels. Despite the unpopularity of using most crops for biofuel sources, jatropha, an inedible plant, is getting a boost in popularity. The oily seeds of the bushy plant are used to create biodiesel, and nearly 2.5 million acres have been planted so far in India, one of the world’s largest producers. In fact, it is one of the most popular biodiesel crops around because harvesters can get a large output of oil from the seeds (producing four times as much fuel as soy, and 10 times as much as corn) while needing to put in only minimal care and resources for growth. Hindustan Petroleum and Chhattisgarh Renewable Energy Development Agency plan to boost that by planting about 37,000 more acres on wastelands in India.

Hindustan Petroleum will refine the seeds from the harvest into biodiesel to sell across the state of Chhattisgarh. Jatropha is intriguing for biodiesel production because the plant grows in areas where edible crops fear to tread, so it is supposedly a non-competitor for farm land. But that doesn’t mean a whole lot if farmers can get more for a crop of jatropha seeds than another food crop they typically grow on their land. Additionally, the areas deemed “wastelands” are in fact used by land-right-less rural populations for grazing their herds. So jatropha cultivation – like most crops for biofuel and biodiesel – isn’t necessarily harmless and farming of it will need to be watched and regulated.

Jatropha isn’t just on the rise in India, but also here in the states, with My Dream Fuel LLC, successfully angling to get citrus growers with diseased trees and cattle ranchers who might want to add something new to their repertoire to plant crops in Southwest Florida – despite the existence of many of our own abandoned farmlands for potential use. Jatropha, while hailed as a miracle crop for biodiesel (alongside algae) and far better than many other crops for biodiesel or biofuels, including the latest inquiries into kudzu, is still a fuel source to keep a close watch on.

Via Treehugger, Cleantech, Naples News; Photo via The Jatropha System