Bio fuel grass or other cash crop?

[coffeeman]

I just heard about some city that is letting farmers grow some kind of grass on public land to be used for bio fuel. It was a radio thing and I didn't catch it all. In fact I might have gotten it all wrong.

Now I'm wondering, are there any new plants that could be grown cheaper than corn and yield a better crop for fuel. Some kind of plant that might grow on crummy land, thus less cost to get to market. Wouldn't it be nice to use those hundreds of thousands of acres that are growing up in brush? I pass a couple thousand acres laying idle on my way to work and I don't drive far. I start at my door with 100 acres that I don't do anything with, except cut a couple times a year.

Cheers....Coffeeman

 

[Flatheadyoungin]

i don't know anything about it, other than remembering Bush say something about "switch grass".......might google it

 

[texasjohn]

Switch grass grows best in good bottom land deep soil sites..... but, it's not nearly as energy dense as is corn, so, you have to concentrate it a little bit... feed it to cows, then fatten the cows up with corn and make fuel from the fat when they are slaughtered.... at least that's my idea of how it would work best.

 

[vsteel]

I did a little search on google and didn't find the article I was looking for but here is the best I can remember.

In and issue of Successful Farming, they had an article on ethanol and the amount of diesel that is needed to grow it.

It basically worked like this, don't be too harsh if my numbers are off.

Corn was a 1 to 5 ratio. (for 1 gallon of diesel you would get 5 of ethanol by the end of the process.)
Corn silage 1 to 7
sugar beets 1 to 9
sugar cane 1 to 12
switch grass 1 to 17.

Like I said, I might be a little off on my numbers, but the bottom line of the story was it was a mistake to try and make all of our ethanol from corn. To really use it we need to get really high ratios of fuel out for the fuel that needs to be put into it.

I don't remember the issue that it was in, but I am sure someone here will post a link or quote on more exact information.

 

[LRH]

If anykind of fuel could be made from kudzu, I'd be rich beyond my wildest dreams; down south that stuff will grow in an asphalt parking lot................