BIOFUELS SUPPLEMENT
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A bi-weekly summary of world developments on biofuels, produced by the Global Knowledge Center on Crop Biotechnology, International Service for the Acquisition of Agri-biotech Applications SEAsiaCenter (ISAAA)
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April 29, 2011

In This Issue:

News and Trends
- IEA Transport Biofuels Roadmap Report 2011 Stresses Sustainability and International Cooperation 
- Direct Ethanol Fermentation of Agricultural Waste Biomass by a Cellulolytic Enzyme-Expressing Yeast 
- Researchers Look Into Local Climate Impacts of Expanded Sugarcane Cultivations for Biofuels in Brazil 

Energy Crops and Feedstocks for Biofuels Production
- High-sugar Ryegrass as Potential Bioethanol Feedstock 

Biofuels Processing
- ASU Gets USDA Research Grant to Study Algal Crop Failure 

Biofuels Policy and Economics
- Corn Ethanol Industry Impacts on US Economics, Environment and Agriculture 
- Report on the Ethical Issues of Current Biofuel Policies 





* NEWS AND TRENDS *

IEA Transport Biofuels Roadmap Report 2011 Stresses Sustainability and International Cooperation
http://www.iea.org/papers/2011/biofuels_roadmap.pdf
http://www.iea.org/press/pressdetail.asp?PRESS_REL_ID=411

The International Energy Agency (IEA) recently announced the release of its report, "Technology Map: Biofuels for Transport". The roadmap identifies the primary tasks that are needed to globally accelerate the sustainable deployment of biofuels, and it also "discusses barriers and challenges to large-scale biofuel deployment, such as the need for commercialization of advanced biofuel technologies, relatively high production costs and supply chain logistics, as well as broader issues governing sustainable feedstock production and biofuel market structures".

Biofuels are reported to have the capability to provide up to 27% of world transportation fuel by 2050. However, technologies and policy actions must be identified in order to expand biofuels in a sustainable way. The IEA press release describes some highlights of the report as follows: (1) The Need for Efficient Technologies: "Further support for advanced biofuel research, development and demonstration is still needed to improve conversion efficiencies and reduce costs"; (2) The Importance of Sustainability: Governments should adopt mandatory sustainability standards for biofuels, and ensure that they are internationally aligned. Since many points of criticism on biofuels' sustainability are issues concerning the agricultural sector, biofuel policies should be aligned with those in agriculture, forestry and rural development; (3) The Need for International Collaboration: "To ensure developing countries can successfully adopt sustainable biofuel production, international collaboration on capacity building and technology transfer will be necessary; developing countries interested in introducing biofuels can profit from the experience of other regions, including lessons learned and best practices for biofuel production, as well as the government policies that can help ensure that required investments are beneficial for local economies".

The full report can be accessed at the IEA website (URL above).

Scientists from the Department of Chemical Science and Engineering and the Organization of Advanced Science and Technology, Kobe University (Japan) report the first "proof-of-concept" study for the direct fermentation of agricultural biomass (rice straw) to ethanol, using a "cellulolytic enzyme-expressing yeast without the addition of exogenous enzymes."

Conventionally, lignocellulosic feedstocks (such as rice straw) must undergo prior pretreatment and saccharification steps before these could be fermented to ethanol by yeasts. The saccharification step for conversion of cellulose into ethanol-fermentable sugars usually involves the addition of (relatively expensive) cellulose-hydrolyzing (cellulase) enzymes. The report of a direct utilization of lignocellulosic feedstocks by a recombinant yeast (harboring the genes for cellulolytic-enzyme expression), can be an important breakthrough in lowering the cost of cellulose-ethanol production.

In the development of the yeast strain, the researchers used a "cocktail δ-integration method" to optimize cellulase expression in two yeast strains of opposite mating types. They mated these strains to produce a diploid strain with enhanced cellulase expression. The diploid strain is reported to produce 7.6 g/l ethanol in 72 hours, with an ethanol yield that achieved 75% of the theoretical value. It also produced 7.5 g/l ethanol from pretreated rice straw in 72 hours.

The full results are published in the open-access journal, Biotechnology for Biofuels (URL above).

Brazil is a major producer of biofuel ethanol (second to the United States), using sugarcane as the dominant feedstock. The expansion of land-use change for the cultivation of sugarcane is most likely to have major impacts on climate change; however, these impacts are not yet fully understood. Scientists from Stanford University and University of Montana (United States) attempted to obtain insights into these impacts by quantifying climate effects of sugarcane expansion in the Brazilian Cerrado. This area is reported to be a vast savannah (south of the Amazon basin), where large agricultural areas have been increasingly converted to sugarcane plantations for biofuel production.

The bioenergy website (URL above) gives highlights of their methodology as follows: "Using maps and data from hundreds of satellite images, the researchers calculated the temperature, the amount of water given off and how much light was reflected rather than absorbed for each of the different types of vegetation." Their results showed that sugarcane reduced the local temperature by an average of 0.93 degrees Celsius (1.67 degrees Fahrenheit), compared to land cultivated with other annual crops. The expansion of sugar cane into existing crop and pasture land has been found to have a "direct local cooling effect that reinforces the indirect climate benefits of this land-use option".

The full study is is published in the journal, Nature Climate Change (URL) above.

A scientific team from Glyndŵr University, Aberystwyth University and Bangor University (all in Wales) has obtained a research grant from the Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council's Integrated Bio-refining Research and Technology Club (IBTI) to look into ryegrass as a biorefinery feedstock. Ryegrasses are considered to grow ideally under climatic/soil conditions in the United Kingdom, can thrive on marginal lands, and can have yields of about 15 tonnes dry weight per hectare per year. One aim of  the research is to investigate how sugars from new types of ryegrass can be chemically processed to produce a wide variety of bioproducts, including biofuel ethanol. Ryegrass is known to be a "cool season grass" with desirable agronomic qualities. The new forms of ryegrass are reported to have fructans (polysaccharides of fructose) as the main storage carbohydrates, instead of starch molecules which are found in traditional ryegrasses.

Fructans are more amenable to processing into ethanol compared to starch, because of their high water solubility and saccharification to simple sugars needs only a single. They are also easier to modify into other biobased products. In addition to the production of ethanol, the production of other value-added products from ryegrass (also known as the "biorefinery" concept) is necessary in order to make commercialization realizable. One target is to "utilise the diverse range of fructan molecules found in the ryegrass, as well as novel molecules created by the action of fructan hydrolysing enzymes on the fructans to produce novel high value chemicals."

Related information on ryegrass: http://pubs.cas.psu.edu/freepubs/pdfs/uc080.pdf.

The Arizona State University (ASU) (United States) obtained a research grant from the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) to study the factors involved in algal crop failure. Algae (particularly marine algae) are sometimes known as the "third generation biofuel feedstock". The oil from the cultivated algae is usually processed into biodiesel fuel. During large scale mass-cultivations of algae, crop failures occur, resulting in productivity and economic losses.

One of the main causes for algal crop failure is contamination by predatory zooplankton. Although cultivation under extreme, environmentally selective conditions (to prevent zooplankton growth) can be a strategy for reducing contamination, there are not too many strains of algae which can thrive under such extreme conditions.

The University of Arizona website explains the team's research strategy as follows: (1) survey of zooplankton contamination in commercial algal production systems, as well as in ASU's own algae test-bed facilities, (2) determination of living and non-living influencers on zooplankton, aiming at developing an empirical model for assessment and prediction of potential impact of zooplankton contamination on overall algal culture stability and biomass production potential. A "Best Management Practices Plan" will be one of the outputs of the study. A rapid, sensitive monitoring and an early warning system will also be developed using state-of-the-art bio-imaging and DNA fingerprinting techniques.

Scientists from the University of Tennessee, Knoxville (United States) report the use of a "Policy Analysis simulation model to look at ethanol production scenarios from 2007 to 2016, and evaluated the impacts of corn-ethanol production on land-use and environment for the United States agriculture in these scenarios.

Some results of the study are: (1) increased corn ethanol production had a positive effect on net farm income and economics of the agricultural sector of the United States; (2) traditional corn-growing areas in the mid-continental United States would see substantial shifts in land use for expansion of corn cultivation; (3) traditional growing areas for other crops (such as soybean and cotton) will be shifted out in favor of increased corn production, (4) other effects of increased corn production include: increase in fertilizer and chemical usage, increase in soil erosion, increase in fossil-fuel bases carbon emissions, decrease in soil carbon stocks.

Some strategies to mitigate the potentially adverse impacts from increased corn ethanol production include: (1) the adoption of additional conservation tillage and (2) the use of genetically modified crops with increased nitrogen efficiency. To maximize the potential benefits in the high-risk areas that have been identified, policies and incentives to encourage adoption of conservation tillage and precision farming practices are recommended.

The full study is published in the journal, Journal of Soil and Water Conservation (URL above).

A report by the Nuffield Council on Bioethics analyzes current biofuel policies and puts up an ethical framework to guide policy making for both current and future biofuels. According to the report, some present biofuel policies in the United Kingdom and in Europe are "weak when it comes to protecting the environment, reducing greenhouse gas emissions and avoiding human rights violations in developing countries". In the development of new biofuel technologies, few incentives to avoid these problems are also been observed. Strategies which consider the wider impacts of biofuel production (i.e. deforestation) would be helpful. Research and development into more "ethical types of biofuels" are also encouraged.

The report recommends that "there should be a set of overarching ethical conditions for all biofuels produced in and imported into Europe". These conditions include the following: (1) consideration of human rights in biofuels development, (2) good environmental sustainability biofuels, (3) significant contribution for the reduction of greenhouse gas emissions, (4) adherence to fair trade principles, (5) equitable distribution of costs and benefits of biofuels. The use of some kind of "certification scheme" (similar to the "Fair Trade Scheme" for cocoa and coffee) to enforce the above conditions was also suggested.

The full report can be accessed at the Nuffield Foundation website (URL above).