Profound changes sweeping across the Northeast are fueling innovation for the introduction of exciting new crops and products that could change the future of agriculture, forestry and rural America — energy biomass and bioproducts.

American agriculture has reasons to be optimistic for the future, says Thomas C. Dorr, U.S. Undersecretary for Rural Development. As rising costs and demands underscore the wisdom of preparing now for a transition from our petroleum-based economy, a “major new cash crop” could become a growing presence in rural America. “Energy from agriculture, in fact, offers the rural economy its biggest new market in history,” he predicts.

Given the challenges of an intensely competitive, highly networked global economy, what can we do to create sustainable growth in rural America? The answer lies in opportunities created from our available resources, Dorr notes.  

Coming to a forest or field near you

One energy resource is so abundant that it may not be obvious to most people — cellulose. Chemically a polysaccharide (complex sugar), cellulose is meriting a closer look as a viable, renewable fuel source. The most common organic matter on earth, Northeast sources of cellulose include willow, switchgrass, agricultural and forestry residues, pulp and paper mill wastes and corn stover. These organic resources all contain carbon, oxygen and hydrogen — no different than oil.

Research and development of energy cash crops that could be produced on marginal agricultural lands is already in its early commercialization phase thanks to work at the College of Environmental Science and Forestry of the State University of New York (SUNYESF). Fast growing shrub willows, for instance, show promise as a sustainable fossil fuel replacement. New willow clones developed through SUNY-ESF’s controlled breeding program can grow some 20 to 40 percent faster than the native shrub willow.

“We feel optimistic for the production of ethanol in the Northeast,” says Dr. Cornelius “Neil” B. Murphy, Jr., SUNY-ESF president. “What we need to focus on is the biomass in the Northeast to create the ethanol. Some of that is agricultural based. Some is wood based.”

Recently Dr. Murphy commended an innovative $20 million program in the state budget to develop a pilot wood-to-ethanol facility.

“The need for alternative energy has never been more obvious than today as we assess New York’s heating and fuel bills,” Dr. Murphy says. In cooperation with private sector partners in the agricultural and forest product industries, the university is seeking ways to “ensure future fuel, chemical and plastics feedstocks are sustainable, renewable and diversified. Together we can use existing infrastructure, create new jobs and develop a commercial market for renewable domestic woody biomass. This is clearly the environmentally sensible choice to ensure energy independence.”

Dr. Murphy says, “From our perspective at ESF, innovation is in the area of research in the forest products industry with a tie-in to agriculture. If you look at some of our high-grade timber, a lot of our lumber is going either north to Canada or to other parts of the country. We are currently making one to two cents per pound on what we are exporting. Our focus is to develop higher-value end products.”

Dr. Murphy points to the work of Dr. Thomas E. Amidon and his colleagues at SUNY-ESF’s paper science and engineering department who have developed a process for removing energy-rich sugars from wood, a process that could help provide local feedstocks for ethanol production and lead the evolution of paper mills into more efficient and sustainable bio-refineries.

The process involves mixing ordinary wood chips with water and heating the solution at high temperatures. The heating time can be shortened if the chips are first subjected to biopulping, a process that allows natural wood-decaying fungi to break down the lignin that binds the cellulose in the wood.

A major advantage of the process is it does not use any harsh chemicals. “Water is the solvent we use. It’s my preferred solvent because if it gets loose in the world, it is just water and the world knows how to deal with it,” explains Dr. Amidon. In addition to extracting sugar from the wood, scientists can extract acetic acid, a key ingredient of polyvinyl acetate, a plastic used in many consumer goods. The commercial value of acetic acid is nearly three times that of ethanol.

The process is a natural fit for the Northeast. New York State alone has more than 18-million acres of mostly hardwood forests. The sugars in hardwood trees are simpler than those found in softwood trees, and they are four times more plentiful. The process is not choosy about the type of hardwood; water-based sugar extraction works as well from forest grown maples as from willow biomass crops.

“You can also extract these components from grasses, but grasses go dormant in the winter and they’re difficult and expensive to store for use in a year-round process,” Dr. Amidon said. “And trees are dense. They can be shipped and stored economically, and they are more efficient energy collectors than annual crops. After the desired components are extracted, the residue can be burned or gasified for combined heat and power uses.”

Wood Chemistry 101

Chemical research followed by practical commercial application is part of the emerging bioenergy equation.

“When we extract these hemicellulosic polymers, we also extract chemicals from wood-like acetic acid and there are a suite of other chemicals,” says Dr. Murphy. “Part of our research is how we separate these other chemicals and what is their commercial application.”

Wood has three components — cellulose, lignin and hemicellulose. Cellulose, which comprises almost half, contains the fibers that give wood its unique structure. Lignin has a high-energy value when it is burned to fuel a mill. But in the milling process, lignin and hemicellulose are combined in the spent pulping liquor, and since hemicellulose has half the heating value of lignin, burning hemicellulose does the mill little good. Almost half of the wood becomes valuable pulp; the other half is burned for fuel, half of which does not generate much heat.

However, hemicellulose is a valuable feedstock for ethanol production. Once an efficient method of converting hemicellulose into sugars for fermentation to ethanol is developed, commercialization will usher in new opportunities for the agricultural and forestry products industries in the Northeast.

Bio-refining the forest products industry

Similar thinking at the University of Maine is ramping up research for transforming pulp and paper mills into bio-refineries thanks to some $10.35 million in grants.

“This project enables UMaine to ensure our role in the state’s economy with the creation of new jobs, with the ability to perform research and develop ideas that create and enhance industry with unique, highly relevant educational opportunities,” says Robert Kennedy, University of Maine president.

Working with private sector partners, researchers are exploring the commercial viability of new wood products currently produced from oil. Like petroleum, chemicals derived from trees could be used in a variety of plastics, adhesives, composites and even nano-materials. A car fender made from a wood-derived resin is just one example of a commercial application developed at the university.

Key to this type of research is the understanding of sustainable forestry, which will create healthier, higher value forests. “By taking this ‘holistic’ approach, Maine has the opportunity to build on our current knowledge and history in forest-based industries,” says Hemant Pendse, of the chemical and biological engineering department at UMaine.

The research energy being poured into these investigations is complemented by other efforts to advance bioproduct technologies. One example is the work of the Fractionation Development Center, a nonprofit organization working on biomass conversion technologies in western Maine. The center specializes in technologies that reduce wood to its basic organic elements — oxygen, hydrogen and carbon, and then recombines those elements to create fuels, fuel additives, gases, chemicals, flavorings, pharmaceuticals and cosmetics.

Bio-refining the future of Northeast agriculture and forestry

Biomass that can be grown, collected, utilized and replaced, promises to create new revenue streams in the Northeast, and not just for fuel. Unique technology leading to commercialization of high-profit margin biochemicals that would leave a smaller, lighter ecological footprint is also within sight. This new convergence of science and industry promises to usher in the next wave of jobs, growth and prosperity to the Northeast agricultural and forestry products industries.

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