GAINESVILLE, Fla. (Ivanhoe Newswire) -- Every year, the United States uses 180 billion gallons of oil to fuel our cars and trucks. Now, farm waste is being used to make fuel.
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For over 30 years, farmer Guy Hale has made his living off the land.
"The way I look at it, agriculture built this country," Hale told Ivanhoe.
He grows hay and millet to feed his cows, but tight times have made it difficult being in the farming industry.
"I think we need a new market … a little niche or something," Hale said.
Microbiologists at the University of Florida may have found that new niche. They've developed a way to turn farm waste into fuel. Just like yeast ferments grapes to make wine, Lonnie Ingram, Ph.D., a microbiologist at the University of Florida in Gainesville, Fla., genetically engineered E. coli bacteria to convert the sugar in corn cobs, leaves, wood and other plant products into ethanol.
"E. coli is actually the workhorse of biotechnology," Dr. Ingram told Ivanhoe.
Farm waste is first soaked in a mineral acid and then squeezed through a press. A steam treatment turns it into a syrup. Enzymes are added and it's put into a machine to ferment for a few days.
"The wood's mainly made of cellulose and it takes the cellulose, and picture it almost like an alligator … It chews along the sugar chain," Michael Mullinnix, a research microbiologist at the University of Florida in Gainesville, Fla., told Ivanhoe.
After being filtered, the end product is ethanol. Experts estimate half the automotive fuel in the U.S. could be replaced using this technology.
"The technology has the opportunity to make a significant contribution to replacing imported petroleum," Dr. Ingram said.
It's also better for the environment. It works in a closed cycle so it won't emit excess carbon dioxide into the atmosphere. The same amount of CO2 it takes to grow what the farm wastes is the same amount that's returned to the air when the ethanol is burned.
"Biofuels offer an immediate route to reducing the rate at which we're changing our atmosphere," Dr. Ingram said.
For farmers like Hale, the prospect sounds promising.
"If you can get into it and make it work, I think it'd be great," Hale said.
A plant in Lousianna is currently using the technology to produce ethanol. A second plant is being built in Florida this year and is expected to produce 36 million gallons of ethanol a year by 2011. The genetically modified E. coli can also be used to produce biodegradable plastics from biomass.
Each year America uses 180 billion gallons of oil to fuel our cars and trucks. Farmers may have the answer to the problem by turning their waste into fuel.
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