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Researchers to make biofuel from poplar forests using termites
10/04/2009
In San Francisco scientists are developing ways to make biofuels from fast-growing poplar forests using a microbe extracted from termites.
The scientists are currently working on refining the process along with several other processes for developing the fuels that may replace petrol and crude oil to power our transport systems.
The researchers are aware that there is, potentially, vast amounts of money to be made by the successful developers, and that the need for alternative, sustainable fuels is ever more pressing.
Federal energy officials want to replace 30% of transport fuel with biofuels by 2030.
Research is particularly prevalent in the San Francisco Bay area and scientists are using processes such as genetic engineering, chemistry and synthetic biology to find out how nature breaks down natural matter to access energy stored in plants from the sun.
Nature is the key to unlocking the energy within plant matter, according to the scientists who are hoping to use microbes in termites’ guts, which break down vast quantities of wood into fermentable sugars. They are also looking at other enzymes and at algae as other possible ways to extract energy from plants and trees.
The scientists are currently working on refining the process along with several other processes for developing the fuels that may replace petrol and crude oil to power our transport systems.
The researchers are aware that there is, potentially, vast amounts of money to be made by the successful developers, and that the need for alternative, sustainable fuels is ever more pressing.
Federal energy officials want to replace 30% of transport fuel with biofuels by 2030.
Research is particularly prevalent in the San Francisco Bay area and scientists are using processes such as genetic engineering, chemistry and synthetic biology to find out how nature breaks down natural matter to access energy stored in plants from the sun.
Nature is the key to unlocking the energy within plant matter, according to the scientists who are hoping to use microbes in termites’ guts, which break down vast quantities of wood into fermentable sugars. They are also looking at other enzymes and at algae as other possible ways to extract energy from plants and trees.
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