Sweet Sorghum

Sweet sorghum is a summer annual grass crop that has been grown in limited amounts in North Carolina for local molasses production?. The juice extracted from the stalks provides a source of aqueous sugar that is easier to convert into ethanol than it is to convert starch and cellulose into ethanol. Production inputs are thought to be less than that for corn. Low inputs and a high yield of easily fermentable sugars? make sweet sorghum a potential crop to produce renewable liquid transportation fuel.

To help determine the sustainability of sweet sorghum as an energy crop, the Biofuels Center of North Carolina is funding research conducted by NC State University scientists at the Biofuels Campus in Oxford, and at research stations in Wallace, Plymouth, and Clayton in North Carolina. This research is focused on developing cost-effective methods to produce fermentable sugars from sweet sorghum by addressing questions concerning large-scale production, processing, and storage. The research is designed to: * Develop a mechanized harvest and juice expelling system; * Determine the best agronomic practices to produce sugars and quantify the efficiency of converting the sugar into ethanol; and, * Identify beneficial uses for the crushed stalk residue?.

There are multiple types of sorghum, bred for sugar, grain, or forage silage. Grain sorghum has been used by the ethanol industry for some time because it uses the same process and yields approximately the same amount of ethanol per bushel as corn.

Because of its excellent characteristics, sweet sorghum is also researched, grown and cultivars exported elsewhere in the world. There is a roundup of links about sweet sorghum on the page: Sweet sorghum by country.

Approximately, 15% of the U.S. grain sorghum crop is already used in ethanol production. Because of sweet sorghum's similarity to sugarcane?, it should prove to be a good alternative biofuels feedstock. There is an added benefit of using it: the silage? remaining after its sugar is extracted is high in nutrient value and can be used for animal feed. Additionally, historically North Carolina has grown sorghum in the past, so this crop should prove viable.

Quick Facts

* There are currently eight ethanol plants in the U.S. that use grain sorghum.
* The crop has a well-established record for ethanol production in India and Brazil.
* Sweet sorghum is drought-tolerant and only needs about 14% of the average water requirement of * sugarcane.
* Sweet sorghum can be grown throughout temperate climate zones of the United States.
* Sorghum is an annual and can fit well into a crop rotation.
* Although sorghum is typically considered to be an annual plant, there are related varieties that are rhizomatous? and perennial?.
* For every unit of fossil fuel energy it consumes, sweet sorghum produces eight units and can go as high as 12 to 16 units in temperate areas.
* Studies have also shown that sweet sorghum is carbon neutral?, emitting only as much carbon dioxide as it absorbs.
* In Florida, plants mature in 90 to 120 days and can grow 12 feet tall.