08/23/07 Biomass removal for biofuels to be studied by Northwest scientists

Farm and Ranch August 23, 2007 Washington State University's Center for Precision Agriculture Systems has received a three-year 395-thousand dollar grant from the USDA to study some of the impacts from the use of crop biomass in biofuel production. Center director Francis Pierce, says no one knows how the mass production and removal of biofuel crops for cellulosic biofuel production will affect the soil and production of those crops. Pierce: "The grant is to look at how removal and non-removal of crop residues of corn and wheat, and how the production of switch grass and polycultures of grasses and legumes will affect the soil processes including carbon and nitrogen cycling and microbial fate and activity." Pierce says the research will be taking place at two locations in the Pacific Northwest. Pierce: "One at the WSU Irrigated Ag Research and Extension Center where we have 7-8 inches of annual rainfall but with irrigation we can create almost any productivity environment found in the United States. And the second location is at the USDA-ARS Pendleton, Oregon research site., which is in the intermediate rainfall zone of dryland wheat production. And they are going to be looking at three levels, natural levels, the high rainfall zones and also high-end irrigated production levels." I'm Bob Hoff and that's the Northwest Farm and Ranch Report on the Northwest Ag Information Network.