Viaspace Cultivating High-Biomass Grass 11/23/09 11:42:19 AM Printer Friendly VersionPrinter Friendly Version
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By Todd Neeley
DTN Staff Reporter
OMAHA (DTN) -- Viaspace could be a sleeping giant waiting for U.S. power plants and cellulosic ethanol producers to get their act together.
Right now the Irvine, Calif., company, which went public in 2005, is carving out a niche in the biomass-to-energy business.
Viaspace is developing a crop in subtropical areas of southern China that it calls "Giant King Grass" -- a high-biomass dynamo that contains two-and-a-half times more energy than switchgrass.
Viaspace CEO, Chairman and co-founder Carl Kukkonen said the company is teaching Chinese farmers to grow the crop near a 30-megawatt power plant that uses biomass instead of coal.
"In China and around the world there are a lot of biomass electricity plants," he said, "and zero cellulosic ethanol plants."
He said the U.S.'s limitation on ethanol blends to E10 in standard vehicles means there is little demand for cellulosic ethanol, leading the company to concentrate its efforts offshore. Ethanol advocacy group Growth Energy has petitioned the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency to allow E15.
Viaspace concentrates on growing, harvesting and processing King Grass into dense pellets that are burned by power plants. It's growing the biomass on about 250 acres.
In a news release this week, Viaspace said it believes it can develop up to 25,000 planted acres of King Grass. Included in this plan are potential projects for 2010 involving 5,000 acres that would produce about 200,000 tons of King Grass pellets that could be sold for about $20 million.
US Power Plants not Part of Market
Kukkonen said because the U.S. didn't sign the Kyoto protocol, U.S. power plants aren't required to use biomass, so there's little or no U.S. market although several states have renewable energy requirements prompting coal plants to burn biomass.
In China, however, he said the government not only buys power from biomass power plants, but it provides subsidies for the production of that power.
Viaspace is banking on the U.S. government to head in the same direction.
"We think it's a matter of time," Kukkonen said. "We believe it's going to be big, and we want to be positioned when it happens. Most (U.S.) utilities are not happy to have offtake agreements with biomass companies."
Viaspace is working with DP Cleantech, which has built 19 biomass power plants in China.
King Grass Could Grow in Cooler Climates
DTN Agronomist Dan Davidson said the scientific name for Giant King Grass is Pennisetum genus, which is related to elephant grass.
In southern China, Kukkonen said, King Grass grows to be 12 to 15 feet. Although the species is best suited for tropical and subtropical climates, he said the company would consider growing the crop in cooler areas of the U.S.
King Grass could be grown from May to November in the cooler regions of the Corn Belt. However, Kukkonen said it would require replanting every year because the colder climate would kill the plant. In warmer climates, the plant is perennial, although Kukkonen recommends replanting every seven or eight years. If Viaspace makes an entry into the U.S. at some point, he said it would be in the South and Southeast where sugarcane is grown.
"If you can rotate with a legume where you can fix nitrogen," Kukkonen said, "it would be a perfect scenario -- soybeans for a few years then rotate back."
DTN's Dan Davidson said King Grass would be tough to include in the typical corn-soybean rotation in the Corn Belt, but not impossible.
"It won’t fit well into a corn and soybean rotation," he said. "It is not adapted to cooler, temperate climates like miscanthus or switchgrass. But generally these species like poor and marginal soils where crops don’t fare so well.
"But (in) the U.S. it could have dual purposes, pelleted for coal fire plants or baled and ground and digested for ethanol. It will have all the characteristics of switchgrass, miscanthus and other grass species for cellulosic conversion. However, it will be adapted to different environments and that is a good thing."
In the second year of growing King Grass, Kukkonen said it could be harvested at three feet high every three months. It has the ability to produce about 71 tons of biomass per acre. If harvested continuously King Grass typically needs to be replanted, he said.
"It uses much less fertilizer than corn and is grown as an energy crop," Kukkonen said. "You're not linked to the food-ripening cycle and can harvest continuously."
When it's first planted the King Grass plant needs to be weeded, and it needs about 32 inches of water and more than 100 days of sun per year, he said. As a result King Grass would be most suitable for warmer, wetter U.S. regions.
It is not an invasive species, Kukkonen said. The company will propagate seedlings by division. He said planting is as simple as digging a hole, dropping in the seedling, covering it up, fertilizing and watering. It's almost like planting a flower garden.
In China, a 30-megawatt power plant requires about 600 tons of King Grass each day. Kukkonen said when the crop is harvested it contains 60 to 65 percent moisture. Then, it can be laid in a field for 10 days to dry down to about 25 percent. At that point, he said it is similar in texture to corn stover.
In China, Kukkonen said his company can produce the grass for about $20 a ton at 25 percent moisture. He said U.S. farmers could probably get anywhere from $36 to $80 a ton for the King Grass, sold either to a biomass power plant or a cellulosic ethanol plant.
He said the company isn't willing to start growing the grass without an agreement with a power plant. So getting started in the United States would require a 30-megawatt biomass-using power plant and about 3,500 acres to grow King Grass.
"You can haul the stuff to a power plant cut to two feet in length," Kukkonen said. "You don't have to bale or store it. We'd like to get a farmer going in the U.S."
Todd Neeley can be reached at todd.neeley@dtn.com. Copyright 2009 DTN/The Progressive Farmer- A Telvent brand. All rights reserved.
