Farm News, IA
11-23-07
Professor builds ‘next generation’ biomass system
By KRISS NELSON, Farm News staff writer
Stuart Birrell, associate professor with Iowa State University, has created a biomass harvester system.
AMES – Harvest, storage and transportation systems for “next generation” biomass crops were the key topics during the 2007 Biobased Industry Outlook conference held Nov. 5-6 at Iowa State University (ISU) in Ames.
Stuart Birrell, Ph.D., associate professor with ISU had the opportunity to present the biomass harvester he has been developing for several years.
The most common ingredient to making ethanol thus far in Iowa has been corn and now experts are agreeing the future of ethanol will require various amounts of biomass, which for Iowa will most likely mean corn stover.
“There will be all different types of material used to reach targets. It will be very regional for example, corn stover in the Corn Belt is the biggest potential at the moment. The south may use woody material and out west they may use straw.
“As they (ethanol plants) come on board there will be a large demand for cellulosic material,” Birrell said. “I see the progression of present plants adding a cellulosic facility adjacent to their grain facility and have both.”
According to information provided by ISU, to accomplish an efficient way of harvesting and moving corn stover from the field to the biomass processing facilities, simple and effective equipment that allows rapid collection of large quantities of stover most be developed, without significant interference of other harvest operations. The primary emphasis of this work has been on innovative single-pass corn and stover harvesting systems, which have both economic and technical advantages for the bioconversion process.
One particular system Birrell has been working on is a stover processing and conveying system attachment to a John Deere 9750 STS combine. The machine incorporates a John Deere 653A whole-crop head that collects the entire plant, which is then fed through the combine. This harvester then threshes and separates the grain as normal, except that the material other than grain (MOG) to grain ratio is significantly higher than for a conventional corn head. The MOG is then chopped by a rotary slicer taken from a production baler. The chopped stover and cobs are then transitioned into a blower and spout from a forage harvester and transferred into a transport trailer.
The most important key, Birrell said is to keep it flexible for the farmer.
“We’re looking at attachments and different (corn) heads,” Birrell said. “Our system is about flexibility at the flip of a switch, the farmer can switch back to conventional harvesting so they don’t need to invest in a completely new machine.”
Birrell said he is unsure just when exactly these attachments for biomass harvesting will become available.
“I don’t know the commercial availability,” he said. “It could be possibly three to five years as the industry develops.”