Carbon footprints. The rising cost of gasoline. Coal, wind or solar power. Energy issues are promoting much discussion today, including in Kansas.
And they're all researchers at Kansas State University's Center for Sustainable Energy think about.
The center, which began taking shape earlier this year, is an effort to bring together all renewable and sustainable energy related activities at K-State – which is saying a lot. That work spans three of K-State's colleges and several departments.
"By consolidating university-wide work on bioenergy, Kansas State University will realize its own efficiencies, which will allow us to take our research to the next level," said M. Duane Nellis, K-State provost and senior vice president. "K-State researchers and resources are being invested in solving this pressing global problem."
The center has three primary goals: to research and develop sustainable energy systems and lower greenhouse gas emissions; to educate those on and off campus about sustainable energy; and to facilitate the adoption of new technology by industrial users. The center was established with a $750,000 K-State Targeted Excellence grant to provide incentives for active research in sustainable energy.
Initially, center activities have focused on the sustainable and efficient conversion of biomass to biofuels and related products. Biomass is the biological material used to produce fuel, typically from plants.
"Kansas State University is uniquely positioned to succeed in this arena," said Mary Rezac, one of the center's two co-directors. "From designing a genetically better plant to understanding the ultimate impact of the emissions which are generated by biofuels, we have researchers who are actively involved."
Much of the work to date has had to do with ethanol, an alcohol fuel that is gaining in popularity. Ethanol is made when the starch in grain like corn is converted to sugar, which is then fermented. That process also produces distillers grains and carbon dioxide.
Distillers grains are fed to livestock as a partial replacement for other feed grains. But the animals can only eat so much of it before growth performance and beef quality are affected.
K-State's Praveen Vadlani, an assistant professor of grain science and industry, has devised a secondary fermentation process through which he's been able to add protein and other nutrients to distillers grains. The hope is that this added value will make it more marketable.
But as the demand for ethanol increases it's likely that the co-product will need additional outlets. Vadlani also is looking at what other chemicals and products can be derived from distillers grains to replace those made today from nonrenewable petroleum resources.
Researcher Bikram Gill, university distinguished professor of plant pathology, is working to engineer plants so that more of the physical structure can be converted into fuel. The kind of ethanol that is commercially available today is made from the starch in grain. But things like wheat bran, straw and dedicated energy crops like switchgrass can go into producing what is called cellulosic ethanol. That process involves breaking down the plants structural components, which is not easy. Gill is working on the genetic level to make these components more susceptible for deconstruction, so that biomass can more efficiently be converted into fuel.
"We've had millennia of evolving the plants for use as food. We haven't selected them for their potential to produce fuel," said Ron Madl, the Center for Sustainable Energy's other co-director. "Our goal now is to develop plant resources designed for more efficient conversion to energy or bio-based products."
Center researchers also are looking at new plants for fuel and the most sustainable way to manage crops. Part of that research has to do with water and the amount of carbon and other nutrients retained in the soil.
Overall, the center will allow for better coordination of efforts across departments and it will ensure that K-State is efficiently using its own resources to solve energy issues.