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Our Bureau

Hyderabad , Aug 12

THE International Crops Research Institute for the Semi-Arid Tropics (ICRISAT) is strengthening its collaboration with partners to promote sweet sorghum varieties, hybrids and technologies to extract alcohol from the crop.

According to Dr William Dar, Director General of ICRISAT, the sweet sorghum varieties, hybrids and technologies developed by the institute hold high promise for the farmers of the semi-arid tropics as they can grow with less water.

In addition to the grain, he said, the crop could be used to produce ethanol in a more environment-friendly manner compared to sugarcane. The ethanol could be used to blend with petrol and diesel for producing gasohol.

In a press release here, Dr Dar stated that the Agri Business Incubator (ABI) at ICRISAT has signed a memorandum of agreement (MoA) with Rusni Distilleries Pvt Ltd of Hyderabad to incubate the ethanol production technology using these sweet-stalk sorghum lines.

ICRISAT has also signed another MoA with Vasanthadada Sugar Institute (VSI) of Pune for identification and development of improved sweet sorghum varieties, characterising the juice, ethanol quality and quantity, and also providing process technology to Rusni Distilleries through ABI.

ICRISAT is hopeful that private seed companies would complement the efforts of the national programme in the development of location-specific hybrids with sugar-rich high stalk yield to meet the expected increased demand for raw material for ethanol production in the years to come.

Dr Dar stated that according to a pilot study conducted by VSI, sweet sorghum was the best alternative raw material, which could supplement the use of sugarcane in ethanol production. At 5,600 litres per hectare per year (over two crops, at 70 tonnes per hectare of millable stalk per crop at 40 litres per tonne), the ethanol production from sweet sorghum compared well with the 6,500 litres per ha per crop of sugarcane (at 85-90 tonnes per hectare of millable cane per crop at 75 litres per tonne).

According to estimates made by National Research Centre for Sorghum (NRCS), Hyderabad, the per litre cost of production of ethanol from sweet sorghum is Rs 13.11 (at Rs 500 per tonne of stalk), when compared with Rs 12.55 (at Rs 1,600 per tonne of stalk) from sugarcane molasses. However, the increased cost of production of ethanol from sweet sorghum is more than compensated by grain yield of one tonne per hectare (which can be used as food or feed) and the superior quality of ethanol. The really significant advantage is that the production of ethanol from sweet sorghum is environment friendly since it uses the non-molasses route.

More Stories on : Agricultural Institutions | Non-conventional Energy

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