Fuel Alternatives

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Energy

In Alcohol Week (October 20, 1980), there is a headline "DOE MAY FUND CATTAILS-TO-ETHANOL TECHNOLOGY: SEES LOWER COST, BIG YIELDS". The unsolicited proposal from a Florida Junior College suggests that one cattail crop will produce 1,000-1,500 gals/acre/year, while two crops would bring 2,100 to 3,100, and three crops 3,100-4,700 gals/acre, the higher figure representing more than 110 barrels ethanol per acre. While I believe these figures are extremely optimistic, I would endorse a serious study of cattails as a potential energy source.

Douglas Pratt is quoted in the Washington Star to recommend several advantages to cattails. "Since they grow in wetlands, cattails do not compete for land that could be used for crops or forests, and drainage is unnecessary. Cattails use some pollutants as nutrients.

Cattail farms near sewage treatment plants could clean troublesome nitrogen and phosphorus from effluent. Unlike nuclear power and fossil fuels, cattails do not add heat and carbon dioxide to the earth but recycle them. The plants use the sun's energy and the atmosphere's carbon dioxide to produce starches and sugars through photosynthesis. This heat and gas are returned to the cycle when the cattails are used as fuel. Wetlands are extensive and largely unused.

According to one estimate, the United States has 140,000 square miles of wetlands from Alaska to the tip of Florida. Minnesota is estimated to have 10 million acres where cattail could grow, which theoretically could supply enough of them to meet the state's entire energy needs. Harvesting cattails in strips is compatible with preservation of wildlife and makes replanting unnecessary.

Cattails spread with underwater stems called rhizomes and each year can recover the harvested strips. Cattails are an annually renewable resource, whereas coal, oil and peat take thousands or millions of years to form." (Washington Star, September 4, 1979).

Cattail Fuel

Cattails can yield up to 1,000 gallons of ethanol per acre, as opposed to the 200 gallons possible from corn or 640 gallons from sugar cane, according to an experimental study called the Aquahol Project. Furthermore, the plants can be grown in swamps and thus do not compete for agricultural cropland.

Coming soon, we will have two complete books on how to produce ethanol from cattails.