Perennial biomass production from marginal land in the Upper Mississippi River Basin

Abstract

Marginal land is considered promising for biomass production. However, understanding on biomass crop growth and total biofuel production from this land type is very limited. This study evaluated potential production of switchgrass (Panicum virgatum) and Miscanthus (Miscanthus × giganteus) on marginal lands in the Upper Mississippi River Basin. A soil and water assessment tool model with detailed representation of marginal lands and their suitability for growth of the 2 grasses was setup. Marginal land was defined as cropland and grassland with land capability class from 3 to 8. All marginal lands were included as new land covers in the land use map and were preserved when HRUs were defined. The soil and water assessment tool model was calibrated for flow at 13 sites within the Upper Mississippi River Basin region at monthly scale. The predicted biomass by growing switchgrass and Miscanthus on marginal lands in the study area can produce up to 37% of the 132 × 109 L biofuel goal set by the 2010 Energy Independence and Security Act in the USA. The simulated flow was lower when marginal lands were converted to grow perennial bioenergy crops. The results from this study improved our understanding on growth of perennial crops on marginal land and their contributions to biofuel development.

Desirable plant cell wall traits for higher-quality miscanthus lignocellulosic biomass

“…Although some have argued that land-use change for the production of energy crops may increase GGEs [6], this claim is essentially valid only for first-generation corn-based ethanol production, and for the cases where forest and grassland are being diverted to biofuel production. A viable alternative to achieve a large proportion of the IPCC target of 7 million km 2 without extensive land-use change is the utilisation of second-generation lignocellulosic feedstocks, which are non-food resources that can be produced with high yields in marginal land [7]—abandoned agricultural land, degraded land, reclaimed land and wasteland. Furthermore, a large-scale industry based on lignocellulose also represents a more sustainable alternative to petrochemical pathways, as released carbon is balanced by photosynthetic capture [8].…”

Surface Depression and Wetland Water Storage Improves Major River Basin Hydrologic Predictions

“…Specifically, studies quantifying the relative contribution of upstream regions to downstream flow variability, separating out the role of climate and land use and attributing potential changes to local/regional driving factors (e.g., Du et al, 2018 ; Frans et al, 2013 ; Tao et al, 2014 ; Wise et al, 2017 ), may erroneously delineate targeted hydrologic management locations (e.g., Figure 4b ) if surface depression storage is not considered in model simulations. This may lead to serious implications for socio-hydrologic modeling involving crop yield, irrigation requirements, and sustainable alternatives in agroecosystems to support human demand ( Feng et al, 2018 ; Srinivasan et al, 2010 ; Yaeger et al, 2014 ).…”

Assessing Potential Bioenergy Production on Urban Marginal Land in 20 Major Cities of China by the Use of Multi-View High-Resolution Remote Sensing Data

“…In addition, at the continental scale, it has been reported that Africa, Europe, and South America have 66-481 M ha of potential marginal land for biomass cropping under different land-cover scenarios, which equates to 10-55% of the global liquid fuel consumption [20]. On the other hand, at the local level, Feng et al [8,21] employed 30-m resolution data for estimating total bioenergy resources at the watershed and regional scales. Marginal land suitability in the Upper Mississippi River Basin for biofeedstock crops was obtained, and their results demonstrated that 60% of the marginal land was suitable for the growth of energy crops.…”