Allison Gordon G, Morris Catherine, Hodgson Edward, Jones Jenny, Kubacki Michal, Barraclough Tim, Yates Nicola, Shield Ian, Bridgwater Anthony V, Donnison Iain S
Institute of Biological, Environmental and Rural Sciences, Aberystwyth University Gogerddan, Aberystwyth, Ceredigion SY23 3EB, UK.
Bioresour Technol. 2009 Dec;100(24):6428-33. doi: 10.1016/j.biortech.2009.07.015. Epub 2009 Aug 5.
Two energy grass species, switch grass, a North American tuft grass, and reed canary grass, a European native, are likely to be important sources of biomass in Western Europe for the production of biorenewable energy. Matching chemical composition to conversion efficiency is a primary goal for improvement programmes and for determining the quality of biomass feed-stocks prior to use and there is a need for methods which allow cost effective characterisation of chemical composition at high rates of sample through-put. In this paper we demonstrate that nitrogen content and alkali index, parameters greatly influencing thermal conversion efficiency, can be accurately predicted in dried samples of these species grown under a range of agronomic conditions by partial least square regression of Fourier transform infrared spectra (R(2) values for plots of predicted vs. measured values of 0.938 and 0.937, respectively). We also discuss the prediction of carbon and ash content in these samples and the application of infrared based predictive methods for the breeding improvement of energy grasses.
