Two Minutes

Land lover seeks soil-saving approach to biofuels production

When Richard Cruse sits in a tree stand waiting for a buck to wander into the range of his bow, he has plenty of time to think. Whether his ideas on biofuels come to him while he's on his arboreal perch, no one knows but him.

Making sense of ethanol: Cruse, a professor in agronomy, believes we need to extract ethanol from corn where it makes sense -- and from other types of biomass where corn doesn't make sense. Near waterways and in highly erodible areas where corn is not practical, Cruse says we should plant other grasses or perennials.

All-purpose technology And that means investing more in technologies that allow companies to efficiently turn all types of biomass into useable liquid fuel. Biofuel-producing methods that focus on a single plant don't serve production or conservation needs very well, especially in the Corn Belt, he says.

Iowa soil on the line: The future of Iowa's soils may depend on obtaining ethanol wisely.

"If it's done right, it'll be the best thing for us since we broke the prairie," says Cruse. "If it's done wrong, it could be the most devastating thing that we've known in agriculture."

-- Dan Kuester