Biomass Yield, Chemical Composition and Potential Ethanol Yields of 8 Cultivars of Napiergrass (Pennisetum purpureum Schumach.) Harvested 3-Monthly in Central Thailand

By K. Rengsirikul, Y. Ishii, K. Kangvansaichol, P. Sripichitt, V. Punsuvon, P. Vaithanomsat, G. Nakamanee, S. Tudsri. 2013

84 citations recorded by the source corpus.

Eight cultivars of napiergrass (Pennisetum purpureum Schumach.), namely Dwarf, Muaklek, Bana, Taiwan A148, Common, Wruk wona, Tifton and Kampheng San, were grown in central Thailand in 2008-2009 and biomass yield, chemical composition and theoretical ethanol yield were measured. Harvests were made every 3 months. Biomass yield and cell wall compositions differed significantly (P 0.05) among cultivars. Tifton produced the highest annual biomass yield at 58.3 t/ha followed by Wruk wona (52.1 t/ha), while the lowest yield of 27.1 t/ha was in Dwarf. Biomass yield varied with season with highest yields in May and lowest in February during the dry season. Cell wall concentrations were higher in the tall cultivars than in the short ones (Dwarf and Muaklek) (P 0.05). Theoretical ethanol conversion efficiency ranged from 350 to 460 L/t DM among the cultivars following pretreatment with steam explosion. While a number of cultivars showed significant potential for use as biofuels in central Thailand, Tifton seemed to be the most promising.

Subfields: Agronomy and Crop Science, Biomedical Engineering

View Paper: https://www.semanticscholar.org/paper/2fc52217af5d948559ca64c769a5643a9d3dfd48

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In Agronomy and Crop Science

Citations in the corpus

Opportunities for Napier Grass ( Pennisetum purpureum ) Improvement Using Molecular Genetics (2017, unknown): “Napier grass cultivars have been reported to yield around 60 tonnes dry matter/ha/year, with some studies indicating significantly higher yields [26,27].”
Multitrait index based on factor analysis and ideotype‐design: proposal and application on elephant grass breeding for bioenergy (2018, background): “Besides the morphoagronomic traits, elephant grass breeders have focused on high quality nutrition attributes for animal feed, emphasizing high nitrogen concentration, low fibre levels and high digestibility (Rengsirikul et al., 2013).”