using plants as biofuel without impacting food security

An Australian-led scientific breakthrough to increase oil yield from plants will help advance the production and use of biofuels, such as sustainable aviation fuel.

The Biomass Oil Project has been developed over a decade by scientists from Australia’s national science agency, CSIRO, and the technology has been acquired by Australian agricultural company Nufarm.

Oils from plants are produced by specialised seeds and fruits, but CSIRO scientists looked at extending that to the biomass of the plant, including the leaves and stem.

Bottle containing oil from leaf biomass (csiro) — *Oil for biofuel from leaf biomass (CSIRO)*

CSIRO’s Dr Thomas Vanhercke, who has been working on the project for more than a decade, says the technology would have the potential to create an important new global energy source.

“We were inspired to develop this technology in response to the world’s need for increased production of plant oil without impacting on food security,” Vanhercke says.

“With CSIRO’s existing expertise in the area and the partnership with Nufarm on the Omega-3 canola project, we started thinking about how to extend that to the challenge of developing industrial scale feedstock oil from plants.

“We took the genetics for seed oil production and incorporated them across a range of crops with promising success.”

Current project lead, Dr Xue-Rong Zhou, says the world-leading research in boosting oil yield from plants is a major breakthrough for Australia and beyond.

Biofuel researcher dr xue-rong zhou — *Dr Xue-Rong Zhou*

“This development of new biofuels and renewable oils will support a sustainable future,” Zhou says.

“We are looking forward to working with Nufarm and our global research partners to deploy the technology into high biomass energy cane and sorghum varieties and make it a reality.”

Nufarm CEO, Greg Hunt, says the company is now bringing together researchers from CSIRO, the University of Florida (UF), USA and the Instituto Agronomico (IAC), Brazil to take the work to the next level.