Barley as a Biofuel?

One of our field day objectives was to discuss new, value added uses of small grains.  There is considerable interest in the use of barley as a potential biofuel. A plant has been built in  Hopewell,Virginia by Osage Bioenergy.  This could have impacts on the potential for barley production in Pennsylvania.  This winter, a presentation on the plant and the process was made at our Winter Crops Short Course.   However last week a press release by Osage indicated a desire to "market the company for sale. The company has also decided not to start production at its Appomattox Bio Energy ethanol plant in Hopewell, Virginia in conjunction with the sales process."  So far now, the potential of barley for bioenergy in Virginia is uncertain.  According to the release, the plant is fully functional, multi feedstock plant. 

Experimental Two Row Barley Line

Most of the barley lines we test are six rowed barley, mostly used in the feed industy.  This year one of the experimental lines in our test is a two row winter barley called VA09H-1102R.  It will be interesting to see how this barley performs in our climate. 

Occassionally I get a request for a barley that would be good for beer making.  Mostly, as I understand it, western two row spring malting barleys are the desired barley for beer making. At least one guy has tried some of the six row barleys for beer making, apparently with mixed success.

When I first saw the two row barley, I thought perhaps my colleagues at Virginia Tech were looking at this potential use..but they have gone beyond that in value added..  I did a little searching and found that there is already a whiskey made from Virginia "Thoroughbred barley' and according to this press release, the Tech researchers are working on developing these two row barleys for the distillery industry.

In any case, it will be interesting to see how the yield and grain quality of this hulled lines compares to some of the industry standard varieties for these and some of our more traditional uses..

2011 PSU Winter Barley Trial

One of the stops planned for our field day was the 2011 Penn State winter barley trial.  This includes some of the top lines from Virginia, Maryland, Pennsylvania and various commercial lines.  A total of 19 hulled and hulless barley lines are included this year.  The trial was planted on September 20, 2011 at 1.6 million seeds/acre and 1.9 million seeds/acre for the hulless lines, which are more responsive to higher plant populations.  We applied 250 lb/acre of 10-20-20 in the fall and 60 units of N as UAN on March 15.  Disease pressure has generally been low.  Some winterkill was noticed on the hulless Eve variety, but it has recovered well.