Sustainability

 The aviation industry accounts for a large portion of global greenhouse gas emissions. Biobased, sustainable aviation fuel (SAF) can mitigate climate impacts, but transitioning to SAF faces critical supply chain constraints.

As a recent communications graduate, Lia Basden missed getting her hands dirty and making things grow. “My parents have a big garden and chickens,” she said. “I missed touching dirt.” That’s why she applied to the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign’s Small Farm Certificate Program. Last semester, after eight months of hard work, she’s the program’s inaugural graduate.

To meet ambitious U.S. Department of Energy targets for sustainable aviation fuel (SAF), production of purpose-grown energy crops must ramp up significantly. Although researchers have made substantial progress in understanding the management and conversion of these crops, key knowledge gaps hold the industry back. Now, two new studies from the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign help fill in the blanks for Miscanthus and switchgrass management. 

Airplane travel is more popular than ever, and our desire for fast transportation means jet fuel has become a major contributor to greenhouse gas emissions. Now, researchers at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign have discovered a novel way to address that problem—by converting food waste into sustainable aviation fuel (SAF) that meets industry standards without relying on fossil fuel blends.

The Institute for Sustainability, Energy, and Environment (iSEE), College of Agricultural, Consumer and Environmental Sciences (ACES), and The Grainger College of Engineering celebrated the investiture of two campus researchers for their leadership in advancing resilient food systems, clean energy transitions, and shaping global sustainability technologies.

If you ate, filled your gas tank, took medicine, or did laundry today, you likely participated in the bioeconomy. That’s the part of the economy that taps as its source material living, growing things. With great potential to reduce waste, grow markets for farmers, and create new jobs, the bioeconomy depends on biotechnology innovations and all the processes and policies required to get those products to your local superstore, pharmacy, grocery store, gas pump, or agricultural supplier. 

In collaboration with other Bioenergy Research Centers (BRCs), researchers at the Center for Advanced Bioenergy and Bioproducts Innovation (CABBI) are developing industrially feasible techniques for second-generation biofuel production from oilcane, an oil-rich variety of sugarcane, to help meet our growing societal demand for fuels.

The Sustainable Student Farm (SSF) is a cornerstone of the College of Agricultural, Consumer and Environmental Sciences community. This Friday, September 5th, from 3 to 6 p.m., the farm is opening its gates and welcoming visitors for its annual open house.There will be food offerings and tours of the farm, as well as talks from faculty and SSF partners.

If you peek into a Turner Hall classroom at the end of the semester, you might see something unusual.

“It’s when you plant one thing, then another, then–”
“Crop rotation!”
“Correct. Next. Um… you have lots of places to live. But they’re all broken up.”
“Landscape mosaic?”
“No, close, you want them to be together–”
“Habitat connectivity!”

A nine-year study comparing a typical two-year corn and soybean rotation with a more intensive three-year rotation involving corn, cereal rye, soybean and winter wheat found that the three-year system can dramatically reduce nitrogen — an important crop nutrient — in farm runoff without compromising yield.

The new findings are detailed in the journal Frontiers in Environmental Science.