Rainfall and droughts turn biofuel crops sugar into toxins, not biofuel

In Michigan, researchers found that rainfall and weather conditions greatly affected crop yields for biofuel crops like switchgrass and corn stover, resulting in composition changes during biofuel production. While the plants produced more sugar after a major drought and after two years of normal rainfall, the sugar ended up producing toxic compounds instead of biofuel.

The study showed that sugars were chemically altered during the pretreatment stage where they formed highly toxic compounds like imidazoles and pyrazines. It also repressed conversion where sugars are fermented into biofuel by microorganisms.

The good news is that they found they could resolve the issue by removing the soluble sugars before pretreatment or by using microbial strains that were resistant to the toxic compounds.