AgBioEn working with La Trobe University on crop trials for Katunga project

In Australia, a cropping trial is now in the ground at Katunga as a forerunner to a A$1 billion renewable fuel development. Investment company AgBioEn is planning a massive biofuel plant on a 40 ha former dairy farm, which will use agricultural waste.

The company is looking for ways of generating the biomass as an energy source and has struck up a partnership with La Trobe University to research ways of growing suitable crops. La Trobe has established three trial plots of maize, with 16 soil sensors that measure soil moisture and temperature every half an hour.

The sensors transmit to a ‘gateway’ box in the corner of the paddock, which uploads the information, together with weather data, onto a computer cloud using the terrestrial communications network. The results of the trials, analyzed by La Trobe University, would be publicly available.

The company intends to produce about 150 million liters of renewable fuels, including aviation fuel and diesel annually. Construction of the plant should start mid next year and see the first fuel emerge from it in 2022. The project was announced in February, but COVID-19 has delayed the development.