Ceeds™ – The easy way to establish energy crops
New Energy Farms (NEF) has developed a revolutionary new method of propagating energy grasses; this will reduce farmer establishment costs by 50% or more. Cost effective scaling of perennial energy grasses such as Miscanthus, Arundo donax and Energy cane has previously inhibited expansion.
NEF has addressed this problem and developed a new planting product for vegetative energy crops, CEEDS™.
These are small capsules that are established using automatic min till planters, like seed.
The process applies to a number of Energy grasses and is currently being evaluated by companies in the US and Canada.
The existing range of NEF energy crops will be available in the CEEDS™ format from Spring 2013 onwards for commercial supply.
The main advantages of CEEDS™ are:
- New cultivars can be bulked up to market volumes 3 times faster.
- Establishment cost for crops such as Miscanthus can be reduced by over 50%.
- Min till, fully automatic precision planting (no planting staff required).
- Reduction by up to 80% in transport logistics for planting material.
- Greater vigor after planting, more shoots produced.
- This system delivers the maximum yield from a cultivar.
- Makes planting energy grasses as simple as drilling conventional arable crops.
Below shows crops planted by CEEDS™ (left) Rhizomes (right) after 90 days
Increased vigour compared to rhizome and plug plants but a substantially smaller planting propagule via CEEDS.
