A new study conducted by a team of American researchers proved that crops are even more amazing that previously thought: they are likely to become our planet’s next source of biofuels!

Scientists were able to produce biofuels from a fast-growing grass and showed they saved huge carbon dioxide emissions compared with petrol. On the other hand, the switchgrass-derived ethanol proved to produce 540% more energy than was required to manufacture the fuel itself.

Taking into account that one acre (0.4 hectares) of grassland could deliver an average of 320 barrels of bioethanol, switchgrass and other crops are very likely to become our planet’s next source of fuel in a short period of time.

The United States’ team of researchers’ study was published in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. Being conducted over a five-year period and involving 10 farms, the study was described as the largest of its kind by its authors. Ken Vogel, the United States’ Department of Agriculture’s (USDA) Agriculture Research Service and one of the authors of the study, said that all the previous energy analyses had been based on data from research plots and estimated inputs.

“We had on-farm trials, so we had all the data from the farmers on all the inputs needed to produce the crops. We were able to take this information and put it into this model and able to come up with a very real-world estimate," Vogel said about his team’s study.

This recent study’s findings are very important in the context of the upcoming petrol crisis and of the global warming phenomenon.