Web exclusive posted May 1, 2008 at 5:36 p.m. CST

Establishing a brand is a major step for differentiating a company's product from the pack. Energy crop company Ceres Inc. will market its agricultural seeds and traits under the trade name Blade Energy Crops in the United States.

Company president and CEO Richard Hamilton unveiled the new brand at the BIO World Congress on Industrial Biotechnology in Chicago this week. "Blade will be the first multi-crop seed brand supplying the new market for non-food, low-carbon biofuel feedstocks," Hamilton said. "These biomass-dense crops will be grown as raw materials for next-generation biofuels and biopower. One of the great appeals of energy crops is that they can thrive on agricultural lands that are ill-suited to food production."

The first products to be sold under the Blade name are currently being multiplied for spring 2009 planting season. These include the first switchgrass cultivars developed specifically for biofuels, EG 1101 and EG 1102, as well as high-biomass types of sorghum. "We expect the seed market for dedicated energy crops to grow in step with investments in bioenergy," Hamilton said.

The company says the Blade name was inspired by its first crops, switchgrass, sorghum and canes, which are from a category of closely related grass species, known as C4 grasses. C4 grasses are by nature the world's most efficient engines of photosynthesis. Ceres has magnified this advantage by using the latest technology in genomics-based breeding, trait development and compositional analysis. "For growers, that means high yields and greater yield stability. Downstream, it means easier processing, and ultimately, more energy per ton of biomass," Hamilton said. "From both an economic and environmental perspective, if we are going to turn plant matter into fuel, we should use feedstocks that give us the maximum fuel yield per acre."

Ceres Vice President of Commercial Development Anna Rath says feedstock supply has become a top-of-mind question for many biofuel producers as the industry moves from pilot-scale to demonstration and commercial-scale projects. "We are working with biorefineries to set up feedstock supplies," said Rath. "Most biofuel producers will use a mix of crops to mitigate risk and to provide flexibility from year to year."

High yielding, dedicated energy crops are needed in many places since widely dispersed sources of biomass are cost-prohibitive to collect and transport. "This issue becomes more evident as scale is increased," she said. Due to their high yields, energy crops can produce more fuel per-acre than first-generation biofuel crops, Rath said, adding, they also mitigate greenhouse gas emissions since they require fewer inputs.

The Blade brand will appear on the company's seed packaging and farm-oriented marketing materials. The company will maintain the Ceres name as its corporate identity and in its collaborations with biorefineries and biofuel technology providers.