Destiny’s Sustainable Energy Farm

Check Out Destiny’s Sustainable Energy Farm

The Sustainable Energy Farm at Destiny is benchmarking and testing a wide range of potential biomass crops. Plants like Sweet Sorghum, Jatropha, Sunflower, Camelina and Arundo Donax may provide the renewable energy and alternative fuel sources the world needs.

Sustainable Agriculture is a key component for Destiny, America’s First Eco-Sustainable City, not only for food but also for our transition from fossil to alternative fuels and renewable energy. Destiny is located in the nation’s “Sweet Spot” for biomass production. Our long growing seasons, large tracts of open land and ideal weather are the perfect combination for producing the needed solutions to the energy crisis.

Yield is only one of the goals to any crop feasibility study. At Destiny, we’re also determining the best species for ongoing sustainability, water consumption and fertilizer requirements. At the Sustainable Energy Farm at Destiny, renewable energy and alternative fuels power the pumps and motors necessary for irrigation of the crops as agronomists perfect techniques for reduced-input crop cultivation, developing and tilling of even marginal soil for growing energy crops like Sweet Sorghum, as an alternative to corn-based Ethanol.

Farm-to-Fuel initiative

We’re currently focused on developing alternative crops to produce ethanol and power without using corn or sugarcane, two food crops that require a lot more water to produce than Sweet Sorghum and many other plant species. Even marginal land can be used to grow energy crops, so in addition to planting 20 acres of Sweet Sorghum, we’re planting numerous experimental plots of new hybrid varieties by testing growth within various kinds of soil treatments, irrigation systems and the amounts and types of organic fertilizers to determine the highest “brix” content, and yield per acre. (‘Degrees Brix’ measures the carbohydrate level in plant juices.)

At the same time, we’re developing and testing carbon-free harvesting techniques to determine the method that will offer the greatest yield with the smallest environmental impact. Samples then go to the University of Florida’s Institute of Food and Agricultural Sciences (IFAS) to measure both pressed and dry yields per acre, which will ultimately help determine the number of potential gallons of ethanol we can produce per acre, and its commercial feasibility.

We’re also taking Our Primary Goal

Efficiency. That's our goal.

What’s the “true cost” of producing fuel and food in a post-petroleum dependent context without chemicals, shipping costs or government subsidies? How can we create economic efficiency with a small carbon footprint? These are the things to which we’re committed and devoting our efforts to discover.

We look to develop an economic foundation, supplying other farms in the area with organic fertilizer, bio-fuels and feedstock. Destiny’s Sustainable Energy Farm is the result of a unique partnership between a growing list of private individuals and companies that are interested in being part of Destiny’s Sustainable Agriculture Initiative. Please join us in this important test program and our growing list of forward thinking doers that know change is up to us.

If you'd like to get involved, please click here contact us today.