Stalks of cotton, corn, wheat and soybean, which farmers have burnt to cook for hundreds of years, will be used to generate electricity in East China's Shandong Province.

Stalks, abundant in Shandong, one of China's major farming provinces, may also help protect the environment and provide some poverty relief, experts said.

Expected to start producing in June 2006, Longji Ecological Power Plant Co Ltd in Shanxian County will use 200,000 tons of crop stalks per year, one-third of the local production, to put out 156 million kilowatt-hours of electricity, sources from the Provincial Development and Reform Commission said.

Statistics show two tons of stalks can produce the same amount of electricity as one ton of coal. Plant ash will be returned to farmers free to be used as fertilizer.

Crop stalks can be thoroughly used to produce electricity. At the same time, burning them creates little pollution.

When they are burnt in the fields after harvest, however, these same stalks can create an environmental headache.

However, officials say electricity prices for stalk-generated power will be higher than coal-based power.

A local official said setting up a stalk-generated power plant requires 30 percent more investment. At the same time, this type of power plant is relatively small, making it difficult to create economies of scale.

(China Daily November 16, 2004)