Environmental and political concerns centered on energy use from gasoline have led to a great deal of research on ethanol production. The goal of this thesis is to determine if it is profitable to produce ethanol in Texas using sweet sorghum juice. Four different areas, Moore, Hill, Willacy, and Wharton Counties, using two feedstock alternatives, sweet sorghum only and sweet sorghum and corn, will be analyzed using Monte Carlo simulation to determine the probability of economic success. Economic returns to the farmers in the form of a contract price for the average sweet sorghum yield per acre in each study area and to the ethanol plant buying sweet sorghum at the contract price will be simulated and ranked. The calculated sweet sorghum contract prices offered to farmers are $9.94, $11.44, $29.98, and $36.21 per ton in Wharton, Willacy, Moore, and Hill Counties, respectively. The contract prices are equal to the next most profitable crop returns or ten percent more than the total cost to produce sweet sorghum in the study area. The wide variation in the price is due to competing crop returns and the sweet sorghum growing season. Ethanol production using sweet sorghum and corn is the most profitable alternative analyzed for an ethanol plant. A Moore County ethanol plant has the highest average net present value of $492.39 million and is most preferred overall when using sweet sorghum and corn to produce ethanol. Sweet sorghum ethanol production is most profitable in Willacy County but is not economically successful with an average net present value of $-11.06 million. Ethanol production in Hill County is least preferred with an average net present value of $-712.00 and $48.40 million when using sweet sorghum only and sweet sorghum and corn, respectively. Producing unsubsidized ethanol from sweet sorghum juice alone is not profitable in Texas. Sweet sorghum ethanol supplemented by grain is more economical but would not be as profitable as producing ethanol from only grain in the Texas Panhandle. Farmers profit on average from contract prices for sweet sorghum when prices cover total production costs for the crop.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--Oregon State University, 2002. / Typescript (photocopy). Includes bibliographical references. Also available online.

Consumer's demand for more natural and high quality food products products, presenting health benefits, has increased over the years. Besides the nutritional aspects, an appealing appearance and texture is also required. Cloudiness or opacity (cloudy appearance) is an important citrus drinks property (orange, lime, lemon, etc.), since it gives natural fruit juice appeal. This property can be achieved through addition of clouding agents, which also help in uniform distribution of flavors throughout the liquid beverage. A common problem in the beverage industry is producing cloud or flavor emulsions that remain stable over the desired shelf life. Beverage cloud emulsions are oil-in-water emulsions to provide cloudiness and are prepared in a concentrated form, but diluted prior to the consumption. / Optical and rheological properties of beverage cloud emulsions as a function of water-phase and oil-phase concentrations were investigated. The specific gravity of phases, particle size distribution and creaming stability of prepared emulsions in diluted forms were evaluated. The rate of cloud emulsion creaming by determining the rheology of water phase, difference in specific gravities of the phases and droplet properties of the emulsion in presence and absence of weighting agents (sucrose acetate isobutyrate and brominated vegetable oil) or/and xanthan gum was studied. Flow and dynamic rheological properties of single-phases and emulsions containing modified starch and arabic gum as surface active hydrocolloids as well as xanthan and tragacanth as stabilizers gums were investigated. Finally, stability of cloud emulsions in orange juice drink was examined. / Oil-phase concentration had a significant effect (P < 0.05) on increasing the opacity of emulsion. Raise in viscosity of emulsions was more pronounced as oil concentration increased and shear thinning behavior of oil added emulsions was associated with droplet flocculation. Creaming in acidified sugar solution of 11°Bx and pH 3 was observed when the oil-phase specific gravity decreased and sedimentation occurred at the lower viscosity of water phase. Addition of xanthan gum into the water phase decreased the flow behavior index (n) form 0.88 down to 0.31 and increased elastic modulus (G') over 20 times at elevated frequency (o = 50 rad/s) and perk up the stability of the emulsion. / The xanthan gum added emulsion indicated smaller average particle size and demonstrated 14 and 5 times slower separation compared to the emulsions without or with the addition of weighting agents respectively. Starch-xanthan stabilized emulsion and associated water phase at 1.5:1 surface active gum to oil ratio demonstrated viscoelastic behavior (G' ≥ G") with lower droplets coalescence and creaming rates, 0.013 nm/day and 0.02 percent backscattering/day respectively. Conversely, arabic-xanthan stabilized emulsion at 1:1 gum to oil ratio showed the highest rate of droplets coalescence at 0.057 rim/day and greater degree of creaming at 0.61 percent transmission/day. While creaming were associated with arabic gum stabilized emulsions, after 3 month storage, modified starch illustrated appropriate shelf stability with no sign of creaming in orange juice drink.

Thesis--University of Florida. / Description based on print version record. Typescript. Vita. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 162-164).

The citrus industry is one of South Africa's largest agricultural sectors in terms of export earnings with lemon fruits and juice as a trendsetter due to their high grade quality. According to growers, the Eastern Cape Province of South Africa alone produces an excess of about 10-14,000 tons of lemon juice which is presently of no economic value due to the sour taste and “bitterness”. As a result of this excess and in order to make use of the polyprotic acids naturally occurring in the lemon juice, four fertilizer nutrient mixtures are formulated, using lemon juice as base. From a conceptual scientific approach, characterization (physico-chemical and functional properties determinations) of Eureka Lemon fruit juices were undertaken, followed by smaller scale batch formulation experiments. On the basis that these lemon juice-based fertilizer mixtures are prepared following standard liquid fertilizer formulation guidelines, a field test was conducted to evaluate their potential effectiveness to influence plant growth. A growth chamber testing on tomato plants revealed high growth response (> 99.9 % certainty) potential in two of the semi-organic mixtures formulated while the organic mixture showed a relatively good growth rate as compared to the control (pure tap water). According to statistical analysis (ANOVA) comparison, two of the semi-organic mixtures performed considerably better than the two commercial samples evaluated. Potential benefits profoundly associated with these nutrient mixtures as compared to similar liquid fertilizer products on the market is that most nutrients are chelated and dissolved in solution. Also, the mixtures contain all necessary nutrients including plant growth substances required for healthier plant growth. The most important socioeconomic impact is the value addition to the technology chain in the citrus industry. The use of fluid fertilizers in significant quantities is less than twenty years old. Nevertheless, growth has been so rapid that in South Africa demand for mixed liquid fertilizer has greatly increased from 90 000 tons NPK & blended micronutrients in 1955 to more than 600 000 per annum tons today (Report 41/2003, Department of Minerals and Energy). The liquid fertilizers market is sparsely specialized with major competitors like Omnia, Kynoch and Foskor supplying more than 50 % of the market demand. Amongst the nutrient mixtures formulated, mixture one is an NPK (1-1-2) based nutrient mixture containing both secondary nutrients (0.5 % Mg & 1.0 % Ca) and seven micronutrients (0.1 % Fe, 0.05 % Cu, 0.05 % Zn, 0.05 % Mn, 0.02 % B, 0.0005 % Mo and 0.0005 % Co). The composition of this mixture offers the formula a potential to be used as a general purpose (all stages of plant growth) fertilization mixture in view of its balanced composition (containing all essential plant nutrients). Mixture two contains essentially the micronutrients and in higher concentrations (0.3 % Fe, 0.3 % Cu, 0.1 % Zn, 0.2 % Mn, 0.02 % B, 0.0005 % Mo and 0.0005 % Co) as compared to mixture one except for boron, molybdenum and cobalt. The concentration of the micronutrients contained in this mixture is adequately high which offers a potential for it to be used in supplementing nutrition in plants with critical micronutrient-deficient symptoms. Mixture three is very similar to mixture two (1.0 % Fe, 0.05 % Cu, 0.05 % Zn, 0.05 Mn, 0.05 % B, 0.0005 % Mo and 0.0005 % Co) except that the concentrations of all seven micronutrients are considerably less than those of contained in mixture two. However, the concentration of iron in this mixture is as high as 1.0 %. The mixture has a potential to be used in high iron-deficient situations. Mixture four is an organic formula with relatively low nutrient concentrations (NPK-0.02-0.02-1, 0.27 % Mg, 0.02 % Ca, 0.008 % Fe, 0.26 % Cu, 0.012 % Zn, 0.009 % Mn). Nevertheless, this mixture is appealing for organically grown crops where the use of chemicals is prohibited by standards. These lemon juice-based nutrient mixtures were further characterized and tested for stability and storability over a period of eight weeks. This study revealed no major change in the physical quality (colour, pH and “salt out” effect). The basic formulation methodology is a two-step procedure that involves filtration of the lemon juice to remove membranous materials, mixing at ambient temperature and stabilization of the nutrient mixtures. However, for the organic nutrient formula mix, filtration follows after extraction of nutrients from plant materials using the lemon juice.

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