John Fike, a Virginia Tech researcher, combs through switchgrass at the school's agricultural center in Orange, Va. According to a five-year study conducted by researchers at the University of ...

The researchers also say that over the lifecycle of the fuel -- from growing the switchgrass to burning the ethanol in a car engine -- it emits 94 percent fewer greenhouse gas emissions than gasoline.

Will switchgrass, a tall, resilient and fast-growing native plant once familiar to pioneers, become the next cash crop for farmers in states in the Chesapeake Bay drainage? In a convergence of ...