Corn is America’s top agricultural crop, and also one of its most wasteful. About half the harvest — stalks, leaves, husks, and cobs — remains as waste after the kernels have been stripped from the cobs. These leftovers, known as corn stover, have few commercial or industrial uses aside from burning. A new article describes an energy-efficient way to put corn stover back into the economy by transforming it into activated carbon for use in water treatment.
